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ABA Teleseminar this Thursday

By Rick Karcher, Michael McCann, Geoffrey Rapp, Greg Skidmore, and Howard Wasserman

This Thursday, the ABA Section of Antitrust Law Trade, Sports & Professional Associations Committee, Section of Intellectual Property Law, The Forum on the Entertainment and Sports Industries and the ABA Center for Continuing Legal Education are sponsoring a 90-minute teleseminar and live audio webcast titled, Whose Home Run is it Anyway? Practical Advice on Intellectual Property Issues in Sports.

The teleseminar will explore the ownership and use of intellectual property by sports leagues, their member teams, player associations, and other entities. The panel will focus on the efforts of professional sports leagues and player associations to control the intellectual property activities of both teams and third-parties, including:

• The burgeoning fantasy sports industry
• The efforts of individual teams to gain increasing control of their own intellectual property

Fantasy leagues have existed for decades, but prior to the internet age participants in those leagues typically cobbled together statistics from the sports section of local newspapers. Most leagues however consisted of small groups of friends. The growth of the internet spawned an explosion of interest in fantasy leagues, making participation more efficient and allowing firms to monetize what had once been a private system. In recent years, attempts to profit from the use of players' statistics have caused disputes between player associations, sports leagues, and third-party fantasy sports purveyors.

Panelists will also discuss disputes that have also arisen regarding intellectual property among some professional teams and the leagues of which they are members. Some teams have sought to manage and profit from their intellectual property in ways not sanctioned by the leagues, leading to legal disputes, including--most prominently--the New York Rangers' recent lawsuit against the National Hockey League.

Program Time
1:00 PM - 2:30 PM Eastern
12:00 PM- 1:30 PM Central
11:00 AM - 12:30 PM Mountain
10:00 AM - 11:30 AM Pacific
6:00 PM - 7:30 PM London
7:00 PM - 8:30 PM Brussels

Panelists
Program Moderator: Scott Walker, Counsel, Lowenstein Sandler PC
Glenn Colton, Partner, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati
Annette L. Hurst, Partner, Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP
Rick Karcher, Director, Center for Law and Sports, Florida Coastal School of Law
James Keyte, Partner, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP
Andrew Lee, General Counsel, New York Jets

This is a great way to pick up CLE credit because you can listen to the seminar right at your desk. To register, click here.

Full post as published by Sports Law Blog on February 17, 2009 (boomark / email).