Ipse Dixit

In this episode, Aliza Shatzman, an attorney and advocate based in Washington, DC, discusses her article "Untouchable Judges? What I've learned about harassment in the judiciary, and what we can do to stop it," which will be published in the UCLA Journal of Gender & Law. Here is the abstract:Drawing from the author’s own experience of gender discrimination, harassment, and retaliation during her clerkship and in the years following it by a former DC Superior Court judge, this Article analyzes the deficits in current federal and DC judicial reporting systems to demonstrate the urgent need for reform. I argue that harassment in the judiciary is pervasive, due to both enormous power disparities between judges and law clerks, and various institutional barriers that perpetuate misconduct and discourage reporting. I survey existing methods of judicial discipline in both the federal and DC Courts and argue that these provide insufficient redress for workplace misconduct. I then discuss the Judiciary Accountability Act (JAA) (HR 4827/S 2553), which would finally protect judiciary employees, including law clerks and federal public defenders, under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, enabling employees to sue their harassers and seek damages for harm done to their careers, reputations, and future earning potential. Furthermore, I argue that the DC Courts should be included in the JAA, because they are Article I courts created and regulated by Congress, and DC Courts judges are arguably federal judges for Title VII and disciplinary purposes. I also offer a variety of other proposed reforms, which would both strengthen the JAA and provide additional protections to uniquely vulnerable judiciary employees. I conclude by reflecting on my attempts to report the misconduct I experienced, how the systems failed me when I tried to report, and my efforts to seek justice for myself and accountability for the misbehaving former judge.This episode was hosted byBrian L. Frye, Spears-Gilbert Professor of Law at the University of Kentucky College of Law. Frye is on Twitter at@brianlfrye.

In this episode, Henry A. Thompson, a Ph.D. student in economics at George Mason University, discusses his article "Cosa Nostra Courts." Here is the abstract:This paper uses economic reasoning to analyze the traditions and institutions of one of the most successful criminal organizations in modern history: La Cosa Nostra (LCN). Drawing on recently declassified FBI reports, the paper's analysis shows that LCN's core institutions are best understood as attempts to protect its secrecy, an asset vulnerable to free riding by its own members. Individual members did not bear the full costs of secret-revealing police investigations and thus had a perverse incentive to resolve disputes violently. LCN preserved its secrecy by incentivizing peaceful reconciliation. La Cosa Nostra rules, and, more importantly, its informal court system, kept disputes from escalating into violence, thereby helping LCN avoid secrecy-threatening investigations. As a result, LCN has become one of the most successful and long-lived criminal organizations in the U.S.This episode was hosted byBrian L. Frye, Spears-Gilbert Professor of Law at the University of Kentucky College of Law. Frye is on Twitter at@brianlfrye.

In this episode, Laura Shin, journalist and host of the Unchained podcast, discusses her new book "The Cryptopians: Idealism, Greed, Lies, and the Making of the First Big Cryptocurrency Craze," which is published by Public Affairs. Shin describes how she became interested in cryptocurrency, how she told the story of the creation of Ethereum, and what she learned while researching the story.This episode was hosted byBrian L. Frye, Spears-Gilbert Professor of Law at the University of Kentucky College of Law. Frye is on Twitter at@brianlfrye.

In this episode, Sarah Burstein, Professor of Law at the University of Oklahoma College of Law, and Saraubh Vishnubhakat, Professor of Law at Texas A&M University School of Law, discuss their article "The Truth About Design Patents," which will be published in the American University Law Review. Here is the abstract:Design patents are hot. Scholars and policymakers are increasingly focusing on this once-niche area of law. However, many of the empirical studies in this area—including old ones that still get cited—rely on statistics and empirical conclusions that were methodologically questionable from the start, or have become outdated, or both. In this paper, we make two sets of contributions to that important and underdeveloped literature. First, we review the empirical studies of design patents thus far, including those that pre- and post-date the creation of the Federal Circuit, and we update the findings of those studies. Second, we consider a set of institutional questions that, to our knowledge, the prior literature has not even broached. Beyond the federal courts, we explore design patent enforcement at the ITC and the use of administrative process to challenge design patents in the Patent Trial and Appeal Board. These contributions put the design patent system into much-needed context with broader debates about U.S. intellectual property policy.This episode was hosted byBrian L. Frye, Spears-Gilbert Professor of Law at the University of Kentucky College of Law. Frye is on Twitter at@brianlfrye.

In this episode, Sarah Moosvi of Protean DAO, Tara Digital Collective and aGENDAdao discusses now she became interested in NFTs and DAOs. Among other things, she explains why DAOs are a useful tool for NFT artists, and how NFT artists use the DAO structure in their work. She also reflects on problems with the DAO structure, including inequities DAOs can perpetuate, especially in relation to members of minoritized communities. This interview was conducted in the convention center at Art Basel Miami Beach. Moosvi is on Twitter at @m00sv1.This episode was hosted byBrian L. Frye, Spears-Gilbert Professor of Law at the University of Kentucky College of Law. Frye is on Twitter at@brianlfrye.

In this episode, Simon Indelicate of The Indelicates describes the creation and sale of his first NFT collection, which consisted of 30 "perpetual admission tickets" for an "imaginary theme park" called Arcadia Park. Simon describes his career as an independent musician, including the creation of the Arcadia Park album. He explains how he repurposed the album for an NFT collection, and why it was consistent with his long-standing objections to the music industry and how it uses copyright. He discusses his experiences, offering advice to other musicians interested in creating NFTs. And he reflects on the future of his project. Simon Indelicate is on Twitter at @simonindelicate and Arcadia Park is at @ArcadiaParkNews.This episode was hosted byBrian L. Frye, Spears-Gilbert Professor of Law at the University of Kentucky College of Law. Frye is on Twitter at@brianlfrye.