At a dinner hosted by the Entertainment Law Society last Wednesday, Pierce Law alumna and IP lawyer Diane Chubb (who eschews the "entertainment lawyer" label because it applies to anyone involved in show biz, not just IP attorneys) spoke about her experiences working for Twentieth Century Fox. Chubb started her career at Fox through an internship. Her advice to students who want an internship: find it on your own, because the career services office has difficulty finding enough internships the students who want them.
Chubb enjoyed her job protecting Fox's 7000+ trademarks, except for the salary. She has a collection of toys, posters, etc., given to her by Fox, which she says would rather give merchandise than pay. In some cases, infringement was easy to detect. Legitimate merchandise from "The Simpsons" contains the abbreviation TCFFC, for Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. Many of the infringing products had the letters in the wrong order, or the wrong number of spikes in Bart Simpson's hair.
Copyright issues involving photographs taken on the set of the X-Files were more difficult. Photographers who were given possession of copyright but signed a contract stating they would not do so released photos to several publishing houses. They had clearly violated their contracts, but stopping them required knowing exactly which photos were released. A picture of someone in one pose and a picture of the same person in an ever so slightly different pose are not copies of each other, so one would not infringe the other, which forced Chubb to meticulously match them up.
Chubb is now a consultant, doing most of her work for the graphics design firm whose owner convinced her to go to law school.
Chubb enjoyed her job protecting Fox's 7000+ trademarks, except for the salary. She has a collection of toys, posters, etc., given to her by Fox, which she says would rather give merchandise than pay. In some cases, infringement was easy to detect. Legitimate merchandise from "The Simpsons" contains the abbreviation TCFFC, for Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation. Many of the infringing products had the letters in the wrong order, or the wrong number of spikes in Bart Simpson's hair.
Copyright issues involving photographs taken on the set of the X-Files were more difficult. Photographers who were given possession of copyright but signed a contract stating they would not do so released photos to several publishing houses. They had clearly violated their contracts, but stopping them required knowing exactly which photos were released. A picture of someone in one pose and a picture of the same person in an ever so slightly different pose are not copies of each other, so one would not infringe the other, which forced Chubb to meticulously match them up.
Chubb is now a consultant, doing most of her work for the graphics design firm whose owner convinced her to go to law school.
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