Copyright Law Important Course Information – Spring 2025

• Syllabus and readings (home page)
• Important course information: materials, mechanics, policies, and grading
• Writing assignments and related instructions
• Open Educational Resources (OER) copyright and permissions information

About the course

Copyright Law is a three-credit limited enrollment course for upper-level law students, with enrollment limited to 50 students. No prior experience with intellectual property law is required.  Students are expected to remember, understand, and apply what they learned in first-year courses in Contracts, Property, and Torts.

The course is LAW 5328 in the University of Pittsburgh course catalog.

Prerequisite

There is no prerequisite for this course. Students are expected to have learned the fundamentals of legal research, legal analysis, and legal writing.

Course objectives and the official course description

The official course description (University of Pittsburgh course number 5328) is this:

Copyright law deals with legal protection for certain kinds of expressive work — literature, music, film, photography, and computer software, among other things — which is an essential element of modern culture, knowledge, and communication. The Copyright Law course will teach you about the many roles that copyright law plays in constructing businesses, markets and other institutions for creating, distributing, and consuming that work. For authors and publishers, how does copyright law help them make money based on their creative works, or based on others’ creative works? For readers and consumers and society as a whole, how does copyright law preserve the power to access and use knowledge? The course will teach those things in the context of teaching the skills of copyright lawyering. How do practicing lawyers work with clients? How do practicing lawyers develop and exercise professional judgment? How do practicing lawyers solve copyright problems? The course will put students in the role of practicing lawyers and teach them to think, write, and act as lawyers generally and especially as copyright lawyers.

What does that mean?

The following provides a fuller description of the goals of the course. In Copyright Law, students will:

• Learn the fundamental nuts and bolts of American copyright doctrine, including how copyright fits into related schemes in international law and in patent and trademark law. Much of the reading is oriented to nuts and bolts questions. Students are expected to master much of the basics of this material on their own. Via classroom discussion and the required writing assignments, students will explore the justifications for the law and will extend and apply the nuts and bolts into newer and unclear contexts.
• Learn many of the theories and policies that underlie copyright law, and many of the practical consequences and questions that copyright lawyers and their clients face. Much of the classroom discussion will be oriented to theory and policy and to consequences and questions. The nuts and bolts of copyright law cover a landscape that is broader than a single semester can cover, and the nuts and bolts change all the time. Therefore, we focus only partly on nuts and bolts. By contrast, copyright theory and policy, and copyright consequences and questions, are more conceptually complex, help integrate the different areas of the law, are (paradoxically) more durable, and are critical to understanding how to use copyright in practice, and for all of those reasons are more important. Students are expected to come to class prepared to engage in discussions that relate nuts and bolts to theory and policy and then to consequences.
• Build on prior experience in the law. It is expected that students will recall and be able to apply the fundamental doctrines and policies of contract law, property law, and tort law.
• Understand law and policy in the context of being a lawyer, that is, in the context of representing clients. Simply knowing law and policy for oneself is not enough. Lawyers (and therefore law students) must be able to situate their knowledge in the context of others’ problems. Lawyers must be effective at identifying risks, understanding problems and opportunities, and using practical judgment – informed by legal expertise but also informed by context, history, and “looking around corners” to help clients. Doing that starts with effectively diagnosing problems, legal and otherwise.  [Note: For the Spring 2025 version of Copyright Law, I deleted references in this paragraph to “problem solving.” Lawyers do more than, and sometimes do less than, simply “solve problems.”] I will rarely ask students to give me the correct answer to a legal question. I will frequently ask students to diagnose problem(s), to explore and assess possible solutions, and to exercise their judgment in counseling others and advocating on their behalf.
• Write. This is a course in advanced legal writing as well as course in the substance of the law.  The basics of the law are learned best when students use the law.  In this class, that means writing. Students should expect to have their writing scrutinized and critiqued at the level of the word and the sentence, at the level of the concept and the structure of the argument, and at the level of substantive legal analysis. This course does not include a final exam. It does include a lot of intensive legal writing.

Let’s be even more direct

The paragraphs above and below can be summed up in a simple, brief sentence. This is a course about lawyering in general and legal writing in particular. Copyrights and copyright law happen to be useful (and engaging, and even entertaining) subject matter for teaching students how to become lawyers, including how to write as lawyers.

“Copyright Law” is about creating, distributing, storing, and using knowledge and culture in material forms. Books, in other words, and the contents of books. Copyright law engages in a lot of rhetorical mis-direction, addressing authors, creativity, and creations. In practice, copyright focuses almost entirely on businesses and other institutions, including educational institutions (such as universities) and disciplines (such as journalism and history) as well as creative arts (such as songwriting) and technological fields (such as coding). A lot of copyright law has to do with how businesses and other organizations and groups organize themselves to produce and circulate what modern arguments often call “content.”  A lot of it has to do with fair and unfair competition among businesses in a market economy, about citizen and consumer interests, about ethical and unethical conduct, and even about knowledge, truth, and the cultural foundations of a healthy society.  Increasingly, a lot of it has to do with individual and collective speech and expression.

What does copyright law (and some related bodies of law, such as trademark law, patent law, Constitutional law, and tort law, among other things) have to say about each of those things?  More important, what do lawyers, clients, and judges do with the law, to make arguments, draw legally-binding conclusions, resolve disputes, and plan their affairs? In what respects is copyright useful and effective?  In what respects it is inadequate and problematic? The semester will be dedicated to developing and discussing answers to those questions.

The required reading for the course consists primarily of cases and some statutes, primarily the federal Copyright Act. Each of these things, and the collection of them, constitutes “copyright law” in the US. There is no traditional law school casebook.    

For each student, the goal is not to memorize copyright law in all of its details.  To repeat:  The goal is not to memorize the details of the law.

Instead, I care about “the tools.” Each student’s first goal, and only a first goal, is to figure out and to be able to state – aloud, and in writing – the core, basic principles of copyright law.  Students (and lawyers) usually can look up the rules and their details. The hornbooks and other references listed below are pretty good compendia of the rules.

Each student’s second goal is to be able to recognize that some conflict between people or organizations, or some negotiation possibly leading to a deal, poses one or more problems and one or more legal issues that those basic principles address.

Each student’s third goal is to be able to use those principles to make arguments and counter-arguments that help a client, or a judge, resolve that conflict or complete that negotiation. Each student should be able to use the basic rules as a set of basic tools.

Learning outcomes

Each student should be able to write an outline of no more than 1-2 pages of all of the basic principles and concepts of copyright law.

Each student should be able to use those basic principles and concepts to identify basic legal and factual issues in a new problem (that is, one that the student has not encountered before), and to write up a short, coherent outline of those issues and how they should be addressed in the form of different arguments.

Each student should be able to determine, briefly and in writing, which arguments are likely to be good and persuasive ones, and which arguments are likely to be poor and unpersuasive ones, and in each instance, why.

In short, each student should be able to DO copyright law in a basic and foundational way.

Getting there

The goal of learning to DO copyright law in this course is accomplished in significant part through three hypothetical problems that each student will analyze and write up during the course of the semester.  By working on these problems each student will practice the skills they are trying to learn, and each student will practice in ways that track the basics of what legal professionals need to master in order to succeed:  working collaboratively and communicating effectively in writing.

These three writing assignments will, collectively, constitute all of the graded work for the course.  We will discuss each hypothetical problem in class before the work product analyzing the problem is submitted.  For more on the writing assignments, see below and the Writing Assignments page for this course.

Class meeting time and place

The first day of class is Monday, January 13, 2025.

The last day of class is Monday, April 21, 2025.

Class will meet on Mondays and Wednesdays from 9:00 a.m. to 10:20 a.m.

We will meet online, rather than in a physical location in the Barco Law Building. There will be no face-to-face instruction.

The online venue for the class meetings will be the ZOOM videoconferencing service (pitt.zoom.us).

Instructions for how to access the ZOOM space are below (in part) and will be distributed to enrolled students via email and via a course page in CANVAS.

Each class session will be conducted “synchronously,” that is, in live or real time. Each class session will be recorded, and the recordings will be posted online so that students can access them and review them later.

Class attendance and preparation

On attendance:

The American Bar Association and the University of Pittsburgh School of Law require regular and punctual class attendance (policy here).

The Law School’s formal attendance policy means that students must attend at least 80 percent of class meetings in order to receive course credit.  

Attendance will be taken via the Top Hat app. The attendance code for each class session is generated that day by Top Hat (i.e., a new code for each class) and will be posted in that day’s chat session on Zoom.

The formal policy is less important than this: Students are expected to arrive for class on time, which means *before the announced start time for the class.* Students are expected to read assignments in advance of the class meeting for which they are assigned. Students should be prepared to have something to say about the assigned material.

Students have plenty to be concerned with, between law school generally, family, friends, health, and life, before wondering about the consequences of possibly missing class. I will be flexible in administering the attendance policy. If you have concerns about that, please contact me.

On participation:

It’s best for all if you ask questions during class (be curious!) and if you refer to specific points and ideas from the assigned materials when you do that.

About Zoom Zoom Zoom

To help ensure a productive online classroom environment for everyone, students should follow these guidelines when using the ZOOM service for this class:

1. Health first. Log in and participate if you’re able. If you’re not, let me know privately and/or or get in touch with one of the deans at Pitt Law.
2. Log in a little bit early if possible, before the official start time of the class, so that you’re ready to participate.
3. Log in with a real name for your screen name: preferred first name, then preferred last name. On your Zoom image on your screen, clicking on the “three dots in the corner” settings icon should allow you o type in the preferred names.
4. If possible, set up your computer in a space that’s quiet and free of distractions and interruptions. Mute or turn off music and other video sources. It’s not always possible to find a completely quiet place, so do your best, and we’ll all be a bit flexible.
5. Camera on, if possible. Again, that’s not always possible (or desirable), so do your best.
6. Microphone *off* by default. But know how to activate it when you want to or need to.
7. Use a headset or earbuds if you can, rather that your computer’s speakers.
8. In voice and in chat, be respectful of everyone else in the group.
9. Class sessions may be recorded. The recordings will be posted to YouTube for review later. As a rule, I do not record student names or images; I record myself, any slides that I use, and voices.

Class cancellations and makeups

If a class is cancelled for any reason, it will be made up via a newly-scheduled class session.  In rare cases, and only when absolutely necessary, you may be referred to a recording of an equivalent class session from a previous edition of this course.

Illness

If you, a friend, or a family member experiences illness or caregiving responsibilities that require that you take time away from this course, please tell me, and please contact the Dean of Students (Alexandra (Allie) Linsenmeyer; alinsenm@pitt.edu) for assistance.

Challenging conversations

To a significant degree copyright law is about the ethics and public policy of free expression in a market capitalist society, both today and historically. We will see over and over again conflicts over language and symbols that challenge our beliefs about distinctions between what is (appropriately) part of a competitive marketplace, (appropriately) part of civil discourse in a democratic society, and what is (inappropriately) hurtful and damaging.

Law students, like lawyers and judges, need to develop techniques for discussing those conflicts thoughtfully without perpetuating the harms that caused those conflicts in the first place. I will help students in this class do that. For more, see the “Inclusivity and Diversity” section, below.

As part of this class, you should expect to see, read, and perhaps hear argument, analysis, language, and imagery that causes offense, and that may be intended to cause offense (not by me, but by companies and/or by others in society at large). “Offense” runs a spectrum from the modestly offensive and pretty common “challenges prior assumptions and beliefs about the world” to the much more substantially offensive and (one hopes) rarer “approaches the edge of causing actual harm in the world.” I will make every effort not to put you in the position of confronting the latter without your choosing to do so.

Inclusivity and diversity

This course, like all law school courses, is designed to be challenging. If there are aspects of this course that prevent you from learning or exclude you, please let me know as soon as possible. Together we’ll develop strategies to meet both your needs and the requirements of the course. I encourage to talk with me directly.

Pitt also has other support for you: the Office of Disability Resources and Services, the Writing Center, and the Counseling Center. For campus financial and food and health assistance, please see this list of resources from Pitt Libraries.

If you need official accommodations, you have a right to have these met; please see the section below on “Students with Disabilities.” If you would like less formal means of support in this course, please get in touch with me.

Students with Disabilities

[The formality of the following comes from the University of Pittsburgh and Pitt Law.]

It is the policy and practice of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, and Commonwealth of Pennsylvania requirements regarding students and applicants with disabilities. Under these laws, no qualified individual with a disability shall be denied access to or participation in services, programs, and activities of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law.

Students who require accommodations because of a physical, learning or other disability must be evaluated by the University of Pittsburgh’s Office of Disability Resource Services (ODRS). The ODRS will document and verify the student’s status and make recommendations for appropriate accommodations to the Dean of Students.

If a student has a disability for which the student is or may be requesting accommodation, that student should contact both the office of the Dean of Students in the Law School (Dean Alexandra Linsenmeyer; alinsenm@pitt.edu) and the University Office of Disability Resources and Services (“DRS”), 216 William Pitt Union, Phone 412-648-7890, Video Phone 412-228-5374, Fax 412-624-3346, as early as possible in the semester. DRS will verify the disability and determine reasonable accommodations for this course. The Dean of Students will oversee the implementation of accommodations.

Students should not discuss exam accommodations with professors. The Dean of Students and the Registrar will insure that any testing accommodations are provided through the DRS.

Academic integrity

Students enrolling in this course are expected to comply with the University of Pittsburgh’s Student Code of Conduct, which may be accessed online here.

Students also are expected to comply with the University of Pittsburgh’s Guidelines on Academic Integrity and the School of Law’s Standards of Academic Integrity.

If my guidance or requirements for this course conflict with either the University’s Code of Conduct, Guidelines, or the School of Law’s Standards of Academic Integrity, my guidance or requirements take precedence,

ChatGPT and Generative AI Generally

If you are tempted to explore the capabilities of ChatGPT or other AI-powered chatbots in the course of writing your papers, feel free to do that. Explore. Learn how to use prompts effectively. You might use AI systems to generate ideas, to develop resources, and to refine your writing. In some respects, AI systems are unavoidable in legal education, because Westlaw and Lexis/Nexis both include AI-developed elements in their research platforms. If you use a writing service such as Grammarly, know that those services, too, include AI elements. Importantly, as a new lawyer you are likely to be expected to use AI systems effectively and efficiently to support both your clients and your colleagues. AI is rapidly become part of law, rather than simply another tool in a lawyer’s toolkit.

Yet:

I do not expect or require that students use AI systems or platforms.

All work that you submit for a grade will bear your name, which means that if any of it originated with a machine, a robot, a chatbot, or an AI – whether in response to prompts from you or otherwise – then you and only you are responsible and accountable for its accuracy, clarity, consistency, persuasiveness, and responsiveness.

One thing that most people have learned about AI chatbots since 2022 is this: They can be useful – to a point – in producing text that is factually accurate with respect to summarizing bodies of material, and in producing text that is “administrative” or “procedural” in character. An AI can write a manager’s memo to employees; an AI can summarize a book. An AI is likely to do a poor job of exercising what we usually think of as human judgment (“is this a wise thing to do? why or why not?”) or evaluating questions of value(s) or ethics.

In this course, to the greatest extent I can manage, the graded assignments will consist of questions of human judgment rather than prompts for summaries or analyses of the law. This course does not ask or expect “issue spotting” analysis or “weigh the parties’ arguments” approaches; the course asks, as real lawyers are often asked, “what should the client do, and why?”

As a general rule, all of this is essentially the same guidance that you will be expected to follow in practicing law. Here as in other aspects of this course, my guidance and requirements are meant to emulate those that you will encounter in your professional careers.

If you have any questions or concerns about what that policy means, consult me before turning in your work.

Contacting Professor Madison

Office hours?

I will not hold regular “drop in” in person office hours. Students are welcome to meet with me virtually, via ZOOM by appointment and in person by appointment (when and where it is safe to do so).

One-to-one meetings:

I will manage student appointments via the Calendly app. Click here to see my schedule (Monday afternoons) and to make a virtual appointment. Virtual meetings will take place via the same ZOOM link used for class sessions.

If you are not available during my usual meeting times, email me to find an agreeable alternative. But please work hard to find a time within the range that I’ve cleared on my Calendly schedule.

I am not available on Fridays.

Advice about talking to faculty members:

Like college students, law students are notorious for not using the most important resource of their school – the faculty – effectively.

What does “effectively” mean? Why meet with a professor at all, whether or not during “office hours”? Maybe students have questions about exams (though that won’t happen in this class), or papers, grades, or class material; those are the usual reasons. But the more important reason, and the better and more effective use of time with faculty members, is simply to get to know them. And that time is also for the professor to get to know the student. What are your hopes and dreams? Anxieties and fears? Passions and talents?

Little of this will matter in the short run, and (to anticipate a common question) your professor (me) is rarely in a position to help a student get a particular job. Personal acquaintance can help professors write more persuasive recommendation letters, but recommendation letters are only the tips of the proverbial icebergs when it comes to benefits from personal relationships. Over the longer run, faculty friendships forged as students often pay enormous dividends in all sorts of unexpected ways.

I’ve certainly experienced that in my observations of former Pitt Law students. I can vouch for that from my own experience as a law student, decades ago. I owe much of my career as a law professor to the fact that I spent many hours during my third year of law school talking about professional soccer with one of my professors, a man who was, at the time, one of the most celebrated Constitutional law scholars in the world. (I was writing a long research paper under his supervision; we also talked about the paper. But the soccer conversations stayed with me, and with him, and they paid off eventually in an extraordinary way.) Soccer may not be your thing. What is? If I know, I’m much more likely to remember you in the years to come.

Required course materials (also: where’s the casebook?)

All of the materials required for the course are available for free online via links included in the syllabus. There is no casebook to purchase.

Readings described as “Boyle & Jenkins” consist of chapters from the Open Intellectual Property Casebook produced by James Boyle & Jennifer Jenkins and described in great detail here.

I do not use a conventional casebook. Each class session comes with its own, discrete collection of digital files, in .docx and .pdf formats. Students may print, annotate, edit, and/or cut-and-paste all or parts of each file as they wish. Federal case law and statutory material is in the public domain, thanks to Section 105 of the Copyright Act; material from Boyle & Jenkins is subject to a Creative Commons license that permits readers and users to “remix” it as they wish.

I do not use a case book in part because I want to configure the readings in a way that suits my goals for the course. Also, I have acquired a strong distaste for the whole concept of the law school casebook. Like law school as a whole, casebooks not-so-subtly tend to present “the law” as collections of distinct, coherent, stable packages of rules. There is “Contract” law, “Property” law, “Tax” law, and so forth, as if each of those subjects is complete, consistent, finished, and ready for digesting by new lawyers. Alas: in law as in life, the “rules” are overlapping, sometimes incoherent, and unstable. Becoming a lawyer means, partly, learning how to understand the incomplete, changing character of law and legal systems. That means learning how to put the pieces together yourself. So, I give you the pieces and something of an instruction manual. You assemble the package.

Optional course materials

There is a vast secondary literature on copyright law. Here are five of the best sources:

• Benjamin Kaplan, An Unhurried View of Copyright (originally published in 1967) (a readable and still relevant overview of copyright history and policy)
• Marshall Leaffer, Understanding Copyright Law (8th ed. 2024) (an excellent one-volume summary of copyright doctrine)
• Melville B. Nimmer & David Nimmer, Nimmer on Copyright (the authoritative multi-volume treatise) (available on the Law Library shelves and via LexisNexis)
• William F. Patry, Patry on Copyright (also an authoritative multi-volume treatise) (available on the Law Library shelves and via Westlaw)
• The Compendium of U.S. Copyright Office Practices (2021)

Students with an interest in history may explore this collection of older copyright materials, produced by United Kingdom copyright scholars:

• Copyright History

In recent years, legal scholars have published several excellent books on the law and policy of copyright.  Try:

• Adrian Johns, Piracy: The Intellectual Property Wars from Gutenberg to Gates (2010)
• Jessica Litman, Digital Copyright (2006)
• Paul Goldstein, Copyright’s Highway: From the Printing Press to the Cloud (2019)
• Neil Netanel, Copyright’s Paradox (2010)
• William Patry, Moral Panics and the Copyright Wars (2009)

Copyright scholars get creative, in productive ways.  One especially interesting and provocative illustration (pun intended) is this graphic novel about copyright itself, produced by a trio of distinguished scholars of law and culture:

• Theft! A History of Music

The syllabus includes references to “CALI Lessons.” These are free, optional guided tours through basic copyright doctrine that are produced by law professors working with the Center for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction (“CALI”), a non-profit organization. CALI lessons for this course are available only through the TWEN site at Westlaw.

Slides

Any slides used in class will be posted afterward on the course homepage.

Grading

The grade for this course will be based on three short open writing assignments. The first two assignments will each be worth 30% of the final grade. The final assignment will be worth 40% of the final grade. The substance and format of the assignments, their timing, and their due dates will be discussed in class as the semester progresses.

Each student in the course must complete all three assignments, regardless of whether they are taking the course for a letter grade or on a pass/fail basis.

Writing assignment due dates

The due dates for the required writing assignments are listed at the Course Homepage / Reading and Class Assignments as part of the list of assignments and readings.

For clarity, the dates are:

• Assignment 1:  Friday, February 21, 2025, at 3 pm.
• Assignment 2:  Friday, April 4, 2025, at 3 pm.
• Assignment 3:  Last day of exams (Wednesday, May 7, 2025), at 12 noon.

The official course policy on due dates is this: 

There will be no extensions or exceptions to assignment deadlines. Do not be late with the assignments.

I am strict about deadlines for two reasons.

One, the assignments in this class move along at a steady clip, and it’s important for practical reasons – my grading and commenting on student papers as a batch, most of all – that the papers for each assignment be turned in essentially at the same time. Any student who expects to encounter a problem with a given due date should contact me directly as soon as that problem develops. I will refer that student to the appropriate Dean at Pitt Law. The Deans have the power to be accommodating for students who, for one good faith (and presumably extraordinary) reason or another, may struggle with that policy. In some rare cases, it is more important that students succeed than that they get the work in precisely on time.

Two, my expectations in this class largely mimic the expectations that you will face in full-time professional employment after you graduate. Employers generally are unforgiving when it comes to timeliness. Judges are unforgiving when it comes to timeliness. And clients, above all, are unforgiving when it comes to timeliness. Getting in the habit of turning in your work when it is due (or earlier) will serve you well as you build a career.

Writing assignment requirements

Each writing assignment will be based on a written problem distributed via the course website, at the Writing Assignments page. There will be an opportunity to discuss the problem in class and ask questions about it after it is distributed. Each problem will be based on the readings and classroom discussions.

The problems are designed so that they can be completed without independent research, but these will be open problems. There are no limits on the resources that students may bring to bear on their work.

Student work product must be typed or printed using a computer.

Each assignment has length and format limitations.

• For assignments calling for legal memoranda, and unless students are instructed otherwise, each memorandum must be not longer than four [4] typewritten or printed pages, double-spaced, with 1″ minimum margins on all sides. No footnotes, endnotes, attachments, exhibits, or hyperlinks are permitted. (Images and other material may be embedded in the memoranda, so long as the work product in total does not exceed four pages.) The twelve [12] point proportional-width font known as Times New Roman must be used. Condensing or expanding the font is unacceptable.  
• For assignments calling for email summaries, and unless students are instructed otherwise, each email prepared as student work product must be not longer than two [2] typewritten or printed pages, single-spaced, with 1″ minimum margins on all sides. No footnotes, endnotes, attachments, exhibits, or hyperlinks are permitted. (Images and other material may be embedded in the memoranda, so long as the work product in total does not exceed four pages.) The twelve [12] point proportional-width font known as Times New Roman must be used. Condensing or expanding the font is unacceptable.
• For assignments calling for PowerPoint [or equivalent] slide decks, and unless students are instructed otherwise, each slide deck prepared as student work product must be not longer than 12 separate slides. [Note: In prior years, the limitation here was 15 slides. I have reduced it.] Any font and font size may be used. No footnotes or slide notes are permitted. No images, animations, media files, or graphical or colored backgrounds or formats may be used other than matter that is (i) part of a professional-looking slide template and/or (ii) relevant to the matter being discussed in the slides.
• All references to authority must include full case names (abbreviated appropriately) and full statutory, case, or other citations. I do not care about Bluebook accuracy; the Bluebook is customary for law school and law review uses and for little else. I do care about completeness (volume, reporter, page, court, and year for first references; shortened case name, volume, reporter, and page for second and further references) and about consistency. Ensure that your citation format remains the same throughout your work.
• Students and only students are responsible for ensuring that their computer system/software platform generates work product that complies with these length and format limitations. I have only one means for determining whether your work meets my requirements, and that is looking at your work on my computer. If the work is out of compliance on my computer, then it is out of compliance.

Work product will be graded based on form, format, and writing quality as well as on content. The problems are designed so as not to have any single correct or even best solution. Each problem will present a range of issues that the student work should identify, analyze, and solve in a creative way.

As is customary for courses that are graded on the basis of students’ out of class work product rather than on the basis of final exams, the assignments will not be graded anonymously. Students should include their own names on the first page of their work product.

Work product should be turned in electronically at the Copyright Law – Spring 2025 page on CANVAS. Each assignment must be turned in no later than 3 pm on the day(s) that it is due or at such other date and time as may be directed in the instructions for a particular assignment.

If students experience difficulty delivering the assignment via CANVAS, then they may send a copy via email to Professor Madison no later than the date-and-time deadline for the assignment in question.

Student work product that does not conform to the format instructions above, or that is turned in late, is subject to grade reduction. In extreme cases, they may be disregarded.

Do not fail to follow the format requirements.

Do not turn in a paper that is too long, even by a word or by a line.

Sample questions are available via the Writing Assignments page.

Grading bonus for student collaboration

Collaboration and teamwork are the essence of professional life. Why not learn how to do it effectively in law school?

Student collaboration and consultation in this course is permitted, even encouraged. The writing assignments are open. You may consult any resources you wish to, You may talk with other students in this class about the assignments and about your work. You may talk with people who are not currently enrolled in the class.

I don’t require collaboration. But simply permitting it is rarely effective. Students are so used to working solo (and are required to work solo in most law school classes) that they often don’t know how to get out of that habit.

To start to change that habit, starting with the Fall 2020 version of this course, I am trying something new: a carrot.

If you collaborate on your work with one or more others, then you have the option of writing and submitting a short (not to exceed 1 page, double-spaced) memo, one per assignment (meaning up to three, in total, over the course of the semester), that reflects on and assesses your collaboration experience. This optional memo should be turned in no later than the due date and time for the associated principal memo.

Each “reflection” memo should address (this list is new for Spring 2025):

• What did you find easy about collaborating? What did you find difficult about collaborating?
• What did you feel that you learned about yourself, as a person or as a future lawyer, as a result of the collaboration? What do you feel that you still have to learn about yourself, as a result of the collaboration?
• How did your work product change as a result of comments or suggestions from your collaborators?
• (If you collaborated with one or more members of this class) how did your collaborators’ work change as a result of comments or suggestions from you?

The reflection memos will not be graded in themselves. At the end of the semester, students who turn in two or more reflection memos will be eligible to have their final grades raised by one-half grade, if the depth and quality of the reflections warrant an increase. [Note: Expecting two or more of these memos represents an increase over prior years for this course.]

Why rely on writing assignments rather than end-of-semester exams

Writing assignments have been included in my Copyright Law and Trademark Law courses for more than 20 years, for two reasons.

First, the best way to learn something is to practice it, rather than to memorize it.  “Doing” Copyright Law is much more effective professional preparation than “studying” Copyright Law.

Second, writing is a practical skill that every lawyer needs to master. All beginning lawyers need as much writing practice as they can get. Your first-year Legal Analysis and Writing course may have been a useful introduction to “legal” writing. In the language of music, you have been shown some of the notes and chords that a proficient performer learns on the way to mastering their instrument. Truly making music – becoming a fluid legal writer – requires years’ worth of supervised instruction. I continued to take continuing education courses on legal writing, and benefitted from them, well into my career as a practicing lawyer. My CLE instructor, Gary Kinder, later founded WordRake.

Email policy

Substantive questions about copyright law are welcome via email, at madison@pitt.edu. In general, questions will be answered during class, rather than via email, so that the entire class gets the benefit of the exchange.