Power Of Attorney

A Tufts graduate who works in media and labor law has been named a “lawyer to watch” by Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly.

Medford/Somerville, Mass. [09.08.06] The legal issues surrounding employment in the mass media field are changing just as swiftly as the technologies that deliver news. Keeping pace with the changes is Jessica Foster, a 1994 Tufts graduate and media labor attorney at the Boston law firm of Prince, Lobel, Glovsky & Tye. Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly recently named her one of the "Up & Coming Massachusetts Lawyers in 2006."

"This firm has a nationally recognized media and intellectual property practice, and media entities have a lot of interesting employment issues," Foster told the Weekly, noting that her love of the media was prompted by her post as op-ed editor of the Tufts Daily.

Foster, who graduated from Tufts with a bachelor's degree in political science, says that one of the questions she harbored early in her career was "whether or not I could succeed - getting over fears of being so young and getting ahead in the profession." She was graduated from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1997.

So far, however, Foster—who splits her time between Prince Lobel's media and intellectual property group and its employment and labor law group—has proven herself more than capable. She’s represented a Vermont newspaper before the National Labor Relations Board; trained New York newspaper managers on avoiding sexual harassment claims; defended a Connecticut-based publisher against advertising discrimination charges; and negotiated a case involving a talk radio libel claim.

"Media entities are very creative, and they don't want to have an overregulated atmosphere," she explained to Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly. "But there's a balance between respecting what our clients want to accomplish and getting them to respect the law."

Foster's clients run the gamut of mass media, ranging from print newspapers and magazines to cable and Internet companies. The emergence of electronic media, she noted, has changed some of the issues she deals with as a media labor and employment law attorney.  

"There's a big contraction in the newspaper world," Foster acknowledged to the Weekly, pointing out that the growth of the online media industry has caused some shakeups, including employee reassignments and layoffs. But despite the decline of the newspaper industry and the boom in online publications, Foster is optimistic for the future of both.

"I'd never give up a daily, hard-copy newspaper," she told the Weekly. "But, with people walking around with Internet access on their phones, the media will be able to expand their audiences."