The Debriefer
Writers And The Law With Donna Ballman
What It Is
Copyright! Libel! Censorship! Not to mention piracy, contracts and plagiarism!
Legal issues affecting writers hit the headlines every single day.
And what if your characters encounter the law?
The Debriefer is here to inform, amuse and inspire you - a real-life legal drama twice a month!
Presented by award-winning Florida lawyer and author of The Writer's Guide to the Courtroom, Donna Ballman.
Donna represented Bill Clinton as his Florida General Counsel for his first presidential campaign. She has been named a Lawdragon 500 Leading Plaintiffs' Lawyers in America and regularly teaches seminars to both lawyers and writers.
Latest Shows
The Narcissistic Personality Disorder of Facebook
This week we talk about why you shouldn’t expect a check for your Huffington Post blog; why you may never be able to write a cookbook, use your checkbook or book a flight again; why you might be hanged if you’re too uppity on Facebook; how to lose $1 million and still keep your job; [...]
Go to show »Smaug The Dragon Sues Hobbit
This week we’ll be talking about an agency that has agreed to stop discriminating against older writers; a big company that has dropped attempts at censorship; a TV show that has copyright issues; allegations of censorship at the London Book Fair; whether Twitter might run afoul of UK libel law; a TV show that a [...]
Go to show »When Good Lawyers Go Bad
This week we talk about how the world is about to change for ebooks in a big way and why we need to be worried, a presidential candidate who thinks he can use your work without paying, a suit over bogus takedown notices, copyright versus patent lawyers in a major showdown, something you need to [...]
Go to show »Donna Is Sheriff For A Day
This week we talk about Amazon taking its name a little too seriously, why Paramount wants a Mario Puzo screenplay to sleep with the fishes, a trademark battle over an ape man, putting pirates out of business, and why a new version of Sherlock Holmes is anything but elementary. Plus, we talk about why your [...]
Go to show »Acting Up Over ACTA, Dicing With DRM
This week we talk about why some works you thought were public domain might be back in copyright; why Wikipedia went dark; how a copyright law that did pass may affect you; school-book censorship; whether Amazon has gone all Capt. Jack Sparrow on us; why some publishing insiders are abandoning DRM; and a law that [...]
Go to show »What Facebook Really Thinks About You
This week we talk about trademark-eating zombies, how signing a check may cost you your copyright, why you might already be a public figure, which famous writer’s heirs’ reign of terror is over, a publisher claiming copyright on rights that didn’t exist, whether agents should have ethics, and how writing a memoir might cost you [...]
Go to show »Here Comes Your Monster Lawsuit!
The Google Book Settlement has been abandoned – but like some monstrous zombie rising from the dead, the litigation continues. Attorneys for the Authors Guild have filed a motion for class certification, the first step towards a ruling that might decide whether Google’s book scanning amounts to copyright theft. Also – when is a blogger [...]
Go to show »Eddie Izzard Is Evil!
Not really – but the English lawyer he plays in “The Good Wife” certainly is… another stupefyingly ballsy case of plagiarism… copyright is failing to feed artists… and Donna has some terrific personal news – all in this action-packed episode of the net’s No.1 real-life legal drama! Presented by leading lawyer Donna Ballman with literary [...]
Go to show »Buzz Cuts
More news, ruminations and legal shenanigans for writers – presented by leading lawyer Donna Ballman with literary agent Peter Cox. Don’t forget – you can post topics for Donna to discuss in Donna’s Domain inside the Colony. [Audio clip: view full post to listen] Download the show as mp3 file Subscribe in iTunes Subscribe to [...]
Go to show »Drawing Offence
More news, ruminations and legal shenanigans for writers – presented by leading lawyer Donna Ballman with literary agent Peter Cox. Don’t forget – you can post topics for Donna to discuss in Donna’s Domain inside the Colony. [Audio clip: view full post to listen] Download the show as mp3 file Subscribe in iTunes Subscribe to [...]
Go to show »Barney The Copyright Monster
A new and frightening way of limiting our free speech… How Barney got into a copyright mess… Why you should never sing Happy Birthday… and the inside poop on jury nullification. All this and more on this week’s show! Presented by leading lawyer Donna Ballman with literary agent Peter Cox. Don’t forget – you [...]
Go to show »Interns Are Slaves: Chinese Walls Are Nonsense
More great news you need and enlightening analysis from the confluence of writing and the law. Presented by leading lawyer Donna Ballman with literary agent Peter Cox. Don’t forget – you can post topics for Donna to discuss in Donna’s Domain inside the Colony. [Audio clip: view full post to listen] Download the show as [...]
Go to show »Julian Assange, The Unauthorised Biography
He’s the quintessential international man of mystery: Julian Assange has surprised the world again by (a) suddenly and secretly publishing his autobiography, and (b) immediately denouncing it and his publishers, Canongate! What happens under these circumstances? Listen to the latest Debriefer to find out… Presented by Donna Ballman with Peter Cox. Don’t forget – you [...]
Go to show »The Doctrine of First Sale
The First Sale Doctrine says that if you possess a copy of a book that you bought legally, then you have the right to resell it after you’re done with it. This allows second-hand bookstores to exist – and also allows libraries to buy and then lend out books. Now, a legal ruling has narrowed [...]
Go to show »Tall Stories From An Ugly War
An author who will be familiar to listeners of Radio Litopia’s Between The Lines show has got himself into trouble. We interviewed Nicolai Lilin a year ago, and found his first book, Siberian Education, very powerful. But his second, Free Fall: a Sniper’s Story is attracting controversy over its veracity. Ostensibly a brutal first-person account [...]
Go to show »
Litopia is the winner
of the first Golden Twits Award for excellence in social media.