Returning to Fowler School of Law as an adjunct professor this spring is double Panther alumna Kaitlin Peterson (JD\/MBA \u201916), currently working as associate general counsel at US multinational tech conglomerate Meta, bringing a wealth of experience in gaming, IP and entertainment law to campus. You might think that gaming and entertainment law would have been an obvious choice for this lively and driven Orange County advocate, but when the gaming penny finally dropped, it took Kaitlin Peterson by surprise.<\/p>\n
As a student at Chapman, Peterson found her way into any number of leadership roles: President of Moot Court, President of the Sports and Entertainment Law Society, and Treasurer of the Student Bar Association, to name a few. With a natural affinity for sports and being part of team, she sought internships with the Angels baseball team, and the World Poker Tour\u2013a hybrid of entertainment and sports that played as a TV show and also included gambling\u2013 but It was only in former general counsel of Blizzard Entertainment, Eric Roeder\u2019s gaming law class at Chapman that the proverbial penny dropped with a resounding, \u201cThis. Is. It!\u201d for Peterson.<\/p>\n
A casual gamer in her youth, Peterson was a quick study of both Blizzard\u2019s gaming portfolio and what her soon-to-be mentor from Blizzard had to offer her and her Chapman class from his years of experience in gaming law. Peterson excelled under Roeder\u2019s mentorship and tutelage, securing a widely coveted role as in-house counsel at Blizzard and staking her own claim as one of Blizzard\u2019s up-and-coming legal advocates. Four years later, amid the waxing and waning of tech company fortunes and the ascendancy of social media giant Facebook\/META, Peterson felt she had \u201cGrown beyond [her] role at Blizzard\u201d and joined the Silicon Valley digital behemoth in 2020, supporting gaming partnerships, contract deals, and entertainment licensing for public-facing programs for META Games. Fast forward another four years, and she is now a rising star in META\u2019s Reality Labs legal team, a mixed-reality gaming platform aimed at augmented devices that, to paraphrase Marty McFly, “You may not be ready for, but your kids are going to love!” This new form of mixed\/augmented technology represents a new frontier for the law, digital rights, rights to privacy, in-house advocacy and education.<\/p>\n
What Peterson brings to Chapman this spring is something not typically found in law school syllabi. Drawing on her extensive experience as in-house counsel in the tech sector, working with teams of whip-smart creatives, coupled with her leadership experience starting as far back as her MBA years at Chapman, Peterson intends to walk Fowler School of Law students through the essential relationship-building between attorney and client (and their in-house teams) that positions in-house counsel as an ally, not an adversary. Sure, there\u2018s the meat and potatoes of entertainment and gaming law to get through, too, but Peterson\u2019s unique contribution is located squarely in positioning the in-house legal team as an advocate for the organization and <\/em>an ally for the creative team, something she finds essential from her recent experience at META.<\/p>\n \u201cChapman already teaches excellent practical knowledge and expertise,\u201d she says, \u201cI\u2019m here to show students how to take that and be a good partner when you are an in-house attorney.\u201d<\/p>\n For Peterson, the early development of her career came from the scaffolding, career opportunities and guidance her mentors provided her with. Her hope is to return the favor and pass along hard-won lessons, insider insights, and leadership skills gleaned in the trenches of the tech sector. We are thrilled to have this alumna return to Fowler School of Law to offer these same gifts of guidance, experience, and unique insight from a generation-defining industry like social media and entertainment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It’s Game On! With Meta’s Tech-Savvy Associate General Counsel<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4618,"featured_media":14550,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"custom_author_name":"","chapman_pin_hero_slider":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[25,386,387,3,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","category-dale-e-fowler-school-of-law","category-entertainment-and-sports-law-symposium","category-faculty","category-general-news"],"yoast_head":"\n