Interested in sports and entertainment law? Our new podcast, Career Tracks for Law Students: Spotlighting the Sports & Entertainment Law Practice Area is just for you!
The idea of representing celebrities, athletes, authors, entertainers and their employers sounds great, but not too many applicants and students really know what the legal practice area of sports and entertainment law involves or how to get started on this career track. With that in mind, we talk with leaders in this practice area, serving both as outside and in-house counsel, and also with a professor who directs the entertainment curriculum at a top law school to get their insight on this topic.
Since jobs and career opportunities are always on the minds of students, we asked our guests about the projected growth for this sector. Fox Television Studio Senior Vice President of Business and Legal Affairs, Shelley Reid says new technology may open new opportunities. “I think that there’s more opportunity in cable but I think that if you’re in school as a freshman or a first year law student, three years from now, the business is going to look very different. Five years from now, it’s going to look very different. I don’t know how it’s going to look, but it’s changing so rapidly. So, the most important thing any young law student can do is really keep his/her eye on the ball of what’s going on in technology. Cable is here to stay, I think, for the not too distant future. I think broadcast television is going to morph into a very different way but certainly, not the mechanics but the economics of television programming across the board are going to change dramatically, podcasting, simulcasting. So, the metrics of the economy, the economics of it are going to change.”
The Managing Director of the Motion Picture Association of America’s Indian Office, Rajiv Dalal, is also a guest on the show and has some great advice for law students interested in this field. Dalal emphasized the importance of international markets and new media needs. “Anyone getting into this field on the transactional side or just even in the representative capacity that I’m in, obviously, intellectual property courses are very important in understanding copyright. But, I would say international copyright classes are really important, which I think people either aren’t afforded that opportunity within their curriculum or they overlook it because it’s so specialized.” Dalal also explains why law students should take advantage of curriculum offerings in internet and new media technology.
Other guests on the show include:
- New York Mets General Counsel, David Cohen
- Loeb & Loeb Associate, Rupen Fofaria
- Executive Director of the Entertainment Program at University of Southern California Law School, John Schulman.