 This course was
offered in Fall Term 2000. Course Description With the explosion of commercial activity on the 'net, the modern lawyer is being increasingly called upon to solve problems characteristic of this technology and the new business opportunities it provides. This course is intended to provide a current snapshot of the array of legal issues raised by electronic commerce, and to provide a framework for responding to problems that may arise in the future. We'll proceed from the premise that successful lawyers in this new environment will be those who understand the law, the technology, and the business of the 'net. Accordingly, legal, technological, and business issues will be integrated into the class discussion throughout. Specific topics will include: Internet networking concepts; personal jurisdiction; online contracting (including state statutory developments, digital signatures, "trusted systems," and intelligent software agents); online consumer privacy (databases, data mining, cookies, and P3P); digital property rights (including domain names, meta tags, search engines, the law of linking, MP3's/Napster, and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act); and the taxation of the 'net. Wherever possible, we'll consider hypotheticals or business school-style case studies to drive the discussion. Topics of course, are subject to change based on legal and technological developments. Links Syllabus (html) | Syllabus (pdf) Exam Answers / Explanation (pdf)
Instructor R. Polk Wagner |