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Disruptive Competition Project

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The Disruptive Competition Project (DisCo) explores how technology and innovation intersect with cutting-edge business, competition, and policy questions. DisCo experts focus on how disruptive change in the modern economy influences policy choices around technology both nationally, and internationally.

DisCo’s primary areas of focus are:

Competition

Some, if not all of society’s most useful innovations are the byproduct of competition. In fact, although it may sound counterintuitive, innovation often flourishes when an incumbent is threatened by a new entrant because the threat of losing users to the competition drives product improvement. The Internet and the products and companies it has enabled are no exception; companies need to constantly stay on their toes, as the next startup is ready to knock them down with a better product.

Intellectual Property

The Internet enables the free exchange of ideas and content that, in turn, promote creativity, commerce, and innovation. However, a balanced approach to copyright, trademarks, and patents is critical to this creative and entrepreneurial spirit the Internet has fostered. Consequently, it is our belief that the intellectual property system should encourage innovation, while not impeding new business models and open-source developments.

Digital Trade

Companies rely on clear, predictable rules that facilitate digital trade to export their products and services around the world. These rules include balancing the competing interests between encouraging investment and enabling information access; promoting the free flow of information online; and maintaining balanced intermediary liability regimes.

Privacy

Trust in the integrity and security of the Internet and associated products and services is essential to its success as a platform for digital communication and commerce. For this reason we’re committed to upholding and advocating for policymaking that empowers consumers to make informed choices in the marketplace while not impeding new business models.

Innovation

New technologies are constantly emerging that promise to change our lives for the better. These disruptive technologies give us an increase in choice, make technologies more accessible, make things more affordable, and give consumers a voice. And the pace of innovation has only quickened in recent years, as the Internet has enabled a wave of new, inter-connected devices that have benefited consumers around the world, seemingly in all aspects of their lives. Preserving an innovation-friendly market is, therefore, tantamount not only to businesses but society at large.

European Union

DisCo is dedicated to examining technology and policy at a global scale.  Developments in the European Union play a considerable role in shaping both European and global technology markets.  EU regulations related to copyright, competition, privacy, innovation, and trade all affect the international development of technology and tech markets.

Contributors

Jonathan Band

Copyright & Policy Lawyer, policybandwidth

Jonathan Band helps shape the laws governing intellectual property and the Internet through a combination of legislative and appellate advocacy. He has represented clients with respect to the drafting of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), and other federal and state statutes relating to intellectual property and the Internet. He complements this legislative advocacy by filing amicus briefs in significant cases related to these provisions.

Jon has also represented clients in connection to the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, the Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement, and other international agreements.

Jon is an adjunct professor at the Georgetown University Law Center, and has written extensively on intellectual property and the Internet, including the books Interfaces on Trial and Interfaces on Trial 2.0, and over 100 articles.

Jon received a B.A. in 1982 from Harvard College and a J.D. from Yale Law School in 1985. From 1985 to 2005, Jon worked at the Washington, D.C., office of Morrison & Foerster LLP, including thirteen years as a partner. Jon established his own law firm in May, 2005.

Kay Jebelli

Competition & Regulatory Counsel, CCIA Europe

Kayvan Hazemi-Jebelli (Kay) is Competition & Regulatory Counsel to the Computer & Communications Industry Association, based in Brussels. Kay has been passionate about technology ever since his dad brought home an x286 based PC. He grew up in silicon valley and learned to build computers in high-school (which he then sold on the internet, in the 90s).

Kay received his B.Sc. in Computer Science & Engineering from UCLA in 2003 before shifting towards law and the rules governing tech companies. He received his J.D. from the University of the Pacific in 2008 and his LL.M. in Competition Law from King’s College London in 2009. Since then, and prior to joining CCIA, he's worked on competition, antitrust and regulatory law in academia, in private practice, in the European Commission Directorate-General for Competition, and as Senior Legal Counsel at a leading UK media and communications company.

Matthew Lane

DisCo’s Legal Analyst

Matthew Lane went to law school specifically to be involved in important issues of technology law and policy, and took every IP class that furthered this goal. His law school papers on technology issues led to a position with former FTC policy director David Balto, where he dealt with complicated issues on behalf of consumers and technology firm clients and learned how to advocate for consumer interests. In this position, he wrote several amicus briefs on behalf of consumer groups and professors, including to the Supreme Court, and successfully led the consumer coalition that opposed the proposed Aetna/Humana and Anthem/Cigna mergers. He has since moved on to start a practice that focuses on advocacy, consumer interests, and resolving complex issues of tech law and policy.

Matthew is a true nerd who has managed to learn photography, 3D printing, drone photography and videography, and pottery in his spare time. He has built his own computers and a 3D printer from base parts and hopes to one day have a garage with a makerspace. He was once on alternate on an amateur eSports team, where he did terribly.

Matthew Lane received his J.D., cum laude, from University of Florida in 2013 and his BS in Business Administration, cum laude, from University of Florida in 2005.

Glenn Manishin

Partner, ParadigmShift Law and DisCo’s Senior Legal Analyst

Glenn Manishin serves as outside counsel to and is the senior legal analyst for Project DisCo; he has represented the Computer & Communications Industry Assn. for more than 20 years. A former AmLaw 100 lawyer and now managing partner at ParadigmShift Law LLP, Glenn’s core competence is antitrust law, although he has worked with a veritable who’s who of leading IT industry firms since 1990 on intellectual property, telecommunications, technology policy, privacy and related Internet-centric issues. Glenn’s claim to fame is that he is the only lawyer to have appeared as attorney-of-record in the two largest U.S. monopolization cases of the past generation — United States v. AT&T Co. and United States v. Microsoft Corp. — in the latter of which he was co-counsel along with former federal appeals Judges Robert Bork and Ken Starr.

Glenn received his J.D. degree from Columbia Law School, where he as a Harlan Fiske Stone scholar and editor of the Columbia Law Review, and a B.A. in economics from Brandeis University.

Glenn is a true Web pioneer, having built and launched one of the first ten law firm Web sites in 1995, and remains a prolific blogger at his Fear & Loathing personal blog, LexDigerati legal blawg and his Formula One Art & Genius grand prix racing site. Glenn’s personal motto, borrowed from John Lennon, is that “Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans.” Carpe diem!

Alex Roure

Director, Public Policy

Alex is Senior Manager, Public Policy in the Brussels office of the Computer & Communications Industry Association. He is primarily responsible for CCIA’s advocacy and engagement on European policies on data protection, surveillance and law enforcement access to data, as well as telecoms rules.

He joined CCIA in November 2017. Prior to that, Alex worked at the Brussels office of BSA | The Software Alliance, where he focused on data protection, cybersecurity, surveillance, data flows, and contract law in the digital space. Before that he worked at LVMH Moët Hennessy – Louis Vuitton and a leading EU consulting firm.

Alex holds a LL.M. in EU law from the University of Essex (UK) with a focus on European human rights law, and a French LL.B. (“Licence Droit Général”) from the Université du Sud-Toulon-Var. He is fluent in English and French, and has a basic knowledge of Italian.

Matt Schruers

President at CCIA

Matt Schruers is President the Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA). He represents the Association before Congress, courts, and the Administration and advises industry on matters including internet law, intellectual property, competition and international trade. He joined CCIA from private law practice in 2005 and has previously served as Vice President and Chief Operating Officer. He has also been an adjunct professor for over 10 years, teaching courses on intellectual property and internet law at the Georgetown University Law Center and Graduate School, and American University Washington College of Law.

Mr. Schruers received his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law, where he served on the editorial board of the Virginia Law Review, and received his B.A. from Duke University.

Rachael Stelly

Policy Counsel at CCIA

Rachael covers digital trade policy at CCIA. Prior to joining CCIA, she worked as Policy Manager at the Washington office of the Trans-Atlantic Business Council where she managed the ICT and IPR working groups. She previously interned for the U.S. Senate Finance Committee, Mozilla, the U.S. Copyright Office, the Internet Education Foundation, the National Telecommunications & Information Administration, and CCIA. She is an inaugural fellow of the Internet Law & Policy Foundry.

Rachael received her J.D. and M.P.P. from American University, where she served as the President of the Intellectual Property Legal Society, worked as a Dean’s Fellow for the Program for Information Justice & Intellectual Property, and was a student attorney in the Glushko-Samuelson Intellectual Property Law Clinic.

Rachael holds a B.A. in Political Science from Texas Tech University. She is admitted to the New York state bar.

Ali Sternburg

Vice President, Information Policy

Ali Sternburg is Senior Policy Counsel at the Computer & Communications Industry Association. After initially joining as a Legal Fellow in June 2011, she focuses on online copyright issues and other areas of intellectual property policy. She received her J.D. in 2012 from American University Washington College of Law, where she was a Student Attorney in the Glushko-Samuelson Intellectual Property Law Clinic, President of the Intellectual Property Law Society, Senior Symposium Chair and Senior Marketing Manager for the Intellectual Property Brief, and a Dean’s Fellow at the Program on Information Justice and Intellectual Property. She graduated from Harvard College in 2009 where she studied Government and Music, wrote her senior honors thesis on “Theoretical and Legal Views on U.S. Government Involvement in Musical Creativity Online,” and interned at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School.

Ali sings mashups and transformative covers and shares them under Creative Commons licenses for free download on her SoundCloud page, to contribute to the progress of science and the useful arts.

Ethan Wham

Policy Manager at CCIA

Ethan is the manager of the Disruptive Competition Project (Project DisCo) at the Computer & Communications Industry Association with a passion for Internet Governance affairs and interests in competition, innovation, privacy, and trade. He began his career path as a volunteer for the Washington DC Chapter of the Internet Society (ISOC-DC) in 2014, where he later served as an Assistant Director. He additionally worked for Public Knowledge from 2016-2017, focusing on telecom issues.

Ethan also participates in the planning and management of Internet Governance Forum USA (IGF-USA) each year and encourages anyone invested in the future of the internet, indisputably everyone, to get involved.

Ethan received his B.A. from Drew University in 2014 in Philosophy with a focus on applied ethics and a keen interest in the intersection between ethics and emerging technology.