By: Nicole Maxwell The rise of social media and technology is causing creators — and judges — to examine old-standing copyright laws more closely. Although Congress has not amended the Copyright Act since 1976, courts are enforcing the exact language of the statute even more than before.[1] In May 2023, the Supreme Court held that…

Read More

By: Leo Garonski Under the Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938, Congress significantly subsidized airlines and created the Civil Aeronautics Board to prevent restraints of trade, designate airlines routes, and control seat prices.[1]  The Act also required that U.S. citizens own at least three-quarters of each U.S.-based airline.[2]  The U.S. airline industry inflected on cost and…

Read More

By: Hannah Lief Alpine Securities Corporation (“Alpine”), a broker-dealer, is challenging the delegation of authority by the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) to Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (“FINRA”) in Alpine Securities Corp. v. Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, Inc.[1] The lawsuit arises out of Alpine’s constitutional challenge to FINRA’s enforcement of securities regulations.[2] During district court…

Read More

By: Sarah Benjamin The Antiquities Act, which was passed in 1906, gives Presidents broad discretion to designate areas as National Monuments and thereby take them out of use for commercial industries and set them aside for the sole purpose of public recreation and enjoyment.[1] Since the Act’s passage, various Presidents have designated nearly 100 million…

Read More

By: Julie Chung The rise in cryptocurrency usage and sales confused the traditional securities and financial space. The Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) typically exercised regulatory oversight to protect investors in the capital markets.[1]Cryptocurrencies have notably dodged financial regulators like the SEC with virtual currencies and sophisticated payment systems structured to avoid financial regulation.[2] Cryptocurrencies…

Read More

By: Miguel E. Serrano How does the sudden prevalence of “Wrapped” compilations fit into U.S. privacy law? On January 17, 2024, the D.C. Metro (Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority or “WMATA”) followed companies like Spotify, Duolingo, and the Washington Post in posting a 2023 “year-end review.”[1] When Spotify launched its Wrapped feature in 2015, the…

Read More

By: Gustav Gulmert According to the Environmental Working Group, over fifty percent of Americans consider their tap water as unsafe.[1]Instead, people turn to water pitcher filters for their drinking water at home, the gym, and work.[2] Zero Technologies, LLC (“Zero”) and Brita sell high-performance gravity-fed water pitcher filters approved by the NSF Foundation, a standards-setting…

Read More

By: Vincent Alfieri Universal Music Group has recently filed a lawsuit against Anthropic PBC, an Amazon backed startup, alleging that the company’s Artificial Intelligence (“AI”) chatbot infringes on the lyrics from multiple copyrighted songs.[1]  Universal’s complaint contains numerous side-by-side comparisons of the chatbot’s generated lyrics and the lyrics from copyrighted works.[2] When directed by a…

Read More

By: Kevin Quintanilla A big win may come soon to consumers due to the Federal Trade Commission’s (“FTC”) new proposed rule to ban junk fees.[1] Junk fees refer to hidden costs or extra charges that a consumer must pay, oftentimes substantially increasing the total price of a product or service.[2] These fees are frequently not…

Read More