The Legal Research Society

This Tuesday, November 28, at 5 pm, in Taylor A15, the society will be discussing the tension between existing copyright law and the sharing of music and movies over the internet. Resolved: (1)File sharing encourages artistic creativity, allows new artists more access to consumers, and should be encouraged. (2) Copyright protection provides too much protection for corporations and artists, and should be amended so as to provide more access for consumers and the general public. File sharing has grown in popularity with the spread of high-speed internet connections. Though legal per se , file sharing is most often used to share copyrighted materials such as music and movies. Recently, some record companies and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) have initiated lawsuits against individuals, as their efforts to pursue the file sharing networks have largely proved unsuccessful. Record companies have argued that the advent of file sharing has hurt their profits and

Donn Zaretsky's Art Law Blog has an interesting piece on litigation surrounding Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan . Two of the "participants" in the movie, a couple of inebriated college students from South Carolina, are bringing suit in Los Angeles Superior Court. You can view the complaint here . Incidentally, whoever drafted it needs to work on their spelling. The students, who might I say looked like complete idiots, are alleging that the production crew got them drunk, and then took advantage of their state. They were paid $200 for their participation. They are asserting causes of action for fraud, rescission of contract, false light, appropriation of false likeness, and negligent infliction of emotional distress. Borat is a smart cookie, and he made the participants in the film sign a consent form, which Slate has made available here . However, there are a couple of problems with it. First, the production com

The Legal Research Society is pleased to announce its research programme for the coming months: Tuesday 14 November, 5pm, Taylor A15 Ole W. Pedersen (co-authored with Anne-Michelle Slater) ‘Devolved Scotland and Environmental Justice’ (moderated by Justin Borg Barthet) Scotland has been a devolved administration since 1999. In this period environmental justice has received increasing attention from a variety of participants and stakeholders on the Scottish political scene. This paper seeks to explore and analyse the emergence of environmental justice in Scotland today. This is done by, outlining the devolution arrangements of the Scottish Parliament and touching upon the implications this has in the area of environmental law. The paper then goes on to consider the origin of environmental justice in Scotland and assesses the development of environmental justice as a concept at governmental level, by analysing the Scottish Executive’s stance on environmental justice and tracing the conce