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We provide you with essential tools to advance First Amendment and media rights, and a supportive community in which to discuss emerging legal issues and the future of communication.
Not a member yet?
We provide you with essential tools to advance First Amendment and media rights, and a supportive community in which to discuss emerging legal issues and the future of communication.
Dori Hanswirth is a partner at Arnold & Porter, where she co-leads the firm’s Technology, Media, and Telecommunications industry group. 1. How’d you get into media law? What was your first job? My first job out of law school was as a Motions Clerk for the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. A…
By Robin Luce Herrmann Yep. I was raised a farm girl. Out of respect for my vegetarian and vegan friends, I will spare you the gory details of my chores and activities on my grandfather’s farm. (If you are morbidly curious, we can discuss wethers and barrows over drinks.) I practice law in the Midwest…
If You Listen Very Hard, the Tune Will Come to You at Last Music is an essential part of entertainment today – from the recording industry to movies, television and videogames. Some recent high-profile cases have raised important questions for media lawyers about originality and copyright in music. We asked three experts – David Aronoff,…
Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts v. Goldsmith By Wesley Lewis This July, a federal district court in New York granted the Andy Warhol Foundation’s motion for summary judgment in a copyright dispute between the non-profit foundation and music photographer Lynn Goldsmith. The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. v. Goldsmith, No….
By Dori Hanswirth, Roberta L. Horton, Theresa M. House, Jesse Feitel and Michael E. Kientzle Erik Brunetti is a Los Angeles-based artist. In 1990, he created the streetwear brand Fuct with professional skateboarder Natas Kaupas, and for the last 29 years the label has been producing the sort of outré clothing its name suggests. The company’s website displays…
By Peter Bartlett and Dean Levitan The Supreme Court of New South Wales has reached a landmark decision in Dylan Voller’s defamation case against three media companies: Voller v Nationwide News; Voller v Fairfax Media Publications; Voller v Australian News Channel [2019] NSWSC 766. The Court decided that media companies are now considered the ‘publisher’…
By Danielle N. Twait Three former Al Jazeera America television journalists filed a federal civil rights action against St. Charles County, Missouri, and St. Charles Deputy Michael Anderson alleging they had been purposefully shot at and tear-gassed during their coverage of protests in Ferguson, Missouri on August 13, 2014, following the shooting death of teenager…
By Jeff Hermes In Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University v. Trump, No. 18-1691 (2nd Cir. July 9, 2019) (Parker, Hall, Droney, JJ.), a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit unanimously affirmed a judgment of the Southern District of New York, holding that the 45th President of the United…
By Reid K. Day While “Fake News!” continues to be a rallying cry for too many powerful political figures, The Kansas City Star recently won a favorable ruling under Kansas’ three-year-old anti-SLAPP statute when Kansas State Senate Majority Leader Jim Denning—and Denning’s aspiring politician/lawyer—attempted to bring claims of “Fake News” into a court of law….
Facebook Comments Not Pure Opinion By Sarah Brewerton-Palmer The Eleventh Circuit reinstated a Haitian businessman’s defamation case, holding that defendant’s Facebook post accusing plaintiff of illegal conduct could be actionable. Deeb v. Saati, No. 18-12577, 2019 WL 2537730 (11th Cir. June 20, 2019) (Rosenbaum, Branch, Fay JJ.) (unpublished). The court noted that while the bulk…
By Al-Amyn Sumar On July 17, 2019, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the dismissal of a libel suit brought against The New York Times Company (“The Times”) by Dr. Carlo Croce, a prominent cancer researcher at Ohio State University. Croce v. The New York Times Co. Importantly, the decision affirms the right of…
Urges Media to Exercise Restraint in Covering Potentially Defamatory Allegations By Sanford L. Bohrer and Christine N. Walz Earlier this month, the Second Circuit reaffirmed the presumption of access to judicial documents. In an appeal filed by the Miami Herald and its reporter Julie Brown (as well as Alan Dershowitz and Michael Cernovich), the Second…
By Chad R. Bowman The Vermont Supreme Court on July 19 reversed a lower court’s sealing decision and made public the first judicial decision applying the state’s new shield statute. The underlying subpoena decision arose out of newsroom subpoena issues in an “inquest”—a Vermont criminal procedure akin to a grand jury—and had remained under seal…
By Thomas R. Burke and Dan Laidman San Francisco police made national news on May 10 when officers burst into a journalist’s house using sledgehammers and kept him handcuffed for hours while they ransacked his home and office. It was a shocking attack on the free press that one might expect in a banana republic,…
By George Freeman Our London Conference (Sept. 15-17) is happening in little more than a month – and it looks to be our best one ever. The bookends of the program will be spectacular: we will begin the proceedings Monday morning with a session starring Justice Stephen Breyer of the U.S. Supreme Court and end…
Download Publication MLRC From the Executive Director’s Desk: London Conference Preview: Breyer, Assange and a Bloody Brilliant CityGeorge Freeman Letter to a Newer Media Lawyer: If a Farm Girl in the Midwest Can Have a Media Practice, So Can You!Robin Luce Herrmann 10 Questions to a Media LawyerDori Hanswirth REPORTERS PRIVILEGE Cal. Super.: The San…