Public Patent Foundation
Services offered: Reexaminations of patents. Pre-litigation counseling, representation and negotiation. Representing defendants in patent litigation. Patent-related only. (No trademark or copyright services.) No patent applications or prosecution.
Eligibility criteria: Economically disadvantaged businesses (including sole proprietors, partnerships, corporations or other entities) accused of infringing dubious patents.
Regions covered: Nationwide in U.S.A.
Fees charged: Clients are expected to pay costs, but normally not attorney fees.
Public Interest Intellectual Property Advisors, Inc. (PIIPA)
Services offered: PIIPA is the global non-profit resource for developing countries and public interest organizations seeking expertise in intellectual property matters to promote health, agriculture, biodiversity, science, culture, and the environment.
Eligibility criteria: Assists governments of developing countries, non-profit organizations in developing countries, and non-profit organizations in developed countries that help developing countries.
Regions covered: All developing countries
Fees charged: None
Patent, Trademark & Copyright Section
Services offered: Amicus briefs
Contact: Ralph P. Albrecht, Chair
(202) 216-8166
Eligibility criteria: No formal criteria
Regions covered: Nationwide in U.S.A.
Fees charged: None
Patent Pro Bono Florida
Services offered: A statewide program of the Arts & Business Council of Miami and Dade Legal Aid to provide under-resourced inventors with pro bono patent attorneys.
International Trademark Association
Services offered: Through its Pro Bono Committee, INTA has established the Trademark Clearinghouse pilot program to bolster the protection of intellectual property by matching eligible clients facing trademark issues with INTA member attorneys so that legal services can be provided free of charge.
The Clearinghouse is intended to serve low-income individuals and/or directors of nonprofit or charitable organizations with low operating budgets (1) who might otherwise not know where to turn or (2) who don’t have access to legal assistance in the area of trademarks. This clearinghouse is the only one currently in existence that is dedicated primarily to trademarks.
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Services offered: Litigation defense, with concentration on “impact litigation”, i.e., precedent setting cases; nationwide referrals to attorneys in technology cases.
Eligibility criteria: No formal criteria
Regions covered: Nationwide in U.S.A.
Fees charged: None
Law School Clinic Certification Program
Services offered: This program allows applicants to obtain pro bono legal assistance in both patent and trademark matters while allowing law students enrolled in a participating law school’s clinic program to practice intellectual property law before the USPTO under the strict guidance of a law school faculty clinic supervisor.
Patent Pro Bono Program
Services offered: A nationwide network of independently operated academic and nonprofit organizations that endeavor to match volunteer patent practitioners with financially under-resourced inventors seeking patent protection.
Letter Supporting CASE Act
IIPSJ sends a letter to Congressman Jefferies supporting passage of the CASE Act.
The Institute for Intellectual Property and Social Justice (IIPSJ) hereby submits the following comments in support of passage of the Copyright Alternative in Small-Claims Enforcement Act of 2019 (HR 2426). IIPSJ was established to address the social justice implications of intellectual property law and policy both domestically and globally. IIPSJ’s work ranges broadly, and includes the scholarly examination of intellectual property law from the social justice perspective; advocacy for social justice-cognizant interpretation, application, and revision of the intellectual property law; efforts to increase the diversity of the intellectual property legal bar; and programs to empower historically and currently disadvantaged and marginalized communities through the development, protection, use, and exploitation of intellectual property.
Click here to read full letter.
MMA
Update on the Passage of the Music Modernization Act
- Idia Egonmwan, a 2L student attorney in the Intellectual Property Clinic at Howard University School of Law.
As many of our membership will recall, earlier this year IIPSJ submitted to Congress both formal comments and also a letter on behalf of intellectual property law and other scholars to support passage of the Compensating Legacy Artists for their Songs, Service, and Important Contributions to Society (CLASSICS) Act and the Music Modernization Act (MMA), and otherwise undertook a public campaign in support of these legislative bills. We are pleased to report that these and other grassroots and other efforts were successful and both acts were passed by Congress on September 18, 2018 (combined into a revised Music Modernization Act) and signed into law by President Trump on October 11, 2018.
What is the Music Modernization Act (MMA)?
The MMA mitigates many of the economic and social inequities perpetuated in the music recording business by creating uniformity in legal protection for pre- and post-1972 sound recordings via the federal copyright system.[1] The MMA is broken into three parts:
- Title I establishes a musical licensing collective to issue and administer blanket mechanical licenses for the use of sound recordings to digital music services and to and collect and distribute royalty payments directly to rights owners, including performing artists;
- Title II compensates pre-1972 sound recording artists by creating a royalty structure; and
- Title III creates a legal right for various musical contributors (producers, mixers, and sound engineering) to collect royalties for digital transmissions of sound recordings.[2]
The IP Social Justice Impact of the MMA
African American and other marginalized creators and artists have historically suffered from legal and social limitations upon their freedom to contract, inequities exacerbated by the systemic manipulation and abuse of the copyright law and music sound recording contracts and licensing agreements. “Legacy” recording artists such as Otis Redding, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, and the Temptations were especially disadvantaged in that copyright protection did not extend to pre-1972 sound recording.[3] As a result of the passage of the MMA, composing artists will benefit from more equitable royalty structures under the Copyright Section 115 compulsory mechanical (recording) license (which historically exploited the inferior bargaining power of all artists, but particularly artists of color) (Title I); limited music copyright protection in the form of a digital performance right has been extended to pre-1972 “Legacy” sound recording artists (Title II); and a right for previously uncompensated producers, mixers, and sound engineers to collect royalties for their creative contributions has been established. (Title III).
Fair Compensation and IP Social Justice for Music Creators and Performers
The Music Modernization Act (MMA) is a progressive step for copyright law and the American recording industry, ultimately providing legacy, current, and future musical artists with more equitable compensation for creating, sharing, and performing their work. Utilizing intellectual property as a means of social justice in the music industry is a small subset of how IP law can be used to empower and rebuild marginalized communities. Although not perfect, the MMA represents the outcomes that can be achieved when legal scholars, legislators, and intellectual property and other social justice activists collaborate to preserve the purpose of copyright and other intellectual property law: to promote and encourage socially equitable and beneficial creative labors.
[1] See the Letter from Lateef Mtima, Dir., Institute for Intellectual Property & Social Justice, to Chuck Grassley, Chairman, U.S. S. Comm. on the Judiciary, Dianne Feinstein, Ranking Member, U.S. S. Comm. on the Judiciary, Bob Goodlatte, Chairman, U.S. House of Rep. Comm. on the Judiciary, Jerrold Nadler, Ranking Member, U.S. House of Rep. Comm. on the Judiciary (Mar. 14, 2018)
[2] See Mark Wittow, A Modern Melody for the Music Industry: The Music Modernization Act Just Passed Congress and Awaits Presidential Approval, The Nat’l Law Review (Oct. 2, 2018), https://www.natlawreview.com/article/modern-melody-music-industry-music-modernization-act-just-passed-congress-and-awaits
[3] Id.