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Abstract:
This article analyzes recent attempts made by the Arica Institute, the Church of Scientology, and Star's Edge - reaching, in each case, the relevant Circuit Court of Appeals - to apply intellectual property law to prevent the unauthorized dissemination of their spiritual teachings and techniques. As the article details, such concerns have been raised in connection with a wide range of traditional and modern practices, including Zen, Kabbalah, Yoga, Sufism, Christian Science, est, Reiki, the Gurdjieff Work, A Course in Miracles, and Transcendental Meditation.
The article draws on a variety of primary sources, including trial transcripts, appellate pleadings, Web sites, confidentiality agreements, rare publications by and about these groups, and an interview conducted with Arica's founder. It identifies and evaluates ten justifications for spiritual secrecy, including the claim that individuals prematurely exposed to advanced texts and techniques (or to misinterpretations of them) might suffer spiritual and psychological harm.
Also discussed in this context are: special concerns of authorship, fair use, trade secret law, and the First Amendment, particularly in the era of the Internet; parallels to secrecy and malpractice issues in the psychotherapeutic professions; the patentability and copyrightability of meditative movements; and the protection of spiritual materials as traditional knowledge.
religion, sacred, copyright, fair use, trade secret, patent, moral rights, nondisclosure agreement, intellectual property, first amendment, church and state, traditional knowledge, indigenous peoples, psychology, psychiatry, psychotherapy, informed consent
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Abstract:
As customers go on-line rather than stand in line, financial institutions have been quick to accommodate this new form of interaction by constructing banking Web sites. However, federal regulators are increasingly concerned that the operators of these sites make appropriate disclosures to consumers and implement privacy policies for information collected through such sites.
This article discusses the latest efforts by regulators and recommends that banks make the text of required disclosures displayed on their Web pages into hyperlinks to the home pages of the appropriate regulatory agencies. In addition, the article proposes the creation of industry-wide icons (such as the scales of justice for the "legal terms and conditions" of use of the site, and a padlock for the site's "privacy policy") that banks could display on their home pages to indicate their adherence to a standardized set of provisions.
Appendices to the article set out a "Proposed Uniform 'Terms and Conditions' Statement" (governing such issues as liability limitations, security, confidentiality, and intellectual property rights) and a "Proposed Uniform Privacy Policy" (defining, and discussing the bank's treatment of, information collected "passively" versus that collected "actively," indicating the bank's restrictions on employee access to information, and expressing the institution's commitment to the maintenance of accurate information).
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