We are adding a fourth panel to the lineup at our upcoming conference on Tuesday September 13 at Fordham Law School in NYC, a panel on Standard Technical Measures for content identification. We’re still looking for moderators and speakers for all panels, so if you’re interested, please send me an email indicating your name, affiliation, panel of interest, and a brief statement of your perspective on the topic.

Here is the complete panel lineup:

Standard Fare: Standard Technical Measures in the DMCA and Beyond

Section 512(i) of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act says, in part, that an online service has to accommodate and not interfere with standard technical measures for identifying or protecting copyrighted works in order to qualify for the DMCA safe harbors. Recent DMCA reform efforts have focused attention on this heretofore obscure portion of the statute, and they are the focus of the recently proposed Tillis-Leahy SMART Copyright Act of 2022. Just what are these “standard technical measures” and how do they relate to the DMCA, the proposed legislation, and the future of online services’ copyright obligations? Our panel will demystify this murky and often contentious area.

Thank You for Your Service: The Future of the Server Test

Fifteen years ago, Perfect 10 v. Amazon.com established the Server Test for content embedded in web pages: the publisher of a web page can be liable for infringement of the embedded content if it also hosts the content on its own servers, but not if it merely links to content hosted elsewhere. Decisions in the Southern District of New York since then, including Goldman v. Breitbart, Nicklen v. Sinclair Broadcast Group, and most recently McGucken v. Newsweek, have gone the other way. Is the Server Test any more or less relevant with today’s technology, as opposed to the technology of 2007? And is it headed for the Supreme Court … or for oblivion? Our panel will discuss.

Inclusive Access: Easing the Textbook Burden

Inclusive Access, a/k/a Equitable Access, is a new model for distributing text materials to college students digitally: every student pays the same flat fee per semester for their text materials, and the university apportions royalties to the publishers of those materials. With this scheme, students no longer need to choose their majors based on whether they can afford the textbooks. Yet some say that Inclusive Access doesn’t go far enough, that only open and free educational resources will truly improve inclusion and equity in higher education. In this session we’ll look at the progress of Inclusive Access, whether it’s the best way to achieve equity for educational materials, how publishers are participating, and the implications for copyright.

Lessons from Across the Pond: The UK Parliament’s Study on Music Streaming Economics

Last year, the UK Parliament published the results of a major study on the economics of music streaming, with many recommendations for changes in copyright laws. In this session, we’ll review the study and its conclusions and recommendations, and we’ll discuss how they might apply in the United States.