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Our 2022 Accomplishments

 
In 2022, New Media Rights worked hard to provide important legal services to hundreds of artists, creators, and innovators throughout the world. We are happy to be back working in person and in our new office space on the California Western School of Law campus! 
 
This year we are particularly grateful for a $33,300 grant from the City of San Diego’s Economic Development Department to support our work with local San Diego small businesses and tech startups. A couple of years ago, the pandemic halted funding from this long-standing grant, so we are thrilled that the City of San Diego can now continue to support our work with the local community!
 
Please take a few moments to donate now to ensure that the essential legal services that we provide to hundreds of artists, creators and innovators throughout the world continue to exist. READ MORE.

 

Submitted by New Media Rights last modified Thu, 02/16/2023 - 1:43pm

Copyright Office issues final small claims rules for Copyright Claims Board, cites New Media Rights’ comments

The United States Copyright Office recently published its final rule for implementation of the procedures that are to govern the initial stages of a Copyright Claims Board (CCB) proceeding. The CCB will be a new forum where copyright small claims disputes can be heard.

It will have a significant impact on creators and technology businesses. Disputes previously too costly to bring to federal court can now be brought to the CCB, which allows claims up to $30,000 (no more than $15,000 per work). Many creators will either face disputes brought against them as respondents, or consider using the process as an enforcement mechanism. 

The final rule establishes a process for bringing claims at the CCB, and directly cites New Media Rights’ comments, written by California Western School of Law 2L Mariana Perez, Executive Director Art Neill, and Assistant Director Erika Lee, multiple times. Our comments discussed law school clinic participation, concerns regarding how respondents receive adequate awareness of the claims against them, the need to collect data on CCB proceedings and revisit and improve CCB processes, and various grammar and typographical errors in the proposed rules. READ MORE

Submitted by New Media Rights last modified Wed, 11/09/2022 - 4:41pm

Our 2021 Accomplishments

Giving Tuesday is here! Please take a moment now and make a donation. 

This year New Media Rights continued to meet the challenges of the global pandemic by providing our services and law clinic online. 2021 brought challenges, but we also had victories along the way. We are glad to now be working in a new space on the California Western School of Law campus, and continuing to serve our community. 

This year we are particularly grateful for a $25,000 grant from the Conrad Prebys Foundation to support our work with creatives and creative organizations in San Diego, as well as further support via a $20,000 Grant for the Web from Mozilla and Creative Commons.

Please take a few moments to donate now to ensure that the essential legal services that we provide to hundreds of artists, creators and innovators throughout the world continue to exist. Here's what we accomplished in 2021. READ MORE

Submitted by New Media Rights last modified Tue, 11/30/2021 - 4:06pm

Why You Should Give to New Media Rights This Year: Our 2020 Accomplishments

 
This year New Media Rights met the challenges of the global pandemic by moving our services and law clinic online without delay. 2020 brought challenges, but we also had some victories along the way.
 
Due to the pandemic, we lost a long-standing grant that usually constitutes $40,000 of our budget. However, we did receive a $20,000 grant from the Grant for the Web, which is backed by Coil, Mozilla, and Creative Commons. 
 
So we now have some ground to make up. Please take a few moments to donate now to ensure that the essential legal services that we provide to hundreds of artists, creators and innovators throughout the world continue to exist. Here's what we accomplished in 2020. READ MORE
Submitted by New Media Rights last modified Mon, 11/30/2020 - 5:23pm

Event: 2020 California Entrepreneurship Educators Conference (Free online event)

Our Executive Director Art Neill will be speaking 10am, Thursday April 16th at the 2020 California Entrepreneurship Educators Conference.  The conference is now completely virtual, and you can sign up to attend for free here! 

Art's panel will be talking about legal education for entrepreneurs, including intellectual property, privacy, contracts, and other areas that are fundamental to getting a business off the ground.

The two-day conference, free of charge, will include interviews and panel discussions featuring an international lineup of keynote speakers.

With the help of their partner, the International Council for Small Business (ICSB), the interviews and panels will be live-streamed via Zoom on April 16th and 17th, with registrants free to come and go as they please. Each day will close with a virtual social gathering!

Here's the link for the event, did we mention it's free? Hope to see you there!

https://lavincenter.sdsu.edu/programs/entrepreneurship-conference-2020

Submitted by New Media Rights last modified Mon, 04/13/2020 - 9:40pm

New Publication in the Texas IP Law Journal!

In a scholarly article, recently published in the University of Texas Intellectual Property Law Journal (Vol. 28, No. 1, p. 87-98, 2019), New Media Rights' Executive Director Art Neill and Staff Attorney Erika Lee consider some options for modernizing copyright registration. The Texas Intellectual Property law Journal is a top 15 ranked Intellectual Property Journal according to Washington & Lee's rankings. 

The article, Fixing Copyright Registration For Online Video Creators: The Case for Group Registration of Published Videos, considers the history of published group registration since the Copyright Act of 1976 and argues that future modernization efforts should include group registration of video. The article also posits that current options for registering videos are ineffective and cost-prohibitive for online video creators, and proposes opening a rulemaking with the Copyright Office to establish group registration of published videos (which is currently not permitted). READ MORE

Submitted by New Media Rights last modified Thu, 02/01/2024 - 3:10pm

Adios Amor - New Media Rights helps bring the story of farm worker's advocate Maria Moreno to PBS

New Media Rights attorneys and law students recently worked on Adios Amor, a powerful documentary by Jane Greenberg and Laurie Coyle.

In Adios Amor, the discovery of lost photographs sparks the search for a hero that history forgot—Maria Moreno, a migrant mother driven to speak out by her twelve children’s hunger. Years before Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta launched the United Farm Workers, Maria picked up the only weapon she had—her voice—and became an outspoken leader in an era when women were relegated to the background. The first farm worker woman in America to be hired as a union organizer, Maria’s story was silenced and her legacy buried—until now.

Submitted by New Media Rights last modified Thu, 05/28/2020 - 2:06pm

Our 2019 Accomplishments!

Whether you’ve joined us as a Student or Open Internet Defender, we’re stronger than ever thanks to support from individuals like you!

If you haven’t become a Supporter, we need your support more than ever this year. Please consider joining our community of supporters by making a donation and help us continue to fulfill our mission to:

  • Provide free and dramatically reduced fee one-to-one legal services to underserved creators and innovators that need specialized help with Internet, intellectual property, media, and technology law
  • Defend the Open Internet and push for badly needed copyright reform.
  • Create high quality legal educational materials and to educate the next generation of lawyers. READ MORE
Submitted by New Media Rights last modified Tue, 12/03/2019 - 2:53pm

New Media Rights Joins the Free Expression Legal Network!

We are thrilled to announce that we joined the Free Expression Legal Network. Supporting journalists and nonprofit news organizations has always been an important part of our work. Journalists face many of the same intellectual property, privacy, and media law issues that challenge other creatives and entrepreneurs.

The Free Expression Legal Network is a nationwide coalition of school clinics, academics, and practitioners focused on promoting and protecting free speech, free press, and the free flow of information to an informed and engaged citizenry. The creation of the network was led by the Reporter's Committee for the Free Press and Yale Freedom & Information Access Clinic.  Members work on media law, transparency, and/or access issues, either as their primary focus or as it intersects with their work on other issues. READ MORE
 

Submitted by New Media Rights last modified Mon, 09/09/2019 - 1:00pm

Copyright Week 2019: Modernizing Copyright & Expanding the Public Domain

New Media Rights responds to over 500 requests for legal services every year, and over two thirds of these involve copyright law.  Copyright law protects the work of these creators, but it also controls how the existing culture around us can be reused and commented upon.  That’s why it’s our mission to make sure that copyright related legal services are available to all regardless of ability to pay. This way we can assist creators who are facing unfair copyright takedowns from people who want to troll or bully them, and we can also work with artists whose rights have been infringed to get justice responsibility and without overreaching in their claims. Read more

 
Submitted by New Media Rights last modified Fri, 03/22/2019 - 2:42pm

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Learn about our legal services for: App Developers, Artists & Graphic Designers, Bloggers & Journalists, Clothing Designers, Entrepreneurs, E-commerce Business People & Startups, Filmmakers & YouTube creators, Public Broadcasting producers,Game Developers, Internet users & Smartphone users, Makers, Musicians, Non-Profits, Photographers, Scholars, Researchers, and Writers and Publishers.