This is the second lesson on title insurance. This lesson is designed to build on what you learned in the first lesson, Title Insurance Basics. Title insurance is a critical component of modern real estate transactions. Anyone buying, selling or owning any interest in real estate, and every lawyer needs to know about title insurance. It's a lot more complicated that the general public believes.
This lesson provides students with an overview of the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Although the lesson does not assume any prior knowledge of the statute, it is nonetheless useful to test more advanced students' knowledge.
This lesson focuses on a tort relation, one where the agent harms the third party, giving the third party a tort claim. Our inquiry is on whether the third party can bring this claim against the principal and the related policy. The lesson is cognizant that this may be your first encounter with agency, a concept that serves as the foundation of business law.
The lesson also includes problems that address Coasean irrelevance (which is often known as the "Coase Theorem").
This lesson reviews the process of tracing wrongfully diverted money or property through a series of exchanges. Students are expected to have a basic familiarity with in-specie remedies such as replevin and constructive trust. The lesson provides problems for students to consider practical evidentiary issues in locating and proving the identity of property and to practice the application of rules for tracing funds into and out of commingled accounts. The lesson will be most useful for review by students in remedies, debtor-creditor or bankruptcy courses.
This lesson introduces the rules governing trademark assignments and licenses under common law and the Lanham Act. It may be used either as review or as the initial introduction to the topic.
This lesson reviews the various defenses to and remedies for dilution available under federal and state law. It can be used either to learn the material for the first time, or to review material already learned in class. The lesson assumes familiarity with several trademark concepts, including dilution (and the prerequisites for dilution protection) and fair use.
This lesson has been removed for revisions due to changes in the law.
This lesson explores the definition of trademark dilution, from its origins in the early 20th century, through the current Federal Trademark Dilution Act. Attention is given to both state and federal laws on dilution, and the elements of a claim under both state and federal law.
This lesson covers the types of marks that are deemed eligible for protection under federal and state dilution laws. Although the focus is on eligibility under the Federal Trademark Dilution Act (Lanham Act section 43(c)), there is coverage of the different types of state dilution statutes -- those based on the earlier (1964) Model State Trademark Bill (such as Massachusetts), and those based on the federal statute.
This lesson addresses the trademark doctrine of "exhaustion/first sale." The doctrine governs the trademark owner's continuing rights regarding authentic goods bearing the mark put into the marketplace. The lesson assumes familiarity with trademark's policy objectives, the basic "likelihood of confusion" test for infringement and "fair use," in particular nominative fair use and the problems associated with implied sponsorship.
This lesson covers the fair use and related "nominative" fair use defenses to claims of trademark infringement. It assumes basic familiarity with trademark policy, the "generic to fanciful" spectrum of distinctiveness trademark classification system, and the likelihood of confusion test for infringement. It can be used (1) as a stand-alone introduction, (2) as a supplement when time restrictions limit in-class coverage, or (3) to reinforce points made during class.
This lesson discusses the social policy justifications for the legal protection of trademarks. It provides a general understanding of how those policy objectives derive from market economic principles as well as how they drive the core elements of trademark law. This lesson may be useful preparation for a first class on trademark law or to reinforce points made during a class on trademark policy.
This lesson is a follow up to the European Union-Trademark Basics lesson. It presents additional information concerning two topics: "Unusual" marks and Exhaustion of trademark rights. (With regard to the latter, there is a comparison with U.S. law in the lesson.) At a minimum, users should be familiar with U.S. trademark law and should either review the Basics lesson or be generally familiar with EU trademark law. This lesson may be best used for review and additional learning.