Event Summary

Come learn about the basics of copyright at this presentation and Q & A session:

U.S. Copyright Basics

• What is a copyright?
• Who owns a copyright?
• When does a copyright exist?
• What is the effect of registration?
• What is the effect of a copyright notice?
• What is a release?
• What is a license?
• Copyrighted works involving people or third party works
• Basics of Fair Use
• Remedies in the United States
• DMCA
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Facilitator: Professor Lolita Darden, George Washington University

Professor Lolita Darden is a SAG-AFTRA actor, content creator, and a registered patent attorney. Ms. Darden’s legal work includes all aspects of IP creation, exploitation, and protection, including patent, trademark, and copyright matters. She has participated in several legal precedent setting patent and trademark cases, as well as copyright cases that have led to positive outcomes from a social justice perspective.

Currently, Ms. Darden is a Visiting Associate Clinical Professor and Director of the IP and Technology Law Clinic at The George Washington University Law School, which provides IP legal services to clients from communities that have been historically and intentionally excluded from access to economic opportunity. Previously, Ms. Darden was a tenured Associate Clinical Professor and Director of the IP Clinic at Suffolk University Law School for six years, where she supervised students on all aspects of IP practice including litigation.

Before joining Suffolk University, Ms. Darden was a partner at Sachnoff & Weaver, where she led the patent prosecution department, assisted with IP litigation, and represented small and emerging businesses in asserting and protecting their IP rights. Prior to joining Sachnoff & Weaver, Ms. Darden was Chief IP Counsel for a small consumer productscompany, where she managed the company's IP prosecution and litigation portfolios and pioneered a strategy for strategically using and creating IP assets that enhanced the company's competitive strength.

As a law professor, Ms. Darden has taught IP survey, trademark law and practice and patent law and practice. Ms. Darden is also a C-IP Scholar at the George Mason University Center for Intellectual Property and Innovation Policy, where her scholarship focuses on the protection and preservation of IP rights for creators and inventors. She is also a member of the Giles S. Rich American Inn of Courtand recently appointed by Secretary of Commerce, Gina Raimondo, to the Patent Public Advisory Counsel.

WALA programs and activities are sponsored in part by the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities. 

Event Details

• Date

  November 18, 2025

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• Time

  11:00am - 1:00pm

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• Venue

  Online