Annual Mosaic IP Law and Policy Roundtable Conference
Mosaic IP Law and Policy Roundtable Conference
The Mosaic IP Law and Policy Roundtable connects IP scholars with political activists, practicing attorneys, community organizers, and policy makers to produce activist scholarship, to collaborate on various IP Empowerment policy initiatives and projects, and to otherwise help to shape and effectuate a progressive and contemporary IP socio-legal agenda.
About the Conference
Each IP Mosaic Conference is typically organized around a specific IP social justice legal issue, policy, or socio-economic challenge. Representative conference themes include equitable access to health, medicines, knowledge, and information; socially beneficial application of information technology and related advances to IP development and dissemination; legal protection for traditional and indigenous knowledge and expression; and promoting IP awareness, education, and entrepreneurial and socio-political empowerment in marginalized communities. The conference format is principally comprised of paper or project presentation sessions and plenary panel discussions. In addition, keynote presentations and “incubator project” and work in progress sessions are also mainstays of the conference.
Co-hosted by Marquette University Law School
2024 Theme | Looking Forward, Looking Back: IP Social Justice & Promoting Human Ingenuity
The IP Mosaic Conference is a unique convening of a diverse collective of academic scholars, policy leaders, and activists who meet to consider and critique IP protection. As we look back on 10 years of the IP Mosaic Conference and revisit the place where it all began, we reflect on the progress we’ve made in the last decade and consider where we go from here. One major evolution in IP law and policy is that the social justice obligations and effects of the IP regime are not questioned and this fundamental principle is now part of the prevailing scholarly and political discourse. In this Tenth Anniversary convening of IP Mosaic we will endeavor to consider what else has changed over the past decade? What remains the same? Has the way we think about humanity and creativity, and how IP protection can serve to foster human actualization towards society’s ultimate benefit changed? And what does progress look like moving forward?
Program Agenda
Friday, November 1
9:30 – 9:45 am CDT
2:30 – 2:45 pm GMT
Welcome & Remarks
Joseph D. Kearney, Dean and Professor of Law, Marquette University Law School
9:45 – 10:50 am CDT
2:45 – 3:50 pm GMT
Plenary Session: The New WIPO Treaty on Intellectual Property, Genetic Resources and Associated Traditional Knowledge: Origins, Context and Significance
Moderator: Metka Potočnik, Senior Lecturer in Law, University of Wolverhampton, Law School and Director of The F-List for Music CIC
Panelist:
Wend Wendland, Director, Traditional Knowledge Division, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and Adjunct Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Cape Town
10:50 – 11:00 am CDT
3:50 – 4:00 pm GMT
Break
11:00 am – 12:00 pm CDT
4:00 – 5:00 pm GMT
Paper Presentation Panel 1: Creation, Access, and Dignity
Moderator: TBD
Presenters:
Michael Goodyear – Dignity and Deepfakes
Arunima Shastri and Himika Batra – Making Intellectual Property Greener: Aligning India’s Patent Regime with Environmental Sustainability through Eco-Patents
Cynthia Dahl and Vicki Phillips – Looking Forward: Data from IP Law Clinics on Their Role in Increasing Access to Justice (invited)
12:00 – 1:00 pm CDT
5:00 – 6:00 pm GMT
Meal Break
1:00 – 2:00 pm CDT
6:00 – 7:00 pm GMT
Paper Presentation Panel 2: Creation and Identity
Moderator: TBD
Presenters:
Tim McFarlin – State-Law Authorship
Sakshi Sharma – The Scarlett Letter (of Infringement) (invited)
Sarah (Fackrell) Burstein – Ornamentality and Crime
2:00 – 2:10 pm CDT
7:00 – 7:10 pm GMT
Break
2:10 – 3:15 pm CDT
7:10 – 8:15 pm GMT
Plenary Session: From Accommodating AI to Achieving Inclusivity: Opportunities for Contemporary IP Policy
Moderator: Lateef Mtima, Professor of Law, Howard University School of Law & Founder and Director, Institute for Intellectual Property and Social Justice (IIPSJ)
Panelists:
Tony Sebro, Change.org
Meredith Rose, Public Knowledge
Ann Chaitovitz, United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO)
3:15 – 3:25 pm CDT
8:15 – 8:25 pm GMT
Break
3:25 – 4:25 pm CDT
8:25 – 9:25 pm GMT
Paper Presentation Panel 3: Traditional Knowledge and Social Justice
Moderator: TBD
Presenters:
Dalindyebo Shabalala – Taking Customary Law Seriously: Domestic Recognition of Traditional Knowledge
Kay Dunn – Empirical research for social justice in intellectual property and cultural creativity
Jack Lerner – Indigenous Expression, Social Justice, and Copyright: Lessons From Hawaiʻi’s Copyright History (invited)
5:00 – 7:00 pm CDT
HAPPY HOUR for in-person attendees
Saturday, November 2
9:30 – 9:45 am CDT
2:30 – 2:45 pm GMT
Welcome & Remarks
Lateef Mtima, Professor of Law, Howard University School of Law & Founder and Director, Institute for Intellectual Property and Social Justice (IIPSJ)
9:45 – 11:15 am CDT
2:45 – 4:15 pm GMT
Paper Presentation Panel 4: Student Papers
Moderator: Tuneen Chisolm, Howard University School of Law
Presenters:
Samantha Lai – Expanding Creative Horizons: Fair Use of Celebrity Portraiture
Usayd Siddiqi – Butter Chicken to Big Data: Preventing Excessive Protection in Sui Generis Regimes
Christelle Tchaou, J.D. – Systemic Solutions for Systemic Racism: Proposing an Equitable Fair Use Defense to Patent Infringement as a Part of Reparations to Historically Underserved Communities
11:15 – 11:25 am CDT
4:15 – 4:25 pm GMT
Break
11:25 am – 12:30 pm CDT
4:25 – 5:30 pm GMT
Paper Presentation 5: TBD
Moderator: Lateef Mtima, Professor of Law, Howard University School of Law & Founder and Director, Institute for Intellectual Property and Social Justice (IIPSJ)
Presenters:
TBD
12:30 – 1:30 pm CDT
5:30 – 6:30 pm GMT
Meal Break
1:30 – 2:55 pm CDT
6:30 – 7:55 pm GMT
Paper Presentation Panel 6: Intellectual Property Theory and Social Justice
Moderator: TBD
Presenters:
Eden Howard (Wednesday Eden) – The ‘Unpropertizable’ Public Domain in UK and EU Copyright Law
Metka Potočnik – Humanity of Songs
— 5 min Break —
Justin Koo – De-Colonizing Copyright Law
Akshat Agarwal – Enabling Creative Production
2:55 pm CDT
7:55 pm GMT
Closing Remarks
Lateef Mtima, Professor of Law, Howard University School of Law & Founder and Director, Institute for Intellectual Property and Social Justice (IIPSJ)
Thank you to our Conference Planning Committee!
Conference Planning Committee
Jasmine Abdel-Khalik, University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law Kali Murray, Marquette University Law School
Tuneen Chisolm, Howard University School of Law Metka Potocnik, University of Wolverhampton, Law School
Betsy Rosenblatt, The University of Tulsa, College of Law Jack Lerner, UC Irvine School of Law
Lateef Mtima, Howard University School of Law Kara Swanson, Northeastern University School of Law
Since 2014, IIPSJ has sponsored the IP Mosaic Conference. Through the IP Mosaic, IIPSJ collaborates with a law school host to provide a venue in which to explore the social ordering function of IP protection in the total political economy, particularly the law’s social justice obligations in promoting human rights and actualization, cultural and technological progress, and self-determination and nation-building.
The IP Mosaic Conference was established to bring together scholars, law and policy makers, and social activists of diverse and multicultural backgrounds and perspectives to explore progressive, social justice-oriented ideas in intellectual property law, policy, and social activism. Beginning in the late twentieth century, digital information technology and other innovations sparked a paradigm shift in scholarly assessment of the social ordering function of IP protection, exposing the need to critically examine the law’s social justice obligations in promoting human rights, self-determination, cultural progress, and nation-building and evolution. IP law and policy makers traditionally value scholarly analyses in their development and interpretation of IP protection. Progressive, social justice-oriented IP scholarship, especially when infused with the experience and insights of policy makers and social activists, can provide the doctrinal basis for shaping a more socially responsible IP legal regime.
IIPSJ Institutional Partners
Leading IP Discourse
Leading IP Discourse
Becoming the central hub for thought-provoking intellectual property law dialogue between industry partners, practicing professionals and mission aligned allies
IIPSJ’s programming such as the Annual MOSAIC conference and our International work forms connections between practicing lawyers, educators, students, corporations, and nonprofits in addition to frequently held online learning workshops
Latest in Leading IP Discourse
Annual MOSAIC Conference
The IP Mosaic Conference is a unique convening of a diverse collective of academics, policy leaders and activists who meet to consider and critique IP protection
IIPSJ International
To date, IIPSJ has conducted CLE and other collaborations with colleges and universities in the Caribbean and South Africa.
Our Foreign Scholar Residency Program exposes participants to US practices that inform their professional work.
Open Access Video Library
Catch the full slate IIPSJ programming including past events such as the Social Justice CLE and HBCU Tech Law Summit, all streamable from our YouTube video library below