Curriculum Guide · Courses

Professors Michael Huppe and Julia Ross

J.D. Seminar 372 (cross-listed) | 3 credit hours

This course will engage in an in-depth exploration of legal issues that arise in the music industry and the complex ways in which the law has shaped the evolution of the industry and the industry has shaped the development of the law. We will begin with a historical unit that traces the manner in which copyright and other laws affected the development of the music industry (and vice versa) in the 20th century. Our second main unit will cover a cross-section of the current legal issues faced by the music industry and the business practices that have been and are being developed to address those legal issues. We will end the semester with a discussion of the future of the music industry and the role that law and public policy will likely play in that future.

While the specific issues covered will vary in light of ongoing developments in the law and music industry business practices, some of the likely topics of discussion and analysis include the distinct “bundles” of rights in music and how the industry developed to exploit them; music licensing and statutory royalty regimes; illegal Internet downloading, its effect on the industry, and the industry’s response; the changing power relationships among the players in the industry and the contractual and legal issues that emerge from those changing relationships; deregulation and the effects of horizontal and vertical integration in the industry; new distribution models and new models of consumption for music and how the law is developing to accommodate them; the changing conceptions of what it means to “own” music in light of technological innovations in the industry; payola prohibitions and their impact on the industry; the future of performance royalties for sound recordings; legislative developments affecting the music industry; and the role of social networking sites, blogs, and other newly-developing avenues for marketing new music.

Some of the issues will be discussed using hypothetical case studies, with students assigned to represent/argue the interests of the various affected parties, such as recording label executives, musicians, songwriters, radio broadcasters, Internet radio operators, and concert promoters. The assigned materials will include a selection of cases, statutes, scholarly articles, and trade publication articles relevant to each of the issues discussed, as well as sample licenses and contracts. Students will be graded based upon their class participation and submission of a final paper for the course.

Prerequisite: Copyright Law.

This seminar requires a paper. J.D. students must register for the 3 credit section of the seminar if they wish to write a paper fulfilling the Upperclass Legal Writing Requirement. The paper requirements of the 2 credit section will not fulfill the Upperclass Legal Writing Requirement.