Dustin Marlan
Associate Professor of Law, Director of the Institute for Innovation, and Director of the Intellectual Property Clinic
Areas of Expertise
- Advertising and Marketing Law
- Copyright Law
- Entertainment, Arts, and Sports Law
- Entrepreneurship and the Law
- Intellectual Property Law
- Internet Law
- Media Law
- Privacy Law
- Public Interest Law
- Science and Technology Law
- Trademark Law
Biography
Dustin Marlan is an Associate Professor of Law at the University of North Carolina School of Law, where he directs the Intellectual Property Clinic and teaches courses in intellectual property and privacy law. His work sits at the intersection of advertising law, cultural theory, and technology, with particular attention to how legal doctrines shape meaning, identity, and power in modern markets.
Professor Marlan’s scholarship has appeared in leading law reviews, including UC Davis Law Review, William & Mary Law Review, Boston University Law Review, and Berkeley Technology Law Journal. His writing examines trademark distinctiveness, the right of publicity, privacy, and the regulation of emerging technologies, often drawing on rhetoric, metaphor, and semiotics to challenge core assumptions in intellectual property law. His recent work includes “Servicing Trade Dress” and “The Trademark Bargain,” with current projects exploring the limits of arbitrariness in trademark law and the phenomenological dimensions of algorithmic privacy.
Before joining UNC Law, Professor Marlan taught at UMass Law and served as a Clinical Teaching Fellow at the University of Michigan Law School. He practiced intellectual property and technology law at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati and K&L Gates and, prior to law school, worked as a paralegal at Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner. He received his J.D., cum laude, from the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School.
Selected Publications
The Arbitrary Myth, 40 BERKELEY TECH. L.J. (forthcoming 2026).
The Trademark Bargain, 75 AM. U. L. REV. (forthcoming 2026).
Servicing Trade Dress: Demystifying the Tertium Quid, 58 U.C. DAVIS L. REV. 1513 (2025).
Westlaw | Lexis/Nexis | SSRN
Psychedelic Capitalism and the Perceptual Threshold, 103 B.U. L. REV. 643 (2023).
Westlaw | Lexis/Nexis | SSRN | Hein
The Nightmare of Dream Advertising, 65 WM. & MARY L. REV. 259 (2023).
Westlaw | Lexis/Nexis | SSRN | Hein | BEPress
The Dystopian Right of Publicity, 37 BERKELEY TECH. L.J. 803 (2022).
Westlaw | Lexis/Nexis | SSRN | Hein
Is the Word "Consumer" Biasing Trademark Law?, 8 TEX. A&M L. REV. 367 (2021).
Westlaw | Lexis/Nexis | SSRN | Hein | BEPress
Rethinking Trademark Law's "Consumer" Label, 55 GONZ. L. REV. 422 (2020).
Westlaw | Lexis/Nexis | SSRN | Hein
Unmasking the Right of Publicity, 71 HASTINGS L.J. 419 (2020).
Westlaw | Lexis/Nexis | SSRN | Hein | BEPress
Beyond Cannabis: Psychedelic Decriminalization and Social Justice, 23 LEWIS & CLARK L. REV. 851 (2019).
Westlaw | Lexis/Nexis | SSRN | Hein