Joho the Blog
An Entry from the Archives

Harvard Law has approved a course I'll be co-teaching with the Berkman Center's John Palfrey during Spring 2008. Holy crap.

It's called The Web Difference? Digital Media, Entertainment, and the Law. Here's the description:

This course will examine the claim of Internet exceptionalism and the implications of this claim in the context of the law and society. Is the Web something substantially new that is changing the fundamentals of who we are and how we're together? Or is it just the next in the communication media humans have invented? What are the problems to which these changes give rise? Which of these problems are ones that we'd like to address through reforms in the law, technology environment, markets, social norms, or other yet-to-be-discovered modes of influence? This course will cover the legal and policy issues to which changes in the news media and entertainment businesses, wrought by the web, give rise. Key doctrinal areas of inquiry include intellectual property, the First Amendment, defamation, and privacy. Students should be prepared to experiment with new technologies, including a course weblog, and to perform some coursework collaboratively. Course requirements include gro up coursework and a final paper, and no examination.

Oy. Not only haven't I taught since 1986, the topics the course plans on covering are way beyond my reach. So, thank heaven for John Palfrey. I am totally thrilled to work with him. (I won't go on to list JP's virtues both because he's modest and because he's my boss at the Berkman Center. But you can just ask anyone.)