2024 Symposium
BETR is hosting a symposium March 14, 2024 which explores controversial areas of the law. Areas that some may consider morally abhorrent will be a part of modern-day Americana in some form—the business and legal implications are too important to ignore. Gambling, marijuana, firearms, and alcohol are a few topics we will explore with the guidance of legal academics and practicing attorneys. CDO professional credit will be offered for this event. Additionally, there will be CLE credit offered for the event, including CLE Ethics credit, so feel free to share this invitation with attorneys in your life. There will be both in-person and Zoom options.
BETR is absolutely thrilled to host practitioners in the field to share their unique perspectives on law and the practical applications to controversial industries. I encourage you to look at the attachment to this email to see a lineup of the speakers and topics. During the lunch hour, you will have an opportunity to talk to the speakers in a less formal setting. I invite all of you to join BETR as explore new and exciting areas of law.
Past Symposia
2022 Symposium
The Business, Entrepreneurship, and Tax Law Review hosted a free symposium available both in-person and virtually, on the Future of Food. The symposium featured nine industry practitioners discussing how law and policy should play a role in navigating the future of food and food systems.
2019 Symposium
Protecting the Public While Fostering Innovation and Entrepreneurship: First Principles for Optimal Regulation
A symposium hosted by the Center for Intellectual Property & Entrepreneurship and the Business, Entrepreneurship & Tax Law Review, with support from the Koch Foundation.
In this symposium, a distinguished group of panelists considered both substantive principles for regulating effectively in particular areas (e.g., financial markets, telecommunications, prescription drugs, network technologies) and broader procedural questions about how regulations should be crafted.
Keynote Address
Commissioner Hester Peirce of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) delivered the keynote address. Drawing on Professor Thom Lambert’s recent book, How to Regulate: A Guide for Policymakers, Commissioner Peirce discussed the difficult issues the SEC faces in regulating “initial coin offerings” (ICOs) and the trading of cryptocurrency-based funds. Commissioner Peirce’s remarks have already garnered the attention of a number of cryptocurrency-focused news outlets, including CoinDesk, CoinTelegraph, and UK-based MondoVisione. Her speech has been published in full in BETR’s Spring 2020 publication, and can be found at 3 Bus. Entrepreneurship & Tax L. Rev. 267.
2018 Symposium
Innovation in Media and Entertainment Law
Featured speakers included Jim Spencer, founder of Newsy, and First Amendment Expert Dean Larissa Lidsky (among others). Our dynamic keynote speaker was Jim Spencer, founder of Newsy. The event was sponsored by the law journal BETR (The Business Entrepreneurship and Tax Law Review) and CIPE (The Center for Intellectual Property & Entrepreneurship).
2017 Symposium
Implementing and Interpreting the Defend Trade Secrets Act of 2016
Trade Secrecy
With its common law origin, trade secrecy has long been an integral layer of intellectual property protection. Trade secrets are broadly defined as confidential business information whose secrecy provides an operator with economic advantage. These may include technological information that overlaps with patent rights such as manufacturing techniques or software code, but trade secret protections also extend to pure business information such as customer lists and proft margin information that are not protectable under other IP regimes. The use of “improper” means to uncover another’s trade secret is ordinarily deemed an actionable misappropriation under both civil and criminal law. Most trade secret cases involve situations where an employee has left to join (or found) a competitor. Those cases draw in employment and contract law issues and challenge the fundamental nature of a competitive market.
Defend Trade Secrets Act
In 2016, a bipartisan majority of Congress enacted the Defend Trade Secrets Act (DTSA) that provides for a federal civil cause of action for trade secret misappropriation as an additional layer to the individual state rights already in existence, as well as for a new seizure order mechanism. Many factors remain unclear. How does the new law integrate with other state law doctrines after considering the federal supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution; how will the seizure orders be implemented; while overlapping, are the federal trade secret rights distinct from state rights; can the federal trade secrecy rights also protect individual privacy?
Symposium Program
Featured Speakers included Berkeley Law Professor Peter Menell and Trade Secrets Expert Mark Halligan (among others). Our dynamic keynote speaker was Professor Orly Lobel from the University of San Diego. Professor Lobel is the author of the great book Talent Wants to Be Free. The event is sponsored, in part, by our new journal BETR (The Business Entrepreneurship and Tax Law Review). The focus is partially on protecting information – but also employment law and competition issues that ensue.