The students' seminar papers have been published on this site, and may be found by clicking here.

(Last updated January 9, 1998)

This Web page is intended for use by students (associates) at the University of Iowa College of Law, Iowa City, Iowa USA, enrolled in the Cyberspace Law Seminar (Firm) [Catalog: 91:624] offered by Nicholas Johnson. The first firm meeting was held Wednesday, January 15, 1997. As the seminar evolves this page will provide links to information about the seminar, the associates and their projects.

If you are not enrolled in this seminar, although you are not forbidden to examine this page and its links, you are requested to maintain the privacy of those who are enrolled. You will find the pages primarily to be administrative in nature, rather than providing many useful links to substantive material (which can be found, however, on the page listing some of my favorite Web pages). The pages here are being created as a resource for those enrolled and on premises in Iowa City, rather than as a facility for a Web-available distributive education course. -- Nicholas Johnson

!NEW Current Notices NEW!

"Watch this space," as they say on the empty billboards. It's where you'll find notices of things you need to know. I'll try to remember to date these notices, and put them in reverse chronological order, so you can quickly see if there's a new notice you haven't read yet.

Reading Assignments (April 9, 16, 23): For the past two or three weeks the associates have been working on final papers/proposals, thus there have been few entries here. For the next (and last) three sessions associates will be making oral presentations to the firm. The reading assignments for associates is to read the papers that will be presented at those sessions. Instructions on finding those papers is being provided by e-mail. Once the papers have been edited into final draft by associates they will be edited, formatted and uploaded to a location that can be found from here. An announcement to that effect will be posted here at that time. April 4, 1997

Final Class Product (see "Firm Group Work Product," below) March 4, 1997

Assignment for March 5 (see "Assignments," below) March 4, 1997

There is now a table listing associates' choice of global corporations (see "Administrative Reference Material," below) February 26, 1997

A new section, Individual Associates' Work Product, below, has been begun with a paper of Chris Gaspar's February 25, 1997

The assignment for February 26, initially distributed as e-mail February 21, was posted here with hot links (see "Assignments," below) February 22, 1997

The schedule for the remainder of the semester, "Semester Schedule," was distributed as e-mail February 21, and posted here (under "Administrative Reference Material," below) February 22, 1997

"Papers: Modules" was e-mailed February 21, and posted here ("Assignments," below) February 22, 1997

An explanatory memo about "Companies," sent as e-mail February 20, has been posted here (within "Assignments," below) February 22, 1997

Memos have been added, formerly distributed as e-mail and/or in hard copy on January 26, 1997, January 29, February 3, February 7, February 12, and February 17. See below. February 17, 1997

Academic and Writing Credits. See the "Administrative Reference Material" section, below. February 5, 1997

Companies. There are three new memos regarding the largest, relevant global corporations. See "Twenty Companies," "90 Richest" and "Feedback on Companies," below. February 3, 1997

Assignment, in the form of a memo regarding a number of aspects of the seminar papers, has been posted. It involves things you should be working on between now and next Wednesday evening. See Assignments section below, "Assignments for January 23-29 Period." January 25, 1997

CLS Bibliography has been begun; first entries are full texts of some ten e-zines. See CLS Bibliography, below. January 23, 1997

Request for common information in country descriptions. See Assignments, below. January 22, 1997

Summary of country information and sources papers and discussion January 15. See new sub-section, Firm Group Work Product, below. January 22, 1997

We now have e-mail addresses for every associate. See Administrative Reference Material, below. January 22, 1997

Country selections have been updated. See Administrative Reference Material, below. January 22, 1997

Information Arcade Training Session [revised January 22 (time change); revised January 19, 1997 (time change); posted January 17, 1997] You wanted a guided tour of the Web from the Information Arcade. You got it. Here are the details, including a hot link to the Arcade's explanatory Web page. See also the January 29 Information Arcade Reminder Memo.

Law School's Web-Accessible Computers [posted January 17, 1997] Having trouble finding access to computers that can take you to the Web? Here's what I found out on a tour of the Law School's facilities. Of course, if you already have easy Web access from computers at home, work, law school, or elsewhere at the University, you don't need to read this.

Seminar Design and Philosophy

Initial Pre-Class Memo, January 8, 1997 (If you are new to the class, be sure to read this. If you were enrolled pre-January 15, 1997, you should have received a hard copy version in your mail folder. It might be useful to re-read this from time to time throughout the semester.)

January 15 -- What We Did, Why We Did It (This is additional explanation of the seminar design and philosophy, in the form of a commentary on what was going on at our first firm meeting -- and why. It should be, at a minimum, a useful recap for everyone. If you are new to the class, it is not a substitute for coming to see me about the first session, but it might be a useful thing to read before doing so.)

Assignments

Assignment for March 5 (This memo, sent in hard copy and as e-mail March 3 is a reminder that associates are to present reports about their selected global corporations at the next firm meeting, Wednesday evening March 5)

Papers: Modules (This memo, sent as e-mail February 21, 1997, proposes "modules," or sections, that should be incuded in the seminar papers, and requests that they be handed in as prepared rather than all together as a "first draft" of the entire paper)

Assignment for February 26 (This memo, sent as e-mail February 21, 1997, contains the references to the Web sites that you are to visit prior to Professor Carlson's presentation Wednesday evening, February 26)

Assignment for February 19 (This memo, distributed February 17, 1997, as e-mail and in hard copy, explains the presentations each associate is to prepare for February 19, and makes reference to scheduling and other assignments.)

Assignment for February 12 (the memo regarding your listing of Information Economy technologies/services and the legal/public policy issues they potentially raise. February 7, 1997)

With regard to those of your assignments involving some of the largest global corporations engaged in relevant businesses, you may find useful Sarah Thier's two memos for you, Twenty Companies and 90 Richest (How many of those on Forbes' 400 Richest Americans list, worth over $1 billion, got there with Information Economy enterprises?), and my summary of your nominations: Feedback on Companies. Additional clarification is provided in the February 20 memo, Companies . And see the table listing associates' choice of company as of the date indicated, Associates' Selection of Global Corporations.

CLS Web: Associates' Poll (This is the January 26, 1997, request for your expression of preferences regarding pictures, Web pages, and related matters. And see "Conferences and Web Pages," a February 3, 1997, report on that poll, listed in "Administrative Reference Material" below.)

Assignments for January 23-29 Period (This is a somewhat lengthy memo regarding the seminar papers you are, or will be, working on, itemizing some of the tasks you should be working on now, including a request for a proposed schedule from you to me some time prior to February 1)

Assignments for January 16-21, 1997 Period

Personal Bio Memo Instructions (Your personal bio is due by January 21. If you have prepared one for a class of mine before, and want to use it, or a revision of it, you probably do not need to read this memo. If you are not familiar with what I am looking for, you should read this before writing.)

Country Descriptions. See the memo below, "Countries: What We Want to Know, Where We Go to Find It," for my detailed request regarding common information in everyone's country description.

CLS Bibliography

Because our project bibliography ultimately will include many sub-sections, and reference to the full text of some documents, one click takes you to the Resources Web page, from where you can then click your way to sub-pages. What's there now (January 23) are full-text samples of some ten e-zines of possible interest and use to you. You are, as you know, encouraged to e-mail to me your own nominations for inclusion in our bibliography.

Individual Associates' Work Product

This section will contain samples of associates' work product. It is not presented as "the best," or as "a model." By the same token, the failure to post work product here does not represent a judgment that it is unworthy of posting. What's here is good. It is illustrative.

First up is Chris Gaspar's February 12 paper, Range of Legal/Policy Questions Posed by Information Age/Economy Technologies. See, above, Assignment for February 12 for the assignment to which this was the response.

Firm Group Work Product

Final Class Product (This memo contains specific suggestions regarding the posting of associates' papers on a Web site at the conclusion of the seminar)

Countries: What We Want to Know, Where We Go to Find It (This is, primarily, Ken Limore's summary of your papers, and our joint discussion, January 15 regarding the kind of information we'd like to have about a country in which a client is considering investment, and the sources we'd go to for that information. It also has my opening comments about common information I would like for each of the country descriptions to contain.)

See also, above, "Feedback on Countries."

Feedback

Asian Country Identification Exercise (No names (you can ask for your score if you're curious); but here are the numbers on best- and least-known countries, and number of associates identifying given numbers of countries, from our January 15, 1997 class exercise)

See also, above, "Countries: What We Want to Know, Where We Go to Find It," and "Feedback on Companies."

Administrative Reference Material

Firm Roster and E-Mail Addresses

Country Selection (by associate)

Country Selection (by country)

Associates' Selection of Global Corporations (A table, added/updated February 26, 1997, listing associates alphabetically by last name along with the global corporation each has chosen to report about)

Topics (A table/chart listing associates alphabetically, with country, technology/service and legal/public policy issue. February 12, 1997)

Schedule for Semester (This memo, dated February 21, 1997, and sent as an e-mail message, lays out a proposed schedule for the last half of the semester)

Conferences and Web Pages (This memo, dated February 3, 1997, regarding the February 5 class, requested each associate schedule a conference; it also puts forth the consensus policy, and default position, regarding individual associates' Web pages)

Academic and Writing Credits (This is a memo, added February 5, 1997, regarding the academic and writing credits available for this seminar)

Administrative Memo, January 16, 1997 (If you are reading this page you probably don't need to see this. It's a Web posting of a memo, already distributed in hard copy to mail folders, about e-mail and this Web page.)