WCL Hosts Finnegan Lecture on Intellectual Property
Event to address who controls patent law and its future in emerging industries
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
WASHINGTON, DC, October 14, 2009 - American University Washington College of Law (WCL) Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property (PIJIP) presents the Fifth Annual Finnegan Distinguished Lecture on Intellectual Property on October 20, at 5:00 P.M. EDT.
With this year's program, Rochelle C. Dreyfuss, Pauline Newman Professor of Law at New York University Law School, will present on "What the Federal Circuit Court Can Learn from the Supreme Court - and Vice Versa."
The lecture will address the questions: who controls patent law, and who should control it, by evaluating the centralization of control over patent law in a single federal court of appeals, subject to review by the Supreme Court. Michael Carroll, professor of law and director of PIJIP, remarked, "Professor Dreyfuss is a renowned expert in patent law who has studied and written extensively about the performance of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit from its founding in 1982 to the present."
For over a quarter century, the Federal Circuit Court has been in the business of using its expertise to revise key aspects of both procedural and substantive patent law. In the Federal Circuit's early years, the Supreme Court largely refrained from reviewing its jurisprudence. However, in the last decade, the two tribunals have engaged in a vibrant dialogue. Professor Dreyfuss will examine the interaction between the two courts. She will question the role that specialists should be permitted to play in tailoring laws to meet the needs of technologically complex and emerging industries. She will also discuss the extent to which generalists can helpfully intervene to keep patent law in the mainstream and attuned to social values and technology-related developments, such as open innovation. And she will discuss the current debate over business method patents and its implications on the technology and financial services industries.
When: October 20, 2009
5 P.M. Reception, 6 P.M. Lecture
Where: American University Washington College of Law
4801 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Washington, DC, 20016, Room 603
About PIJIP
The Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property at American University Washington College of Law promotes balanced approaches to intellectual property that reward creators while ensuring broad public access to information and related products. Each fall, PIJIP partners with Finnegan to sponsor the Distinguished Lecture on Intellectual Property.
About Finnegan
With more than 375 intellectual property lawyers, Finnegan is one of the largest IP law firms in the world. From offices in Washington, DC; Atlanta, Georgia; Cambridge, Massachusetts; Palo Alto, California; Reston, Virginia; Brussels, Belgium; Shanghai, China; Taipei, Taiwan; and Tokyo, Japan, the firm practices all aspects of patent, trademark, copyright, and trade secret law, including counseling, prosecution, licensing, and litigation.
About Rochelle C. Dreyfuss
Rochelle C. Dreyfuss is the Pauline Newman Professor of Law at New York University School of Law and the Director of the Engelberg Center on Innovation Law and Policy. After earning a JD from Columbia University School of Law, she was a law clerk to Chief Judge Wilfred Feinberg of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and to Chief Justice Warren Burger of the U.S. Supreme Court. Professor Dreyfuss was a consultant to the Federal Courts Study Committee. She sits on the National Academy of Science's Committee on Science, Technology and Law, Secretary of the Department of Health & Human Service's Advisory Committee on Genetics, Health, and Society, and BNA's Advisory Board to USPQ.
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