All VLS Courses

Corporations and Other Business Structures B

This course provides an introduction to the basic legal principles that govern a variety of business organizations, including partnerships, limited liability companies, and corporations. Issues covered include the selection of a business form, business formation, governance and management, tax, financing and dissolution. The fundamentals of the federal securities laws are also covered.

Accounting and Business Fundamentals is recommended, but not requir

Digital Drafting

The impact of digital technologies on the practice of and business of law is already profound - and it will only grow in coming years.  This course will focus on the on how these technologies affect legal drafting, with particular attention to document assembly systems, expert systems, and XML contracting.  In addition, the class will consider the historical background of law and technology, the logical basis for such legal documents as contracts, wills, statutes and regulations, and the theory, expounded by scholars such Lessig, of embedding law in code.  We will also consider the secondary effects on law, lawyering and the legal profession likely to arise from the digitization of many legal tasks.
 
In addition to the reading and class discussions, students will learn basic programming techniques and will undertake drafting projects.

Entertainment Law

This course will cover the legal and business issues faced by attorneys practicing in the entertainment industry. The first half of the course will focus on the body of laws that form the basis of entertainment properties, including copyright, privacy and publicity, defamation, unfair competition, and obscenity. The second half will cover the contractual, financial and structural considerations that arise in the normal course of the entertainment business. The course will end with a contract negotiation and drafting project.

Not offered in 2009-10.

Human Nature and the Law Seminar

Legal systems are examples of human behavior, and any external study of this behavior must be rooted in a model of what makes people work. This course will take as its starting point the idea that humans are biological creatures, and that human nature and its manifestation in the law can be profitably approached from a biologically informed viewpoint. Students will build on this foundation to examine concepts of culture and other influences on social interaction that help to shape legal systems.

Not offered in 2009-10.

Property

An introduction to the concept of ownership and its legal implications: rights to control, enjoy, and transfer real and personal property, including public and private restrictions on use; estates in land; concurrent ownership; adverse possession; easements and licenses; and landlords and tenants.