Professor Christal Sheppard served as part of an intellectual property panel at the AALS Annual meeting in Washington DC. "The Nuts, Bolts and Duct Tape of Reform" was held on January 4, 2015.
Below is the full description of the panel:
Washington institutions influence intellectual property law profoundly: IP-specific agencies like the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office or U.S. Copyright Office, other executive agencies such as the U.S. Department of Commerce, and of course Congress. What obstacles arise in guiding reform of IP law though the complex policy process in Washington? What biases? What can we learn from recent episodes in Washington such as passage of the America Invents Act, the ongoing examination of orphan works at the Copyright Office, or the PTO’s report on trademark over-enforcement? In this session, panelists with significant firsthand experience will discuss the nitty-gritty of IP policy making in Washington, DC, and ways that scholars can play a positive role in reform efforts.
Moderator: William McGeveran, University of Minnesota Law School
Speaker: Justin Hughes, Loyola Law School
Speaker: Mark P. McKenna, Notre Dame Law School
Speaker: The Honorable Sharon Prost, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
Speaker: Pamela Samuelson, University of California, Berkeley School of Law
Speaker: Christal Sheppard, University of Nebraska College of Law
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Professor Sheppard helped to draft the 2014 USPTO Annual Report in late 2014. Highlights from that report were featured in the National Law Review in January.