Paul is uniquely qualified to facilitate settlement of entertainment-related and copyright disputes. Paul has served as a neutral in over 80 music, feature film and TV disputes involving the Motion Picture Association of America, the Recording Industry Association of America, Internet Service Providers, and ISP subscribers.
In 2017, Paul successfully mediated a multi-party dispute involving the star of a TV series concerning the foreign tax treatment of compensation. In 2018, Paul was appointed as an arbitrator in a licensing and manufacturing dispute between the owners of a TV show and a toy manufacturer. In 2019, Paul was appointed as an arbitrator in a dispute involving the estate of a world-famous novelist concerning theatrical rights. In addition, Paul represented one of the world’s first Internet-based streaming entertainment content companies and was involved in all aspects of production and content agreements, talent contracts, relations with SAG/AFTRA and other guilds, advertiser agreements and software development agreements.
Paul has acted as lead counsel in copyright disputes involving software, databases, website content, gaming, music, photographs, images and architectural works. Paul has also been recognized as a leading Copyright Lawyer by his inclusion in Best Lawyers in America® for Copyright Law and Intellectual Property Litigation and by the Copyright Society of the USA twice as a mid-year meeting co-chair and speaker.
For the past two years, Paul was a speaker at San Diego Comic-Con International on a panel of prominent lawyers and a 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals Judge speaking about artificial intelligence, data privacy and the legal treatment of issues raised by the HBO’s hit TV show Westworld. In June 2018, Paul spoke on a panel before the Beverly Hills Bar Association on Successful Entertainment Arbitrations and Mediations, with the Senior VP and Head of Litigation of a major studio and a VP of the American Arbitration Association.
Since 2008, Paul has been an Adjunct Professor of Law at Pepperdine University School of Law’s No. 1 ranked Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution where has taught law students and lawyers how to mediate copyright and entertainment-related disputes and conducted many simulated mediations in his course entitled “Selected Issues in Dispute Resolution: Intellectual Property Disputes.”
Paul is a member of the Entertainment Law and Intellectual Property Sections of the Beverly Hills Bar Association, the Los Angeles County Bar Association and the State Bar of California.
Mediator Paul E. Burns, Esq.
633 West 5th Street, 26th Floor
Los Angeles, CA 90071
Tel: 424-303-3066
Email: paul.burns@mediatorpaulburns.com