29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: Origins, Evolution, and Possible Futures of the 1976 Copyright Act

PROGRAMS IN BUNDLE

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  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: (Lunch Keynote) Lunchtime Key Note

  Format: On-Demand | Instructor: BCLT

  Showing: November 30, 2027
  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: Origins, Evolution, and Possible Futures of the 1976 Copyright ActLunchtime Keynote: Honorable Margaret McKoeown, KeynoteApril 16, 2026 0.50 General CLE Offered Event Information | Agenda | Resource(s) | Speaker Bio(s) & Contact Info Judge M. Margaret McKeown of the Ninth Circuit delivered the BTLJ Spring Lunch Keynote on May 7, 2026, arguing that generative AI presents copyright’s most profound doctrinal stress test since the internet, but that the 1976 Copyright Act’s flexible language—particularly the fair use factors and the undefined scope of “original works of authorship”—remains capable of absorbing the disruption, even as courts await a first appellate decision and Congress remains largely dormant. Instructor(s)Hon. M. Margaret McKeown, Senior Circuit Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth CircuitMolly Van Houweling, UC Berkeley LawErik Stallman, UC Berkeley Law

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  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: (Panel 1) Welcoming Remarks, Opening Key Note, Panel 1

  Format: On-Demand | Instructor: BCLT

  Showing: November 30, 2027
  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: Origins, Evolution, and Possible Futures of the 1976 Copyright ActWelcoming Remarks | Opening Keynote | Panel 1: Origins of the 1976 Copyright ActApril 16, 2026 2.50 General CLE Offered Event Information | Agenda | Resource(s) | Speaker Bio(s) & Contact Info At the 29th Annual Berkeley Center for Law and Technology–Berkeley Technology Law Journal Symposium, Register of Copyrights Shira Perlmutter and Professors Peter Menell, Jessica Litman, and Jane Ginsburg examined the origins, structural compromises, and enduring limitations of the Copyright Act of 1976, concluding that while its core architecture has proven remarkably resilient against successive technological disruptions, the statute’s negotiated promises to authors have broken down in practice, leaving individual creators systematically disadvantaged a half-century after enactment. Instructor(s)Shira Perlmutter, Register of Copyrights and Director, U.S. Copyright OfficeJessica Litman, Professor, University of Michigan Law SchoolJane Ginsburg, Professor, Columbia Law SchoolPeter Menell, Professor and Faculty Co-Director, Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, UC Berkeley School of LawPamela Samuelson, Professor and Faculty Co-Director, Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, UC Berkeley School of LawMolly Van Houweling, Professor and Faculty Co-Director, Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, UC Berkeley School of Law.

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  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: (Panel 2) The Role of the Author, Panel 2

  Format: On-Demand | Instructor: BCLT

  Showing: November 30, 2027
  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: The Role of the Author and the Acquisition and Duration of Their RightsPanel 2: The Role of the Author April 16, 2026  1.50 General CLE Offered Event Information | Agenda | Resource(s) | Speaker Bio(s) & Contact Info At the Berkeley Technology Law Journal’s 29th Annual Symposium, Professors Tyler Ochoa, David Nimmer, Robert Brauneis, and Peter DiCola examined the 1976 Copyright Act’s author-centered reforms—covering formalities, duration, termination of transfer, fixation, joint authorship, and market structure—and concluded that twin oligopolies in copyright aggregation and technological distribution have structurally disabled the economic leverage those reforms were designed to provide, while judicial resistance and contractual end-runs have eroded the inalienable termination right that was the Act’s most ambitious pro-author innovation. Instructor(s)Tyler Ochoa, Professor of Law, Santa Clara University School of LawDavid Nimmer, Professor from Practice, UCLA School of Law, and Of Counsel, Irell & Manella LLP, author of Nimmer on CopyrightRobert Brauneis, Michael McKeon Professor of Intellectual Property Law and Faculty Co-Director, GW Barnard Center for Law and Technology, George Washington University Law SchoolPeter DiCola, Professor of Law and Director of the JD-PhD Program, Northwestern Pritzker School of LawMolly Van Houweling, Professor and Faculty Co-Director, Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, UC Berkeley School of Law.

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  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: (Panel 3) The Scope of Exclusive Rights, Panel 3

  Format: On-Demand | Instructor: BCLT

  Showing: November 30, 2027
  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: Origins, Evolution, and Possible Futures of the 1976 Copyright ActPanel 3: The Scope of Exclusive Rights and Modes of Enforcement April 16, 2026 1.50 General CLE Offered Event Information | Agenda | Resource(s) | Speaker Bio(s) & Contact Info A Berkeley Technology Law Journal symposium panel examined how the Supreme Court’s unanimous 2025 decision in Cox Communications, Inc. v. Sony Music Entertainment overhauled a half-century of contributory copyright infringement doctrine, sharply narrowing secondary liability to two specific fact patterns—inducement and tailored material contribution—while leaving platforms, AI gatekeepers, and lower courts without coherent guidance on how the new framework interacts with the broader architecture of copyright enforcement. Instructor(s)Christopher Sprigman, Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Engelberg Center on Innovation Law and Policy, NYU School of LawOren Bracha, Professor of Law, University of Texas School of LawJustin Hughes, Distinguished Professor of Law and Distinguished Chair in Business and Economics, Loyola Law SchoolLaura Heymann, Professor of Law, William and Mary Law SchoolErik Stallman, Clinical Professor of Law, UC Berkeley School of Law

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  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: (Panel 4) The Shifting Line Between Federal and State Protection, Panel 4

  Format: On-Demand | Instructor: BCLT

  Showing: November 30, 2027
  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: Origins, Evolution, and Possible Futures of the 1976 Copyright ActPanel 4: The Shifting Line Between Federal and State Protection April 16, 2026 1.50 General CLE Offered Event Information | Agenda | Resource(s) | Speaker Bio(s) & Contact Info At the Berkeley Technology Law Journal’s 29th Annual Symposium, Professors R. Anthony Reese, Marketa Trimble, Guy Rub, and Shyamkrishna Balganesh examined the federalization of unpublished works under the 1976 Copyright Act, the residual terrain of state copyright statutes, the contract-preemption frontier under Section 301, and the misappropriation doctrine’s corrupted legislative history—concluding that the House Report’s endorsement of hot news misappropriation described a statutory provision that was never enacted, and that courts have been building doctrine on that error for decades, with direct and unresolved consequences for data scraping, AI training, and the boundary between state and federal intellectual property protection. Instructor(s)R. Anthony Reese, Professor of Law, UC Irvine School of LawMarketa Trimble, Professor of Law, University of Nevada Las Vegas William S. Boyd School of LawGuy Rub, Professor of Law, Temple University Beasley School of LawShyamkrishna Balganesh, Professor of Law, Columbia Law SchoolPeter Menell, Professor and Faculty Co-Director, Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, UC Berkeley School of Law

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  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: (Panel 5) Copyrightable Subject Matter, Panel 5

  Format: On-Demand | Instructor: BCLT

  Showing: November 30, 2027
  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: Origins, Evolution, and Possible Futures of the 1976 Copyright ActPanel 5:  Copyrightable Subject Matter and the Special Problem of SoftwareApril 17, 2026 1.50 General CLE Offered Event Information | Agenda | Resource(s) | Speaker Bio(s) & Contact Info At the BTLJ Spring Symposium’s panel on software, copyright, and generative AI, scholars and practitioners traced how AI-generated code — likely uncopyrightable under current Copyright Office guidance — threatens to collapse the legal infrastructure underpinning open source software licenses, and how empirical evidence of large language model memorization is forcing courts to reconsider whether a model’s weights may themselves constitute a copy fixed in a tangible medium of expression. Instructor(s)Clark Asay, BYU LawA. Feder Cooper, Yale University Jule Sigall, former MicrosoftPamela Samuelson, UC Berkeley Law

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  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: (Panel 6) Unanticipated Consequences, Panel 6

  Format: On-Demand | Instructor: BCLT

  Showing: November 30, 2027
  29th Annual BTLJ-BCLT Spring Symposium: Origins, Evolution, and Possible Futures of the 1976 Copyright ActPanel 6: Unanticipated Consequences of New Technologies and Practices April 17, 2026 1.50 General CLE Offered Event Information | Agenda | Resource(s) | Speaker Bio(s) & Contact Info At the closing panel of the Berkeley Technology Law Journal’s 29th Annual Symposium on the 1976 Copyright Act, Professors Daniel Gervais, Matthew Sag, Rebecca Tushnet, and Jennifer Urban examined four unanticipated strains on the Act—the licensing architecture’s adequacy for generative AI, the fair use status of non-consumptive copying, the legal standing of non-commercial fan creators, and the stalled orphan works reform—concluding that voluntary licensing, conflict preemption doctrine, and a targeted Section 107 amendment each offer partial solutions, but that no single mechanism can resolve the scale, territorial, and political-economy failures that AI training has simultaneously exposed. Professors Peter Menell, Pamela Samuelson, and Molly Van Houweling followed with closing remarks. Instructor(s)Daniel Gervais, Professor of Law (Emeritus), Vanderbilt Law SchoolMatthew Sag, Professor of Law, Emory University School of LawRebecca Tushnet, Professor of Law, Harvard Law SchoolJennifer Urban, Professor of Law, UC Berkeley School of LawPeter Menell, Professor and Faculty Co-Director, Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, UC Berkeley School of LawPamela Samuelson, Professor and Faculty Co-Director, Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, UC Berkeley School of LawMolly Van Houweling, Professor and Faculty Co-Director, Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, UC Berkeley School of Law