Copyrights in Estate Planning and Divorce: A Thorny Set of Issues

Copyrights in Estate Planning and Divorce: A Thorny Set of Issues

With Ivan Hoffman, B.A., J.D.

Copyrights are assets in a class all by themselves since dealing with these assets involves an estuary of federal and state laws. There are many potential legal pitfalls when dealing with clients who have copyrights within an estate planning or divorce context.

Among the most important issues dealing with copyrights and estate planning are whether a testator (or even someone dying intestate) can leave these assets to anyone he or she chooses or whether the federal copyright law and including but not limited to the Supremacy Clause determine what parties may exercise important rights to these copyrights. And among these rights are the rights to terminate transfers.

Additionally, copyrights can have significant implications in terms of divorce including the possibility that, under legally appropriate circumstances, marital settlement agreements involving copyrights may be terminable.

And mixed into all the above issues are whether copyrights are even community property for it is by no means clear that copyrights are such community property.

So if you deal with estate planning or divorce matters and have clients who have, or wish to claim rights in copyrights, then this workshop is a must. 

Presenter: Ivan Hoffman, B.A., J.D. attended UCLA as an undergraduate (1961-1965) and law school (1965-1968). He was in the Moot Court Honors Program. He is now in his 45th year of practice. Mr. Hoffman’s work deals with Entertainment Law, Internet Law and Intellectual Property Law (music, records, films, television, Internet Law, authors, publishers, web site designers, site owners) including issues related to copyrights, trademarks, licensing, agreements and similar matters. He has authored numerous articles on this divorce/estate planning topic which have been published in the Los Angeles Daily Journal, San Francisco Daily Journal, California State Bar Trusts and Estates Planning Quarterly, State Bar of California Family Law Newsletter and State Bar of Georgia Family Law Review. Mr. Hoffman has taught widely including at UCLA Extension and published numerous articles. 

WORKSHOP PRICING:

• General Admission: $20 Online.


• CLA Members: $10 Online. Requires Member Access Code.


• CLA Senior Members $5 Online. Requires Member Access Code.


• CLA Student Members $5 Online. Requires Member Access Code.


• [$10 Extra At-the-Door]