Annual Report, 2016

The Tech Policy Lab at the University of Washington has had an exciting third year! From organizing national and international policy fora to helping local authorities generate best practices, the Lab continues its record of rigorous, impactful research.https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/techlab/1009/thumbnail.jp

The Lab\u27s First Year

The Tech Policy Lab at the University of Washington is off to an energetic start, thanks to a transformative founding gift from Microsoft and the efforts of our staff, students, and colleagues. We have hosted important policy conversations, carefully put into place the methods of procedure for true interdisciplinary research, and completed or initiated a variety of important projects around emerging technology policy.https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/techlab/1007/thumbnail.jp

Annual Report, 2017

The Tech Policy Lab at the University of Washington has emerged as a leading resource for policymakers interested in wiser and more inclusive technology policy. This year the Lab built on its reputation for excellence in interdisciplinary research, published scholarship and tools to benefit tech policy, and had direct input into policymaking at multiple levels of government.https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/techlab/1010/thumbnail.jp

Annual Report, 2018

The Tech Policy Lab at the University of Washington has become an indispensable source for tech policy research, education, and local, national, and international thought leadership. The Lab has worked directly with policymakers, published research and guides on emerging technologies, and provided opportunities for the public to learn from experts.https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/techlab/1011/thumbnail.jp

Second Annual Report

The Tech Policy Lab at the University of Washington continues to pick up steam in our second year. We have hosted national policy discussions, collaborated directly with policymakers on open data and other issues, and continue to develop strong, method-based interdisciplinary research.https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/techlab/1008/thumbnail.jp

ENDURING EQUITY IN THE CLOSE CORPORATION

This commemorative reflection on Wilkes v. Springside Nursing Home,, Inc. develops the theme of change/sameness in connection with equity—the source of the fiduciary duties which stood, as they often do in close corporations, as the centerpiece in Wilkes. Equity’s role in the Western legal tradition began, of course, long before Wilkes, and it endures today in the law of close corporations precisely because, ironically, it is so adaptable. Parts I, II, and III of this Article sketch the larger milieu of the Wilkes case, where details about place, industry, and company are rich in their historic particulars but where too endless change is at work in the perennial quest for survival. Part I describes the city, Pittsfield, Massachusetts, where the focal point of litigation—Springside Nursing Home, Inc. (Springside)—was located. Part II tells a bit about the key industry in the case, nursing homes, from the early 1950s to the mid-1970s—the period spanning the company’s origins to the Supreme Court decision in Wilkes. Part III highlights a few noteworthy, but little noted, facts about Springside itself. Part IV hones in on the dispute between Stanley Wilkes and his fellow shareholders in Wilkes v. Springside Nursing Home, Inc., and on how the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, in resolving that dispute, re-fashioned the equitable concerns animating thelandmark Donahue v. Rodd Electrotype Company decision. Part IV also places the Wilkes decision in a broader legal context— where it is seen as no aberration—and elaborates on how and why, in 2011, equity endures, by taking account of the inevitable flux in business relations in a way which static law does not. Equity endures even as it continually eludes law’s attempted subduing by rules, with the result that equity itself must still be endured by those involved in close corporations