David Nimmer

Practice Areas

David Nimmer is of counsel to Irell & Manella LLP, where he is a member of the Intellectual Property group. Widely recognized as a foremost expert on copyright law, Mr. Nimmer testified before Congress about copyright reform in 2014. In addition to client work, he updates and revises Nimmer on Copyright, the standard reference treatise in the field, first published in 1963 by his late father, Professor Melville Nimmer. Routinely cited by domestic and foreign courts at all levels, cases within the U.S. have relied on Nimmer on Copyright as authority in over 3,500 judicial opinions. Mr. Nimmer is the lead author of Chambers’ 2022 Copyright guide.

Mr. Nimmer has twice served as co-counsel representing clients before the U.S. Supreme Court. On the first occasion, a unanimous decision in favor of his client drew the boundaries between copyright and trademark protection. In the second, another unanimous decision in favor of his client set the stage to compensate all freelance journalists in the country for their past articles.

In 2022, as co-counsel, Mr. Nimmer obtained a settlement for director Quentin Tarantino in a breach of contract and copyright and trademark infringement suit brought by his former studio Miramax, which involved Tarantino’s plans to publish portions of his “Pulp Fiction” screenplay via NFTs (non-fungible tokens).

Mr. Nimmer earned his J.D. from Yale Law School in 1980, where he was editor of the Yale Law Journal. He earned his A.B with distinction and honors from Stanford University in 1977.