Hello,
My first posting on OGF. :)
> So, to all of you lawyers and business people in the know: Where is the
>best law school for IP? I'm considering Franklin Pierce because they
offer a
>Masters in Intellectual Property along with the JD, but I have never heard
of
>them.
When picking your law school, I'd advise just going to the best law school
you get into. It makes life much less difficult, and you'll have your pick
of jobs from any field, including IP. At one time, none of the top schools
focused on IP and so 'boutique' schools like Franklin Pierce flourished.
Nowadays, Stanford, Columbia et al have very strong IP programs and so
there is no reason to go to a second tier school to study IP.
Of top tier schoools, I would suggest NYU, Columbia, Stanford, and Berkeley
as having very strong IP programs but any top tier school is fine. I
predict that Stanford will rise to be the #1 IP school in the country, at
least with regards to 'cutting edge' electronic-type IP.
> And one more question for my application essay... How, exactly do IP
>attorneys work in the gaming industry and what potential do they have to
>influence the industry? Are there many? If not there probably will be
soon,
>wouldn't you say?
First off, let me say that an interesting background and good essay can
carry you quite far in the law school admissions process. I'm a recent
graduate of Harvard Law School. When I applied, I had good grades and
LSATs, but I was coming from a state school without any particular prestige
and had no scholarships, fellowships, or research papers to my name. I got
in largely because the admissions committee was impressed by my experience
as a professional miniatures wargames designer. Apparently the admissions
committee was unaware that there were miniature wargames, let alone that
people made money designing them. :) So, if you can bring to bear
experience in the game industry and future plans to return to it, the law
schools will eat it up, I expect.
As to the actual impact of IP lawyers on the game industry� in my own
experience, I�ve worked with several IP lawyers. They did the following for
me:
(1) registered trademarks
(2) drafted intellectual property transfer agreements
(3) reviewed game development contracts to ensure that the IP created was
properly allocated between publisher and developer
IP lawyers are specialists and as such are not your day-to-day counsel for
corporate affairs, nor are they typically the lead negotiators. Their work
runs from the humdrum to the theoretical/interesting. If you work in
academia, you�ll do more of the latter, if you work for a firm its largely
humdrum. (For that latter reason I decided after graduating not to actually
work in law, and am now working in the computer game industry.)
Best regards,
Alexander P. Macris
WarCry Corp. -- Chief Executive Officer
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Tele: 617.354.7843
Cell: 617.515.6934
Fax: 253.423.6181
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