I recently came across an outfit called Cubby Law. Their website currently explains how it works as follows:
Cubby creates a personalized study system you can rely on from day one of the semester through finals.
Cubby uses your course materials and permitted professor materials to tailor your practice to your class, so you’re not just practicing Contracts, you’re practicing for your Contracts exam.
Those paragraphs were edited in the last few days. According to the Wayback Machine, it formerly stated:
Cubby creates a personalized study system you can rely on from day one of the semester through finals. Powered by analyzing your professor’s teaching style, course materials, and past exams.
Upload your outline, notes, slides, and past exams. Cubby adapts to your professor’s teaching approach, emphasis, and exam style, so your practice mirrors how you’ll actually be tested.
Just last week the latter paragraph still stated:
Cubby trains on your professor's actual materials, past exams, and model answers so you're not practicing Contracts, you're practicing your professor's Contracts exam.
The original phrasing clearly encouraged students to upload materials provided by faculty, whether permitted or not.
I assume the latest edit was done, at least in part, because I sent Cubby a detailed demand letter explaining that their use of my materials, name, image, and likeness violated both state and federal law.
I know other faculty have also complained.
In a transparent attempt to avoid legal liability for theft of intellectual property, Cubby’s current web site includes a page attempting to put the burden on students who upload materials:
It is every student’s responsibility to understand their school’s specific honor code and follow it.
Some honor codes address how professor-created materials, such as syllabi, past exams and lecture slides can be used. Some schools restrict uploading these materials to third-party platforms, while others draw the line differently. These policies vary, and it’s your responsibility to understand your school’s specific rules.
If your honor code restricts uploading professor materials to third-party tools, that restriction applies across the board: Cubby, ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, NotebookLM, or any other tool. We do not condone using Cubby in any way that violates your school’s academic integrity policies.
Note that Cubby’s website states:
If your school restricts uploading professor materials, Cubby works well with your own notes and outline.
The UCLA Honor Code
Sections 102.01 and following of the UCLA Honor Code identify the various sorts of conduct that violate the code. Section 102.04 provides:
102.04a: Theft includes taking without expressed permission or, misappropriation of, any property or services of the University or property of others while on University premises or at official University functions; or possession of any property that the Student had knowledge or reasonably should have had knowledge was stolen.
102.04b: Damage or destruction of any University property, or the property of others while on University premises or at official University functions.
Section 102.05b provides:
Violations of copyright laws, whether by theft, unauthorized sharing or other misuse of copyrighted materials such as music, movies, software, photos or text.
Section 102.23 provides:
102.23a: Unauthorized Use, Distribution, or Sale of Academic Materials
Selling, preparing, or distributing for any commercial purpose academic materials including, but not limited to, written, video or audio recordings of any course, or course materials, unless authorized by the University in advance and explicitly permitted by the course instructor in writing. The unauthorized sale or commercial distribution of academic materials including, but not limited to, recordings by a Student is a violation of the UCLA Student Conduct Code whether or not it was the Student or someone else who prepared the materials. This policy is applicable to any recording in any medium, including handwritten or typed notes.
102.23b: Copying Course Notes
Copying for any commercial purpose handouts, readers, or other course materials provided by an instructor as part of a University of California course unless authorized by the University in advance and explicitly permitted by the course instructor and the copyright holder in writing (if the instructor is not the copyright holder).
Thus, uploading the Cubby any of the PowerPoint decks, the sample exams, the handouts, and so on that I provide students would violate the honor code.
Students currently enrolled in a course may provide a copy of their own notes or recordings to other currently enrolled students for non-commercial purposes reasonably arising from participation in the course, including individual or group study.
At least here at UCLA, students who upload “their own” notes to anyone other than “other currently enrolled students” violate the honor code.
Copyright Law
I am the author and copyright owner of these course materials. Cubby’s business model relies on copying my work, uploading and processing it through its systems, and then using it to create derivative materials that it sells commercially. I have never authorized Cubby to use my work in this way.
These activities—including copying my materials, creating derivative works from them, and distributing them without my permission—implicate my exclusive rights under 17 U.S.C. § 106. The fact that a student may have uploaded a copy does not give Cubby permission to commercially exploit my work. A student’s access to my course materials does not give that student the authority to grant a commercial company a license or sublicense to use, reproduce, or create derivative works from them. As such, Cubby faces exposure for contributory infringement if it has knowledge (or reason to know) that users are uploading infringing copies and materially contributes to or induces that infringement. In addition, by charging subscription fees, selling advertising, or otherwise monetizing the AI teaching-assistant service while having the technical ability to filter or block infringing uploads would face heightened vicarious liability exposure.
Defenses that Won’t Work
Cubby may claim a fair use defense. Although teaching and similar educational uses are listed in § 107 as valid examples of fair use, the educational category applies more naturally to the student-user than to a commercial platform that profits from the arrangement.
Cubby might invoke the DMCA safe harbor for information stored “at the direction of a user” under § 512(c), but this defense has important limitations. To qualify for the defense, the platform must, among other things: designate a DMCA agent, adopt a repeat-infringer policy, lack actual knowledge or red-flag awareness of infringement, respond expeditiously to takedown notices, and not receive a financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing activity where it has the right and ability to control it. Critically, moreover, Cubby’s own model training, indexing, output generation, and deliberate reuse of uploaded material likely fall outside the “storage at the direction of a user” rationale. A platform that actively processes, trains on, and generates derivative outputs from copyrighted works is doing substantially more than passively hosting user-uploaded content.
California Education Code
California Education Code § 66450 prohibits anyone—including students and commercial business—from preparing, selling, distributing, sharing, or publishing, for any commercial purpose, notes or recordings of an academic presentation at a California university without the instructor’s authorization. The ban covers not just audio and video recordings, but also handwritten or typed class notes.
Outlines and study materials derived from students’ notes of my UCLA lectures, sold on a subscription basis, fall squarely within that prohibition. Note that this is another reason that uploading “their own” notes is not a defense. Uploading “their own” notes not only violates the UCLA honor code, but also California law.
California NIL Law
Misappropriation of name and likeness. Cubby uses my name to identify, organize, and market paid products tailored to “my” courses. They also use my image and likeness on their website. That is a knowing commercial use of my name and image without consent, which is actionable under California Civil Code § 3344 and California common law.
What I Would Like to See Happen Next
As noted, I sent Cubby a demand letter to which they have not responded. As a result, I am going to ask:
The UCLA Law School to adopt a policy forbidding students from uploading professor-prepared course materials and class recordings covered by § 66450, to include so-called “personal notes” to any AI for use in training such service to provide any service.
The UCLA campus administration to add a similar policy to the honor code.
The UCLA School of Law to send a collective letter to Cubby informing them of our objection and demanding that they take down the infringing materials.
As for what I’m going to do, I plan to inform my students that uploading any of my materials to Cubby is a violation of both the UCLA honor code and California and federal law.
I also hope to gather together a group of like-minded legal academics to discuss bringing a class action lawsuit to protect our right.
Watch this space for further developments.