February 13, 2025 • 45 mins
Thinking about leaving your 9-to-5 to start your own business? It’s not as easy as it looks.
In this episode of From Crisis to Justice, Parag Amin sits down with Chuong Bui, a former engineer turned successful entrepreneur, to discuss the real challenges of transitioning from employee to business owner. Chuong shares the lessons he learned when taking the leap into entrepreneurship—what worked, what didn’t, and what every aspiring entrepreneur should know before making the jump.
Key takeaways include:
- Making the Transition – The mindset shift from employee to entrepreneur and what no one tells you.
- Risk vs. Reward – How to take calculated risks without betting everything on one move.
- Building a Sustainable Business – Why long-term planning and adaptability are crucial for success.
- Lessons from Experience – What worked, what didn’t, and what every aspiring entrepreneur should avoid.
If you’re an entrepreneur, business owner, or thinking about making the jump from employee to business leader, this episode is packed with insights you won’t want to miss.
Learn more about Chuong Bui:
Chuong's Firm Website: https://counselforcreators.com/
Chuong's Firm Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/counselforcreators/
Learn more about Parag Amin:
Parag's Business Law Firm: https://lawpla.com
Parag's Personal Website: https://paraglamin.com
Follow Parag:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/paragaminesq
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hi, I'm Parag Amin.
Welcome to my podcast.
From Crisis to Justice.
As a lawyer and entrepreneur, I'mpassionate about helping small business
owners successfully navigate situationsthat can kill a business.
As a kid, I watched my dad's dreamsof being an entrepreneur were destroyed
by an unethical businessman, and I don'twant that to happen to you or your family.
(00:22):
That's why I started my law firm.
I want to protect and defend businessowners and their legacies from crisis.
Welcome to From Crisis to Justice.
Welcome back,
everybody,to the From Crisis to Justice podcast.
I'm your host, Parag Amin,and I'm joined by my friend
(00:44):
and special guest, Chuong Bui.
He is a seasoned entertainmentattorney and partner
and counsel for creatorsbased in Los Angeles, California.
His practice includes entertainmentand commercial transactions,
copyright, trademark and corporate law.
Over his career is representeda wide range of creative clients,
from filmmakers to musiciansto fine artists and book publishers.
(01:10):
Technologyand startup and serial entrepreneurs.
So welcome, John.
Thank you so much for being on today.
Hey, Parag, thanks for having me.
So tellus what made you get into the space
as a counsel for creative artists?
Yeah.
So when my partner Chrisand I formed Counsel for Creators,
(01:30):
you know, we both come from creativebackgrounds and music him in design.
And we realized that
there wasn't really like
a, a way for creatives, for artists
to get legal help in a waythat was accessible.
Right.
Because legal fees are oftentimes,
as you know, unpredictableand can be really high.
(01:53):
And I think there is also a disconnectbetween artists
getting like the businessand legal information and then also them
feeling like they're compromisingtheir artistic integrity in a way.
Right.
Because there is, you know,being an artist, being a creative,
a lot of times what you do from a businessstandpoint is tied to you
(02:15):
intrinsically to your creativity.
And creativity is something that's
a very inherentit's a very personal thing, right?
So I so my point is,I think having to deal with the legal
and business stuff can be a little bitoverwhelming and also feel a little weird.
So we wanted to create a law firmthat could address
all of those pain points, right.
And make things accessible,make things affordable, and also
(02:39):
just to be able to speak the languageof the artists and the creative,
I think, and to understandtheir world goes a long way.
So, you know, usbeing creatives ourselves,
we thought, what better way to dothat, to honor, like, you know,
this ethos than to create a law firmwith that business model.
So and then, you know,like from a personal interest standpoint,
like I love all the thingsthat my clients do.
(02:59):
My clients are amazing.
They, they make films, they do thesemassive murals, public installations.
They write books.
They're they do like they write cookbooks,They're chefs.
They do like food, influencervideos and stuff, you know?
So all these things are likeeminently interesting to me
and to everyone that works for us,I think right?
So it's honestly, like, awesome.
(03:21):
Like, I love it.
Like it's such a cliche,but I love waking up and working
just because of what I doand the people that I support. So
yeah, that's awesome.
Yeah, you can, you can hear it and see itthe way you talk about it.
I know firsthand how hard you workand how much you love this space.
You know, I know that we'vewe've had some clients together as well.
(03:43):
And so tell me a little bit about the
the creative journey.
Like, I've heard two different thingswhen it comes to artists.
What's interesting isyou have some artists
that are very commercially successfuland sometimes
for whatever reason, there issometimes a stigma.
Like there's there's like,
like the artist is, is selling outor they're becoming too commercial
(04:06):
and there's something nobleabout being a starving artist.
Do you have any thoughts on onewhere that comes from
and then to just about that ideagenerally?
Yeah.
So the notion that artists
have to be starvingor come from like traumatic backgrounds
in order to channel thatdarkness to create I think is a cliché
(04:30):
because at the end of the day you gotbills to pay, man, you have bills to pay,
you have families to support,you have a lifestyle to sustain,
and maybe you have people working for youthat you have to pay.
Right. So there is a romantic
idea that, yeah,
of the starting starving office,a starving artist, but
(04:53):
it's just not practical.
So I think like how for us, likehow do we kind of marry those two things
in a way where the artistsbecause I think like
what we're trying to dois we're trying to make sure
that the artists can free themselvesfrom a bandwidth standpoint.
Like just today,
I was talking with one of my colleaguesabout the notion of decision fatigue.
(05:14):
Right.
And how decision fatiguecan seep into every aspect of your life
so that it would prevent youfrom doing the things that you need to do,
that you prioritize. Right?
So for us, it's like,okay, let's eliminate this stuff for you.
You don't have to think aboutwhat kind of business you need to set up.
You don't need to think aboutyour contracts or anything like that.
Don't worry about it.
Delegate that to us or someone else.
(05:36):
Get an accountant.Don't do your own taxes.
Don't worry about that stuff.
So you can focus on what makes you great,which is being creative.
And I think that can maybe overcomethat sort of stigma of, Oh, well,
I don't want to sell out or anythingbecause again, like as an artist,
you are also a business
and this is one of the first thingsI always tell my clients,
(05:56):
You are a businessin and of yourself, right?
You are different than, say, Google
or Apple in that
those companies are not definedby one person's creativity.
I guess Apple a little bit
with Steve Jobs back in the daybut even then massive corporation right
but artists, they are the enginesof their own business.
(06:17):
Right?
And like I said, they have so many thingsthat they are responsible for clients,
employees, family members,whatever their community.
Right. So
you could sell you couldyou could frame it as being a sell out
or you could frame it as why you are this
like very important
nexus in so many different people's lives.
(06:40):
Why would you consider yourself a sellout
if you're supporting and helping outso many people in your community? Right.
So I don't know if I answer your question,but yeah, that's what I did.
Yes. Yeah.
No, that's exactlyit is being able to provide value
and that really is at the end of the daywhen it comes down to it.
So let's talk a little bitabout you and Chris
and you guys providing all thistremendous value to your clients.
(07:04):
Yeah, in terms of youstarting your own law firm,
which is also a business,
how did you know thatthat was the right move for you
or did you knowdid you just take a blind leap of faith
hopingthat it would be the right move for you?
Well, first of all, I should
tell the audience that you and I,we started our law firms at the same time.
(07:25):
Do you remember that?
So do we used to.
Yeah, we used
Parag and I and a few of our other friendsthat had our own law firms.
We used to meet for lunches every weekor to write, and we would just share
best practices, kind of just have a spacewhere we could, like,
vent to each otherand, like, support each other.
And so I think that was one of the thingsthat was very helpful for us
(07:47):
starting out.
And I think having maintainedthis relationship and friendship
with you over the years has also beenreally valuable for us as business owners.
So side note, but I justI wanted to I want to bring that up
to answer your question.
Why? How did we know?
Man, I think I justI don't like working for people.
(08:08):
You know, I think I kind of chafeat authority, to be honest.
I've worked corporate
for most of my life prior to going tolaw school and after law school for a bit.
And I just I just feel like, you know,
I could there's a part of methere's a there's an ego to it.
I think you know this, right?
There has to be a bit of an egowhere it's like, I know what I'm doing,
(08:29):
I'm going to learnI don't know everything,
but I know enough, right,to do what I need to do.
And so for me, I've always been like,I can I feel like I, I know what kind of
work life balance I want to
establish for not just myself,but for the people that work for me.
I know what kind of cultureI want for my business, right?
(08:49):
I'm very clear on that culture.
I am very process driven,
so I know I can get processes downpretty well, automation, all that stuff.
And I'm a people person,so I feel like I can work
well with others as well, you know?
So how do I fold all thatinto being a lawyer?
And I think
when I met Chris,my business partner and friend,
(09:11):
it was just really
a stroke of luckbecause we were introduced
through our mutual friend Vivek, who,
you know, who's who also startedhis own immigration practice at that time.
And we found out that all of us werein the same attorney meditation
group in L.A..
I think you were part of that group too,for a while.
And then also we found outthat we had all these similar interests.
(09:33):
So I think there was a part of meat that time
that was like, Look,I feel like I can kind of do something.
But there was also an understandingthat I can't do it on my own.
Like, you know, props to you andeveryone else who's a solo business owner.
But for me,I just like having someone else there
because you can kind of sharethe burden, share the risks,
share the wins and losses,you know, in a way.
(09:54):
So when I met Chris, I was like,Oh, this is perfect.
His personality is the exact balancewith mine, I think.
And, and so all those thingskind of coming into play.
We just felt like, okay, this isa good time, this is a good time to do it.
And, you know, like going back toyour original question about,
you know, who we are and what we do,
yeah, we shared a shared valuesand shared ethos and like the kind of law
(10:18):
firm experience we wanted for the kind ofclients that we wanted to work with.
Right?So all that kind of like fell into place.
And then again, like, like I said,like having a community of young
entrepreneurial attorneys like yourselfand some of our other friends
was also really helpfularound that time, too.
Yeah, I mean, it'sI think it's been over ten years now,
(10:41):
so it's crazy over a decade,an incredible amount of time.
And, you know, it'sI've loved seeing you guys
transition, transform, continue to growyour firm and be successful.
Well, let's talk a little bitabout the partnership
aspect of things,because you're one of the few partnerships
(11:02):
that's that has withstood the test of timeand even distance
with Chrisnow having moved to Croatia. Yes.
And practicing law from there.
So can you talk a little bit about that?
And has it been an intentional process,Meaning have you had to sit down
periodically or systematically
to talk about what it isthat you want out of this business?
(11:24):
Did you formalize that partnershipagreement and how you've navigated
any kind of disagreements, which surely
you have had along this journey and path?
Great question.
I love this question because I work witha lot of people that are like talking.
They come to us and they'll say, Hey,you think about forming a partnership,
think about starting to work togetherwith these people.
(11:46):
What should I do?
And I think like the most important thingyou can do when you're about to work with
someone is to have these
really frank conversationsabout the most important things, right?
Not just money, not just moneyor responsibilities, but things like,
Hey, what do you believe in?
Like, what are your values?
What kind of clients doyou want to work with?
What kind of peopledo you want to work with?
(12:08):
What is your goal?
Where do you see us goingfive, ten years from now?
How do we resolve disagreements?
You know, do we flip a coin?
What happens if I get burnt out?
Like, will you be there to support me?
Or what if one of us has a babyand we have we need to take time off?
Like, do you believe in like,
do you believe in like maternity leaveand paternity leave or things like that?
(12:31):
Everything.Everything that's important to you, right?
Because
if you don't talk about any of this stuffand I would say come to an agreement
and ideally document it somewhere doesn'thave to be a partnership agreement.
Could just be like an email bullet.Right. Whatever.
So that you have a reference point, right?
If you don't do these thingsand let's say something comes up like, Oh,
(12:52):
I get you know, I gotI got into like an accident
and I can't work for three months,
you know, you don't want to decidethen what to do.
You want to make sure you referencethis thing that you had already discussed.
Right?So that's exactly what Chris and I did.
We we talks.
He broachedthe subject of us working together.
And then I think that's right aroundwhen I met you
(13:13):
and then we spent six months
working on two matters together.
Right. We hadn'twe haven't started anything.
We're just like,let's see what it's like to work together.
So we kind of dip their toe into likethe working relationship concurrently.
We had these conversations, right,about all these important things.
So we did all of that before.
(13:34):
And, you know, wewe tried that really important things.
Like I think one of the big breakthroughsfor us
was figuring outhow do we deal with money, right?
Like because of the traditional law firm
model, you know, this is okay,maybe we get paid a base
and then if you bring in more work,you get paid for that.
If you do the work,you get paid for that, right?
So it's always like there's tiersof getting paid right?
(13:56):
And that works for a lot of people.
I knew that would not work for me.
I knew that would not work.
He knew that would not work for himbecause there's a lot of stuff,
you know, this that we dothat is outside of fulfilling legal work,
that's outside of likebringing in business, right?
That's also valuable to the business.
So we just decided, hey, you know what?
Let's just do a 5050.
Everything doesn't matter.
(14:17):
You bring in more, I bring in more.
Does it matter if you do more workor I do more work?
We're always going to be doing somethingthat's valuable to the business.
Let's make it 5050.
Good thing we got to that pointbefore we started working together, right?
Because you, you and I, I'm sure.
I'm sure.
You know, I knew so many lawyerswho who start law firms and they end up
(14:38):
not working out a lot of time.
It comes down to money, you know,
And, you know, we eliminate thatpain point and you eliminated
everything else that could be a problemand came to an agreement.
And then we formed counsel for creators.
Right.
So having these conversationsupfront, regardless of your profession,
I know we're lawyers,but anything you do, if you are like, Hey,
(14:58):
I want to start an agency with someone,or Hey, I want to like start
making videos with someone, right?
Like and putting them on YouTubeand TikTok and whatever.
It's valuableto have these conversations upfront
because you never knowwhat's going to happen.
You, you, you come into
a working relationship with someonenot expecting things to go bad.
You expect things to go well, right?
(15:21):
This is one way you can actually increasethe likelihood of things
going well by having these conversationsdocumenting them.
Yeah, I completely agree with that.
Let me ask you this.
I mean, in terms of, you know, one ofthe challenges I've seen in partnerships
is what you've described,but it goes in the opposite direction.
(15:41):
And what I mean is somebody who's doingmore work or somebody is bringing
in more business, therefore they believethat they're entitled to more
or they perceive that the partner
who's bringing in less businessor is doing less work
is therefore less valuableto the partnership.
And so there's athere's a strong aspect of of trust
(16:04):
based on the relationshipthat you developed here of 5050
and the other person's work ethic, that
even if they're not bringing inas much business as I am
or billing as many hours as I amor finishing as many projects as I am,
that they're still creatingsufficient value for the business
(16:24):
that they're entitled to.
5050 Can you talk a little bitmore about that?
Yeah, I think we're nowwe're talking about like the sort of
like emotional and psychological aspectsof having a partnership, right?
Like, I think people are going to projectwhatever they have, you know, And I think
as you know, speaking as lawyers,we there's a
(16:45):
you know, we can be over analyticaland to a fault.
We I think we can be aggressiveto a fault sometimes and sort of like
yeah those are things to to toto be mindful of.
I just knew like
I can't speak for everyone but for me andfor Chris, that's just not how we roll.
(17:05):
Like we're both of us are very ourvalue is in building through community.
Right?
And I think like again, we both knew that
if we gave each other
the sort of grace to do things
that maybe don'tbring in money right away, but have value
(17:28):
and and those things can actuallyreally pay off really well for us.
You know, Chris,you know, Chris, he's a brilliant writer,
brilliant writer, brilliant guy, general,but brilliant writer.
And I think like for him,
I want to be able to give him like, space.
Okay, you know what?
I'm going to writeall this content on threads.
(17:49):
I'm going to write these blog posts
that I know are going to driveSEO for us down the line.
For example,drive organic traffic to our website.
Yeah, maybe like he spends a weekdoing that
and he's not working on legal work, butthat's okay because he's going to bring
that his his work is going to bring ina lot more stuff down the line.
(18:10):
And I think like we are able to arriveat that trust pretty easily
because we were just getting kind ofgetting to know each other as people.
And I think once we aligned from a valuestandpoint, I think it just made things
a lot easierto maybe a lot easier to trust each other.
I think that when you'regetting into business with someone,
if you see that your partner maybe istalented and can do a lot of great things,
(18:32):
but they're also kind of shadywhen it comes to money or
like they're just like very territorialwhen it comes to money and stuff.
That's a red flag.
I think that's another thingpeople don't think about too.
Like maybe you have been homies
with someone for so long and you're like,Hey, we should start a business.
Oh yeah, great idea.
Then you, once
you start learning about them,
you learn all these things that you didn'tknow because you just friends, right?
(18:54):
There's always an opportunityto pull the ripcord and be like, I'm out.
I don't think this is going to work outright. There's always that opportunity.
Sometimes people feellike, Oh, I'm on this like
this, this
path, this linear path that goes one way.
And it's like this end, like I'mmy moment.
I can't stop my momentum of creating thispartnership or working with this person.
(19:15):
And if I say something, it'sgoing to like, damage our relationship.
Well, you could say something early onand maybe salvage the relationship.
You can't say something down the linewhen something blows up,
like money, for example.
And I don't know if I'm answeringyour question, by the way, but
but yeah, I think, like
you want to be able to work with peoplethat kind of align with you
(19:37):
different levels,
not just like for my energy energetically,but also like, I think like money.
That's an important thing.
If you feel like I think I'm to
I think I'mgoing to get jealous of this guy
if he makes more money than me,if he brings in.
So maybe you figure out a systemthat works out for you guys.
You know, if that makes sense,it makes perfect sense.
Yeah.
And so in terms of the hurdlesand the various crises that come up,
(20:01):
the entrepreneurial journey,what's the biggest entrepreneurial crisis
that you guys have facedand how did you navigate it?
Hum, let's see.
There's a few.
And I would say the the one
when you say crisis,I would say the pandemic in 2020,
that was probably probably the biggestlike out of our control crisis.
(20:26):
Right.
And I think at that time
that was what March,
March iswhen when when we're when when everything
shut down March, March2020 here in California, April, May, June.
Well, tough, tough.
Three months, I think. Right.
I feel like we navigated that
(20:49):
by kind of just trusting in each otherand having we just
you know, we we were just able to be I'mvery grateful that, you know,
I had Chris, because, you know,I would just be spiraling on my own
and thinking about things,
and then I would just give him a callor we'd meet up and I would feel better.
(21:10):
I'd be like,you know, things are not as bad.
And I have someone I can likebe open to and be vulnerable with.
For us, our business.
You know, we are a transactional law firmthat does a lot of things
like setting up businessesfor creative structuring.
Those businessestrademarks like brand protection,
protecting intellectual property, propertythrough copyright, and, you know,
(21:31):
doing a lot of like deals, negotiation,drafting documents, drafting contract,
all the things that, you know, peoplein the beginning of the pandemic
were like, I don't need tothink about this right now, right?
I'm freaked out.I don't know what's going to happen.
There's so much uncertainty.
So we're like, okay, you know what?
A lot of these things that we sell are
kind of like kind of like,
(21:52):
I would say like a higher tierprice, right?
And people aren't thinking aboutspending money right now on those things.
People are like genuinely,genuinely worried
about all the financialand like health uncertainties.
So why don't we focus on the thingthat is the
the sort of the expression of our ethos,which is make legal accessible.
(22:16):
So we have a subscription service,we've had a legal subscription service,
I would dare
say we probably the first law firmto have a legal subscription service
for creatives,
ignore all the people out therewho's saying they're the first.
We were the first 100%. You know, this.
They we were like, okay, well, we havethe subscription service is affordable.
It's like a gym membership.
(22:37):
You can join and quit any time andyou can use it to just get legal advice.
If you're worried about something,if you need a roadmap,
if you need to talk strategy,if you need to get legal advice
about something at that time, there'sa lot of questions about, I have a lease,
how do I get out of my lease right forbecause I can't enter my building,
I can't access my officebecause my landlord
(22:59):
won't let me into the buildingbecause of the pandemic.
I'm not an essential business.
That's one of the things.
Another thing is like, Hey,my clients are canceling on me.
Like because they can't do their weddinganymore, right?
Like,and then I did all this work for them and,
you know, they owe me money or whatever.What do I do?
So, so we've shifted on to things.
Let's, let's help these people addressthese pain points with free content.
(23:21):
So we started doing
videos with each other.
I think you did one of them, right, Parag
And then we would post them free videoswhere we're giving a lot of tips
to deal with these specific pandemicrelated business issues.
And then also
pushing our subscription serviceas an affordable way to get legal advice
(23:42):
because we all know,like get 10 minutes of your time.
Parag is already goingto be hundreds of dollars, Right? So
for me toand but what if we just eliminate that
pain point you don't have to worry aboutpay me hourly.
You just get advice on a month,a month basis, right.
And so, yeah, we just I guess, long storyshort, we focused on what people needed
(24:07):
versus what we needed.
I guess if that makes sense,what people needed
and how we're able to fulfill that needgiven our like infrastructure.
Right?
That's how we I thinkthat's how we pivoted and a little bit
and that's it's it was very helpfulI think because that was a crisis.
I think that was not specificto our business.
(24:30):
I mean, you dealt with it, too.Everyone dealt with it at that time.
I think for solo entrepreneurs, forbusiness owners, small business owners,
the pandemic was a crazy timefor all of us.
You know, we weren't like, you know,I think the big corporations,
I think big, big companies like,I don't know, like Amazon,
they could just sell a ton of toilet paperand they'd be fine, right?
Because everyone wanted toilet paper.
(24:51):
At that time, we didn't have that luxury.We had to hustle.
We had to pivot. Right.I'm actually curious.
I have a question for you.
What how did you handle that?
The pandemic?
Yeah, the pandemic was a tough time.
I had made the decisionto let people go home
before California startedshutting things down
because we had a lot of litigation.
We were still consideredan essential business, so we could
(25:14):
still keep going.
But a lot of our casesat that time were contingency fee cases.
And because courtroom shut down,insurance companies
tightened up their wallets like theythey find any excuse to do.
And they knew that our cases couldn'tget out for trial. Yeah.
So they started saying, well, look,we're just we're not paying out right now.
We don't know when courtroomsare going to open back up.
(25:36):
And so you're just going to have to wait.
And so I still kept everybody on.
I felt likeI wanted to take care of my team.
They taken care of me.
And so it was still bleeding out a lot ofmoney every single month on losses
whilerevenue had slowed down dramatically.
So it was a very difficult time. Frankly,
(25:56):
one of the most difficult financial timesI've had since starting my firm.
And I was at that moment of, Hey,
does it really make senseto potentially shut this firm down?
And I that was the first timeand the only time
I have seriously considered shutting downmy firm was the pandemic.
And it was one of the most painful,challenging situations.
(26:16):
It was very tough.
I mean, I had a young familyand so I've got to be able to provide
and take care of them.
And so I could have gone back to big lawand working there, but
I had this dream ofI want to make this thing work.
And so I still very distinctlyremember conversations
with my wifepretty much on a daily basis about this.
(26:37):
And the analogy I'd used is the Phenix,the mythical bird
that grows,and the whole idea of the Phenix
is it dies in its ownashes, it burns and then is reborn,
but it's rebornbigger and better and stronger.
And that, luckily isis what we were able to do.
(26:58):
So when we came through the pandemic,we came back stronger financially.
We're able to hire morepeople have expanded reach and growth.
But it was all through sheerperseverance of just self-talk,
positive self-talk on a daily basis,along with talking to my wife
(27:18):
and some other close friends abouthow do we do this, you know, and
just keeping
on the path to eventually come backtowards profitability.
And luckily those insurance companiespaid many times over
when lawsuits started being set againor trial date started being set again.
And so we were able to capitalize on that.
(27:40):
And that created a nice little cushionto be able to to boost.
But I will say part of what I learned fromthe pandemic was
was really the importance of economizing
and watching your expenses very closely,
which I think many of usI mean, certainly me
weren't
(28:01):
I wasn't as careful necessarily about thatwhen things are going
well, you know,you want to spend for that growth.
You want to to invest in the growth.
But then when you're investing
and the growth isn't coming, it reallyjust feels like spending and spending.
And so
that's something I had to take a lookat in terms
of the overall expensesof like where I was spending funds
(28:22):
or I wasn't necessarily getting a return.
So I had to take a look at that.
Yeah,that's a good I remember doing that too.
I remember even like looking at allthe even like something as
simple as like software, all the softwaresubscriptions that we had because,
you know, we use a lot of automationtechnology in our practice.
And I'm just like, why are we payingfor this thing that we were like,
I would find like to like a, like,like a software platform that would like,
(28:46):
that was like very duplicativeof other platforms.
There's a
I remember like finding opportunitiesto pay of yearly versus monthly and saving
30% that way.
Yeah, definitely, definitely taking a hardlook at your expenses.
That's a good point.
Like, yeah, when things are good, you'rejust like, Yeah, let's keep this going.
You know, let's, let's keep spendingbecause it's working for us, right?
(29:07):
But no, I hundred percent agreewith you on that point.
It's definitelysomething that we had to do too.
Yeah. And you know what?
I will say that I am grateful for it,looking backwards, going through it.
Certainly one of the more painful.
Yeah.
Man parts and I thinkthe most painful part of business
as far as a lessonand getting through that.
(29:30):
But having come through it,
one of the best lessonsthat could have occurred.
So I'm a firm believer in that, that
if you find a way to take every problemor challenge
and turn it into an opportunity, there'sno stopping in, there's no stopping you
and you can't lose.
But it's just
(29:51):
persevering through thatand finding a way to turn those problems
into opportunities.
Yeah, and having the self-confidenceto be able to do it
and to be able to withstandthat pain, to be able to do it.
So yeah, I would, I would just use thisas a quick opportunity to encourage
anybody going through a tough timein their business or their life
to try to find the opportunitieswherever they might lie,
(30:13):
because they're certainly there,
if you look for them hard enoughand carefully enough and you'll find them.
And that may be the exact key that helpsyou get through and come through it
stronger and better.
Yeah, well said. Well said.
I think like let me ask you this.
When it comes to creative clients,what's a legal tip you can give to them?
That is like a common misconception,but if they just knew this,
(30:34):
it would save them either a bunch of moneyand or a bunch of headaches.
When we think about a creative businessowner, we think about
four things that are important.
We think about
setting up
your business in a way where the structurealigns with what you're trying to do.
(30:57):
That'swhen l elaborated to answer your question.
The second thing we think aboutis your brand, right?
The brand is anything that connects you,
your company, to your customers, right?
How they recognize you through your brand.
The third thing we think about
is the things that you createand how to protect them, right?
(31:19):
Whether they are artwork, illustrations,
designs, music, films, whatever,whatever you make,
you know, you have to protect it
because if you don't,you could potentially get exploited.
Someone copies you. Right.
And on the flip side, if you protect it,you also have the opportunity
to exploit itand leverage it to make more money.
(31:40):
Right.
And then the fourth
thing we think about is the relationshipsthat you have, the working relationships,
and how you protect and preservethose relationships.
Oftentimes, those relationshipscan be preserved through contracts, right?
So but those are like the four thingswe call them, the four pillars, right?
So I think you could pick anythingfrom any of those four pillars
(32:02):
and you could say, okay, well,if you don't think like creatives often
forget about this.
One thingI will say that people forget to do
and it's really easy to do, really
easy to do is register, bring a copyright.
So copyright law is the area of lawthat protects
(32:24):
the creations,the things that you create, right?
Copyright law protectsthings like your manuscripts, texts,
literature, write films,choreography, dance, art, whatever.
Right?
So what I see with a lot of creativesis they'll make something
(32:45):
and then they'll start sellingprints of it or something, right?
Or they'll write something,
and then they'll startsending it to people to pitch.
Right?
But they don't register the copyright.
Right. And here's the thing.
If you don't you know this,if you don't register in copyright
for the thing that you've createdand it's original, right?
So you create somethingthat's original and it's fixed somewhere,
(33:07):
like on a napkin even,or text or digital file, whatever.
You've created something that's original.
You're about to do somethingwith it, right?
If you don't protect it by registeringthe copyright, you legally cannot
sue someone for copyright infringement.
You can't go after copycats.
But more so, as a practical matter,you put something out there
(33:28):
and then someone on Instagram takes itand then like copies it, right?
You can't go to Instagram and say,Hey, take this down because I own this
because then they're going to say,Well, prove it.
Prove that you own this thing.
You prove itby having the copyright certificate.
Right?
So that's that's one thing that I seepeople do and they forget about it.
They forget aboutregistering the copyright.
(33:49):
And sometimes people say, well,I created it.
Don't I have copyrights in it already?
Like, yes, sure you have.
But by default,once you create something and it's done,
then the copyright law conferscopyright to you.
However, you can't access the full suiteof benefits
and rights under copyrightlaw unless you register it.
(34:13):
Sometimes people who are
writers will say,Oh, I registered with the WGA.
Doesn't that count? It doesn't count.
You have to registerwith the Copyright Office.
So that's one thing I would say.
If you're creating something
and you're trying to sell itor exploited it
or share it with someone else,you got to register the copyright.
That's like number one thing.
(34:34):
Yeah, that's really good.
So let's talk a little bit about the
the legal aspects of protecting an idea,
because I think there'sa very common misconception about this.
Peoplesay, Well, no, that I had that idea first.
That's really my idea.
And the way I've explained it is likethe law doesn't really protect the idea.
(34:55):
It's the execution of the idea.
So it doesn't matter that you came upwith some conceptual idea of what
this thing could be, It ultimatelycomes down to the expression of that idea.
So that's that's on the one hand.
But then you canyou talk a little bit about
I believe this falls in the copyrightspec, like,
(35:17):
for example, show or game formats.
So like
if, if somebody wants to create eithera new show,
whether it's like a television show
or a YouTube show or like a game
in copying the idea of someone elsein terms of the format.
(35:37):
So what, what exactly is protectedfrom that idea and how
and how does somebodythen potentially create
something that similarwithout running afoul of of copyright
or other intellectual propertyprotection laws?
Yeah, I mean, like you got it right.
Like intellectual property law exists
to protect the execution of ideas,not the ideas in and of themselves.
(36:01):
I have some thoughts on
how you can protect an idea, though,that we can maybe talk about later.
But to answer your questionfor like a format, right?
Like our game show, you were like,when you have an idea for a show, right?
Usually you express that ideainto something like a treatment.
A treatment is like a short script,basically, that kind of outlines
(36:22):
everything that's important to the storyor the idea of the format of the show
or whatever, right?
You can actually registera copyright for a treatment
because it's it's consideredliterature, it's text, right?
So let's say you punch down some ideas.
Maybe you have like you describe like,oh, yeah,
So this,this game show, it's going to have these
(36:44):
the structure, these are the rules.
I'm going to give names to certain aspectsof the show like the different events.
Again, each one is going to have a name.
There's going to be like certain thingsthat happen throughout the show
that I'll assign like a conceptand maybe a name or something.
I'll describe it right.
You can write all this down.
Yeah.
(37:05):
And once you write all it down,
that's when it becomes somethingthat's eligible copyright protection,
because it is a completethere's an app to be published.
Does it have to be out?
There just has to be done, Done and fixed
in a, say, tangible medium.
That just means somewherethat you can access it, somewhere
(37:25):
you can hold it or see it or whatever.Right?
So that would be text, maybe punch it up.
You write a microsoft
Word, you save it as a
dock file,and then I have this written down.
Then you can register the copy.
That's an easy way.
You can protect it.
So you see, you travel a lot.
So you've probably watched TVin other countries, right?
(37:49):
You see the same show in differentyou see Biggest Loser or
you see like Amazing Race, but you see itin different countries, versions of it.
You see like Top Chef or
what's the what's the big one?
Not MasterChef,but the the the one with the three chefs
that they're competing against. Iron Chef.Iron Chef.
You see Iron in different countries,right?
(38:10):
The reasonwhy is because someone created the format
and then they're licensing it outto different countries.
Right?
So in my in my world,that is a powerful place to be.
Once you create something, if youprotect it and you set up the foundation,
they're not just copyright registration,but you set up the business,
you set up the team,you set up everything,
(38:32):
the infrastructure correctly,and you have a winner,
your code,
your golden, because then you can sell itto other people, other countries,
and you make a fee,you make a royalty off of that.
Right.
And none of that starts
none of that happens unless you have thatcopyright registration first, start
with securing your unassailable
(38:53):
ownershipand rights in that thing that you created.
So it's the
show format rights that that stemmedfrom that copyright and that treatment.
Is that is that how it works.
Yeah.
Or whatever scripts, whatever it is,whatever you've secured right.
In addition to that there'sprobably a trademark registration or two.
Right.
Because you've got to protect namesand brands
(39:14):
and stuff too, that are associatedwith that thing as well.
So all in all, it's all a very like
I would say like strict
there's a strategic way of looking at itand setting things up.
But, you know,if you're just starting with an idea,
get that ideawritten down somewhere, right?
(39:34):
Get it, get it somewherethat you can actually like
so that you can actually register.
And that's a greatstarting point. Some people
will writedifferent versions of that thing, right.
And oh,I'm going to wait until the final version,
you know, and we get all this feedback inand then I'll register it.
Well,you can register the original version
and then you can just addall the different editions, right.
(39:57):
That you've done
as part of the copyright registration too,unless you materially change it.
Right? So there's there's a waythere are ways to do it.
But if you're planningon sharing your idea,
if you're planning on tryingto sell your idea, picture idea,
get it written down somewhere, get it,get it fixed in some sort of medium
where you can register the copyrightbecause that gives you that additional
(40:17):
layer of protection.
I will say this to, you know,
when you are in a positionwhere you don't encounter this as much.
But I do like with my writerswho are clients, they're
they're constantly trying to pitch ideas,the constant trying to sell their ideas.
Right? You're going in to a
(40:38):
transaction where you'renot going to have the leverage, right?
They're going to have the leverage.
The people that you're pitching to,they're the ones who are buying.
They're the ones with moneyor the resources to do the thing.
Why don't you put yourselfat a better position
from a leverage standpoint by protectingthe thing before you go in right?
Yes. Vastly overlooked by many people.
(41:00):
Yeah.
And happens everywherefrom Hollywood to Silicon Valley.
Somebody goes in and, pitches this ideaand they say, okay, thanks for the pitch.
And then they go offand remake a very similar idea.
Yeah,that actually brings me to that idea.
The thing I wanted to bring up earlier.
So, yes, you can't you can't make thesepeople sign NDAs, right?
(41:23):
Because they would never signed an NDA.
But what you can do, this is what I tellpeople is you go into a meeting,
you you have a conversation,then you leave the meeting.
Right. Well,
what's stopping you from summarizingthe meeting over email?
Hey, it was great talking to you.
Just so I understandthis is what we discussed, right.
(41:43):
And looking forwardto our next conversation.
Whatever.So now you have something documented.
If there was any sort of promisethat was made in that conversation,
like we will work with youif you do this or whatever, right.
Some something that was exchangedthat is a little bit
that could lead to like a potentiallylike a contract, right.
(42:05):
Like a verbal contract.
If you have a documented you have likesomething you can reference, Right.
So I always tell people that
even if they're not going to sign NDAand you're
you're sending themyour life's work or whatever,
but the least you can dois these practical things to kind of like
protect yourselflittle by little incrementally.
Yeah, I love that.
I think that the
the power of the recap email is somethingthat's supremely overlooked.
(42:29):
It's something I strongly
recommend done multiple videos on itto talk to my clients about this
all the time of just that onesimple email.
You know, you don't necessarilyneed a formal written agreement
for everything, especially when it comesto simpler things.
But that email can can do
a whole lotin terms of protection and clarifying
(42:50):
if something such as in disputecomes up later. Yep.
Awesome junk.So where can people find you?
If you want to find out more about you
or your law firmor that subscription package you offer.
Oh man, so many places.
You ready?
So our website iscounsel for creators dot com.
(43:10):
You can also that's counsel
at c0u and ACL for creators dot com
you can also find uson all the social media platforms.
We're very active on Instagram, veryactive on threads at counsel for creators.
We're on Tik Tok.
Don't know how long that's going to lastbecause apparently
they have to sell the companyor they may be banned in the U.S.
(43:32):
But we are active onTik Tok at Council for Traders.
We're active on Twitter,formerly X, formerly known as Twitter.
I believe it's at Creators Council.
I think we're going to move to Blue Skyat some point.
But you got to talk to Chris about that.
Are you on blue sky yet?
I am not. Yeah.
So we move thereand then join our mailing list.
(43:55):
We send a newsletter every week.
We also post interesting articlesfrom the world of arts, creative legal
business, whatever we share, articlesthat we write, content that we produce,
and then our subscription service,the creator's legal program,
you can find it on our websiteor you can go to Creator's
(44:16):
Legal program dot com creator'slegal program, dot
com and email
this email me Chuong at counselfor creators that com
I think I think that's itI think that I think that
given that your emailto everybody emails on my website it's
you can actually email me my biothat you read that you read or e-mail.
(44:38):
I look for people who really is all aboutthat.
Is that open for everybody? Email.
Okay, good. Yeah.
I mean, I might not answer your email,
but I read it to my assistant,but it'll be there every 10 minutes.
So thank you so much for joining us today.
But to all the listeners,thank you all so much for tuning in.
(45:00):
Hopefully you got a lot of value.
Zhang normally chargeshundreds of dollars an hour, so
hopefully these tips will saveyou much more than that
and could save your business.
And if you like this material, pleasemake sure you like
and subscribe so that you knowwhen the next episode is coming out
so I can continue bringing you more value
with guests such as Chuong and others.
(45:23):
Thanks so much, guys.
Thank you. All.
Hi, I'm Parag Amin.
Welcome to my podcast.
From Crisis to Justice.
As a lawyer and entrepreneur, I'mpassionate about helping small business
owners successfully navigate situationsthat can kill a business.
As a kid, I watched my dad's dreamsof being an entrepreneur were destroyed
by an unethical businessman, and I don'twant that to happen to you or your family.
(00:22):
That's why I started my law firm.
I want to protect and defend businessowners and their legacies from crisis.
Welcome to From Crisis to Justice.
Welcome back,
everybody,to the From Crisis to Justice podcast.
I'm your host, Parag Amin,and I'm joined by my friend
(00:44):
and special guest, Chuong Bui.
He is a seasoned entertainmentattorney and partner
and counsel for creatorsbased in Los Angeles, California.
His practice includes entertainmentand commercial transactions,
copyright, trademark and corporate law.
Over his career is representeda wide range of creative clients,
from filmmakers to musiciansto fine artists and book publishers.
(01:10):
Technologyand startup and serial entrepreneurs.
So welcome, John.
Thank you so much for being on today.
Hey, Parag, thanks for having me.
So tellus what made you get into the space
as a counsel for creative artists?
Yeah.
So when my partner Chrisand I formed Counsel for Creators,
(01:30):
you know, we both come from creativebackgrounds and music him in design.
And we realized that
there wasn't really like
a, a way for creatives, for artists
to get legal help in a waythat was accessible.
Right.
Because legal fees are oftentimes,
as you know, unpredictableand can be really high.
(01:53):
And I think there is also a disconnectbetween artists
getting like the businessand legal information and then also them
feeling like they're compromisingtheir artistic integrity in a way.
Right.
Because there is, you know,being an artist, being a creative,
a lot of times what you do from a businessstandpoint is tied to you
(02:15):
intrinsically to your creativity.
And creativity is something that's
a very inherentit's a very personal thing, right?
So I so my point is,I think having to deal with the legal
and business stuff can be a little bitoverwhelming and also feel a little weird.
So we wanted to create a law firmthat could address
all of those pain points, right.
And make things accessible,make things affordable, and also
(02:39):
just to be able to speak the languageof the artists and the creative,
I think, and to understandtheir world goes a long way.
So, you know, usbeing creatives ourselves,
we thought, what better way to dothat, to honor, like, you know,
this ethos than to create a law firmwith that business model.
So and then, you know,like from a personal interest standpoint,
like I love all the thingsthat my clients do.
(02:59):
My clients are amazing.
They, they make films, they do thesemassive murals, public installations.
They write books.
They're they do like they write cookbooks,They're chefs.
They do like food, influencervideos and stuff, you know?
So all these things are likeeminently interesting to me
and to everyone that works for us,I think right?
So it's honestly, like, awesome.
(03:21):
Like, I love it.
Like it's such a cliche,but I love waking up and working
just because of what I doand the people that I support. So
yeah, that's awesome.
Yeah, you can, you can hear it and see itthe way you talk about it.
I know firsthand how hard you workand how much you love this space.
You know, I know that we'vewe've had some clients together as well.
(03:43):
And so tell me a little bit about the
the creative journey.
Like, I've heard two different thingswhen it comes to artists.
What's interesting isyou have some artists
that are very commercially successfuland sometimes
for whatever reason, there issometimes a stigma.
Like there's there's like,
like the artist is, is selling outor they're becoming too commercial
(04:06):
and there's something nobleabout being a starving artist.
Do you have any thoughts on onewhere that comes from
and then to just about that ideagenerally?
Yeah.
So the notion that artists
have to be starvingor come from like traumatic backgrounds
in order to channel thatdarkness to create I think is a cliché
(04:30):
because at the end of the day you gotbills to pay, man, you have bills to pay,
you have families to support,you have a lifestyle to sustain,
and maybe you have people working for youthat you have to pay.
Right. So there is a romantic
idea that, yeah,
of the starting starving office,a starving artist, but
(04:53):
it's just not practical.
So I think like how for us, likehow do we kind of marry those two things
in a way where the artistsbecause I think like
what we're trying to dois we're trying to make sure
that the artists can free themselvesfrom a bandwidth standpoint.
Like just today,
I was talking with one of my colleaguesabout the notion of decision fatigue.
(05:14):
Right.
And how decision fatiguecan seep into every aspect of your life
so that it would prevent youfrom doing the things that you need to do,
that you prioritize. Right?
So for us, it's like,okay, let's eliminate this stuff for you.
You don't have to think aboutwhat kind of business you need to set up.
You don't need to think aboutyour contracts or anything like that.
Don't worry about it.
Delegate that to us or someone else.
(05:36):
Get an accountant.Don't do your own taxes.
Don't worry about that stuff.
So you can focus on what makes you great,which is being creative.
And I think that can maybe overcomethat sort of stigma of, Oh, well,
I don't want to sell out or anythingbecause again, like as an artist,
you are also a business
and this is one of the first thingsI always tell my clients,
(05:56):
You are a businessin and of yourself, right?
You are different than, say, Google
or Apple in that
those companies are not definedby one person's creativity.
I guess Apple a little bit
with Steve Jobs back in the daybut even then massive corporation right
but artists, they are the enginesof their own business.
(06:17):
Right?
And like I said, they have so many thingsthat they are responsible for clients,
employees, family members,whatever their community.
Right. So
you could sell you couldyou could frame it as being a sell out
or you could frame it as why you are this
like very important
nexus in so many different people's lives.
(06:40):
Why would you consider yourself a sellout
if you're supporting and helping outso many people in your community? Right.
So I don't know if I answer your question,but yeah, that's what I did.
Yes. Yeah.
No, that's exactlyit is being able to provide value
and that really is at the end of the daywhen it comes down to it.
So let's talk a little bitabout you and Chris
and you guys providing all thistremendous value to your clients.
(07:04):
Yeah, in terms of youstarting your own law firm,
which is also a business,
how did you know thatthat was the right move for you
or did you knowdid you just take a blind leap of faith
hopingthat it would be the right move for you?
Well, first of all, I should
tell the audience that you and I,we started our law firms at the same time.
(07:25):
Do you remember that?
So do we used to.
Yeah, we used
Parag and I and a few of our other friendsthat had our own law firms.
We used to meet for lunches every weekor to write, and we would just share
best practices, kind of just have a spacewhere we could, like,
vent to each otherand, like, support each other.
And so I think that was one of the thingsthat was very helpful for us
(07:47):
starting out.
And I think having maintainedthis relationship and friendship
with you over the years has also beenreally valuable for us as business owners.
So side note, but I justI wanted to I want to bring that up
to answer your question.
Why? How did we know?
Man, I think I justI don't like working for people.
(08:08):
You know, I think I kind of chafeat authority, to be honest.
I've worked corporate
for most of my life prior to going tolaw school and after law school for a bit.
And I just I just feel like, you know,
I could there's a part of methere's a there's an ego to it.
I think you know this, right?
There has to be a bit of an egowhere it's like, I know what I'm doing,
(08:29):
I'm going to learnI don't know everything,
but I know enough, right,to do what I need to do.
And so for me, I've always been like,I can I feel like I, I know what kind of
work life balance I want to
establish for not just myself,but for the people that work for me.
I know what kind of cultureI want for my business, right?
(08:49):
I'm very clear on that culture.
I am very process driven,
so I know I can get processes downpretty well, automation, all that stuff.
And I'm a people person,so I feel like I can work
well with others as well, you know?
So how do I fold all thatinto being a lawyer?
And I think
when I met Chris,my business partner and friend,
(09:11):
it was just really
a stroke of luckbecause we were introduced
through our mutual friend Vivek, who,
you know, who's who also startedhis own immigration practice at that time.
And we found out that all of us werein the same attorney meditation
group in L.A..
I think you were part of that group too,for a while.
And then also we found outthat we had all these similar interests.
(09:33):
So I think there was a part of meat that time
that was like, Look,I feel like I can kind of do something.
But there was also an understandingthat I can't do it on my own.
Like, you know, props to you andeveryone else who's a solo business owner.
But for me,I just like having someone else there
because you can kind of sharethe burden, share the risks,
share the wins and losses,you know, in a way.
(09:54):
So when I met Chris, I was like,Oh, this is perfect.
His personality is the exact balancewith mine, I think.
And, and so all those thingskind of coming into play.
We just felt like, okay, this isa good time, this is a good time to do it.
And, you know, like going back toyour original question about,
you know, who we are and what we do,
yeah, we shared a shared valuesand shared ethos and like the kind of law
(10:18):
firm experience we wanted for the kind ofclients that we wanted to work with.
Right?So all that kind of like fell into place.
And then again, like, like I said,like having a community of young
entrepreneurial attorneys like yourselfand some of our other friends
was also really helpfularound that time, too.
Yeah, I mean, it'sI think it's been over ten years now,
(10:41):
so it's crazy over a decade,an incredible amount of time.
And, you know, it'sI've loved seeing you guys
transition, transform, continue to growyour firm and be successful.
Well, let's talk a little bitabout the partnership
aspect of things,because you're one of the few partnerships
(11:02):
that's that has withstood the test of timeand even distance
with Chrisnow having moved to Croatia. Yes.
And practicing law from there.
So can you talk a little bit about that?
And has it been an intentional process,Meaning have you had to sit down
periodically or systematically
to talk about what it isthat you want out of this business?
(11:24):
Did you formalize that partnershipagreement and how you've navigated
any kind of disagreements, which surely
you have had along this journey and path?
Great question.
I love this question because I work witha lot of people that are like talking.
They come to us and they'll say, Hey,you think about forming a partnership,
think about starting to work togetherwith these people.
(11:46):
What should I do?
And I think like the most important thingyou can do when you're about to work with
someone is to have these
really frank conversationsabout the most important things, right?
Not just money, not just moneyor responsibilities, but things like,
Hey, what do you believe in?
Like, what are your values?
What kind of clients doyou want to work with?
What kind of peopledo you want to work with?
(12:08):
What is your goal?
Where do you see us goingfive, ten years from now?
How do we resolve disagreements?
You know, do we flip a coin?
What happens if I get burnt out?
Like, will you be there to support me?
Or what if one of us has a babyand we have we need to take time off?
Like, do you believe in like,
do you believe in like maternity leaveand paternity leave or things like that?
(12:31):
Everything.Everything that's important to you, right?
Because
if you don't talk about any of this stuffand I would say come to an agreement
and ideally document it somewhere doesn'thave to be a partnership agreement.
Could just be like an email bullet.Right. Whatever.
So that you have a reference point, right?
If you don't do these thingsand let's say something comes up like, Oh,
(12:52):
I get you know, I gotI got into like an accident
and I can't work for three months,
you know, you don't want to decidethen what to do.
You want to make sure you referencethis thing that you had already discussed.
Right?So that's exactly what Chris and I did.
We we talks.
He broachedthe subject of us working together.
And then I think that's right aroundwhen I met you
(13:13):
and then we spent six months
working on two matters together.
Right. We hadn'twe haven't started anything.
We're just like,let's see what it's like to work together.
So we kind of dip their toe into likethe working relationship concurrently.
We had these conversations, right,about all these important things.
So we did all of that before.
(13:34):
And, you know, wewe tried that really important things.
Like I think one of the big breakthroughsfor us
was figuring outhow do we deal with money, right?
Like because of the traditional law firm
model, you know, this is okay,maybe we get paid a base
and then if you bring in more work,you get paid for that.
If you do the work,you get paid for that, right?
So it's always like there's tiersof getting paid right?
(13:56):
And that works for a lot of people.
I knew that would not work for me.
I knew that would not work.
He knew that would not work for himbecause there's a lot of stuff,
you know, this that we dothat is outside of fulfilling legal work,
that's outside of likebringing in business, right?
That's also valuable to the business.
So we just decided, hey, you know what?
Let's just do a 5050.
Everything doesn't matter.
(14:17):
You bring in more, I bring in more.
Does it matter if you do more workor I do more work?
We're always going to be doing somethingthat's valuable to the business.
Let's make it 5050.
Good thing we got to that pointbefore we started working together, right?
Because you, you and I, I'm sure.
I'm sure.
You know, I knew so many lawyerswho who start law firms and they end up
(14:38):
not working out a lot of time.
It comes down to money, you know,
And, you know, we eliminate thatpain point and you eliminated
everything else that could be a problemand came to an agreement.
And then we formed counsel for creators.
Right.
So having these conversationsupfront, regardless of your profession,
I know we're lawyers,but anything you do, if you are like, Hey,
(14:58):
I want to start an agency with someone,or Hey, I want to like start
making videos with someone, right?
Like and putting them on YouTubeand TikTok and whatever.
It's valuableto have these conversations upfront
because you never knowwhat's going to happen.
You, you, you come into
a working relationship with someonenot expecting things to go bad.
You expect things to go well, right?
(15:21):
This is one way you can actually increasethe likelihood of things
going well by having these conversationsdocumenting them.
Yeah, I completely agree with that.
Let me ask you this.
I mean, in terms of, you know, one ofthe challenges I've seen in partnerships
is what you've described,but it goes in the opposite direction.
(15:41):
And what I mean is somebody who's doingmore work or somebody is bringing
in more business, therefore they believethat they're entitled to more
or they perceive that the partner
who's bringing in less businessor is doing less work
is therefore less valuableto the partnership.
And so there's athere's a strong aspect of of trust
(16:04):
based on the relationshipthat you developed here of 5050
and the other person's work ethic, that
even if they're not bringing inas much business as I am
or billing as many hours as I amor finishing as many projects as I am,
that they're still creatingsufficient value for the business
(16:24):
that they're entitled to.
5050 Can you talk a little bitmore about that?
Yeah, I think we're nowwe're talking about like the sort of
like emotional and psychological aspectsof having a partnership, right?
Like, I think people are going to projectwhatever they have, you know, And I think
as you know, speaking as lawyers,we there's a
(16:45):
you know, we can be over analyticaland to a fault.
We I think we can be aggressiveto a fault sometimes and sort of like
yeah those are things to to toto be mindful of.
I just knew like
I can't speak for everyone but for me andfor Chris, that's just not how we roll.
(17:05):
Like we're both of us are very ourvalue is in building through community.
Right?
And I think like again, we both knew that
if we gave each other
the sort of grace to do things
that maybe don'tbring in money right away, but have value
(17:28):
and and those things can actuallyreally pay off really well for us.
You know, Chris,you know, Chris, he's a brilliant writer,
brilliant writer, brilliant guy, general,but brilliant writer.
And I think like for him,
I want to be able to give him like, space.
Okay, you know what?
I'm going to writeall this content on threads.
(17:49):
I'm going to write these blog posts
that I know are going to driveSEO for us down the line.
For example,drive organic traffic to our website.
Yeah, maybe like he spends a weekdoing that
and he's not working on legal work, butthat's okay because he's going to bring
that his his work is going to bring ina lot more stuff down the line.
(18:10):
And I think like we are able to arriveat that trust pretty easily
because we were just getting kind ofgetting to know each other as people.
And I think once we aligned from a valuestandpoint, I think it just made things
a lot easierto maybe a lot easier to trust each other.
I think that when you'regetting into business with someone,
if you see that your partner maybe istalented and can do a lot of great things,
(18:32):
but they're also kind of shadywhen it comes to money or
like they're just like very territorialwhen it comes to money and stuff.
That's a red flag.
I think that's another thingpeople don't think about too.
Like maybe you have been homies
with someone for so long and you're like,Hey, we should start a business.
Oh yeah, great idea.
Then you, once
you start learning about them,
you learn all these things that you didn'tknow because you just friends, right?
(18:54):
There's always an opportunityto pull the ripcord and be like, I'm out.
I don't think this is going to work outright. There's always that opportunity.
Sometimes people feellike, Oh, I'm on this like
this, this
path, this linear path that goes one way.
And it's like this end, like I'mmy moment.
I can't stop my momentum of creating thispartnership or working with this person.
(19:15):
And if I say something, it'sgoing to like, damage our relationship.
Well, you could say something early onand maybe salvage the relationship.
You can't say something down the linewhen something blows up,
like money, for example.
And I don't know if I'm answeringyour question, by the way, but
but yeah, I think, like
you want to be able to work with peoplethat kind of align with you
(19:37):
different levels,
not just like for my energy energetically,but also like, I think like money.
That's an important thing.
If you feel like I think I'm to
I think I'mgoing to get jealous of this guy
if he makes more money than me,if he brings in.
So maybe you figure out a systemthat works out for you guys.
You know, if that makes sense,it makes perfect sense.
Yeah.
And so in terms of the hurdlesand the various crises that come up,
(20:01):
the entrepreneurial journey,what's the biggest entrepreneurial crisis
that you guys have facedand how did you navigate it?
Hum, let's see.
There's a few.
And I would say the the one
when you say crisis,I would say the pandemic in 2020,
that was probably probably the biggestlike out of our control crisis.
(20:26):
Right.
And I think at that time
that was what March,
March iswhen when when we're when when everything
shut down March, March2020 here in California, April, May, June.
Well, tough, tough.
Three months, I think. Right.
I feel like we navigated that
(20:49):
by kind of just trusting in each otherand having we just
you know, we we were just able to be I'mvery grateful that, you know,
I had Chris, because, you know,I would just be spiraling on my own
and thinking about things,
and then I would just give him a callor we'd meet up and I would feel better.
(21:10):
I'd be like,you know, things are not as bad.
And I have someone I can likebe open to and be vulnerable with.
For us, our business.
You know, we are a transactional law firmthat does a lot of things
like setting up businessesfor creative structuring.
Those businessestrademarks like brand protection,
protecting intellectual property, propertythrough copyright, and, you know,
(21:31):
doing a lot of like deals, negotiation,drafting documents, drafting contract,
all the things that, you know, peoplein the beginning of the pandemic
were like, I don't need tothink about this right now, right?
I'm freaked out.I don't know what's going to happen.
There's so much uncertainty.
So we're like, okay, you know what?
A lot of these things that we sell are
kind of like kind of like,
(21:52):
I would say like a higher tierprice, right?
And people aren't thinking aboutspending money right now on those things.
People are like genuinely,genuinely worried
about all the financialand like health uncertainties.
So why don't we focus on the thingthat is the
the sort of the expression of our ethos,which is make legal accessible.
(22:16):
So we have a subscription service,we've had a legal subscription service,
I would dare
say we probably the first law firmto have a legal subscription service
for creatives,
ignore all the people out therewho's saying they're the first.
We were the first 100%. You know, this.
They we were like, okay, well, we havethe subscription service is affordable.
It's like a gym membership.
(22:37):
You can join and quit any time andyou can use it to just get legal advice.
If you're worried about something,if you need a roadmap,
if you need to talk strategy,if you need to get legal advice
about something at that time, there'sa lot of questions about, I have a lease,
how do I get out of my lease right forbecause I can't enter my building,
I can't access my officebecause my landlord
(22:59):
won't let me into the buildingbecause of the pandemic.
I'm not an essential business.
That's one of the things.
Another thing is like, Hey,my clients are canceling on me.
Like because they can't do their weddinganymore, right?
Like,and then I did all this work for them and,
you know, they owe me money or whatever.What do I do?
So, so we've shifted on to things.
Let's, let's help these people addressthese pain points with free content.
(23:21):
So we started doing
videos with each other.
I think you did one of them, right, Parag
And then we would post them free videoswhere we're giving a lot of tips
to deal with these specific pandemicrelated business issues.
And then also
pushing our subscription serviceas an affordable way to get legal advice
(23:42):
because we all know,like get 10 minutes of your time.
Parag is already goingto be hundreds of dollars, Right? So
for me toand but what if we just eliminate that
pain point you don't have to worry aboutpay me hourly.
You just get advice on a month,a month basis, right.
And so, yeah, we just I guess, long storyshort, we focused on what people needed
(24:07):
versus what we needed.
I guess if that makes sense,what people needed
and how we're able to fulfill that needgiven our like infrastructure.
Right?
That's how we I thinkthat's how we pivoted and a little bit
and that's it's it was very helpfulI think because that was a crisis.
I think that was not specificto our business.
(24:30):
I mean, you dealt with it, too.Everyone dealt with it at that time.
I think for solo entrepreneurs, forbusiness owners, small business owners,
the pandemic was a crazy timefor all of us.
You know, we weren't like, you know,I think the big corporations,
I think big, big companies like,I don't know, like Amazon,
they could just sell a ton of toilet paperand they'd be fine, right?
Because everyone wanted toilet paper.
(24:51):
At that time, we didn't have that luxury.We had to hustle.
We had to pivot. Right.I'm actually curious.
I have a question for you.
What how did you handle that?
The pandemic?
Yeah, the pandemic was a tough time.
I had made the decisionto let people go home
before California startedshutting things down
because we had a lot of litigation.
We were still consideredan essential business, so we could
(25:14):
still keep going.
But a lot of our casesat that time were contingency fee cases.
And because courtroom shut down,insurance companies
tightened up their wallets like theythey find any excuse to do.
And they knew that our cases couldn'tget out for trial. Yeah.
So they started saying, well, look,we're just we're not paying out right now.
We don't know when courtroomsare going to open back up.
(25:36):
And so you're just going to have to wait.
And so I still kept everybody on.
I felt likeI wanted to take care of my team.
They taken care of me.
And so it was still bleeding out a lot ofmoney every single month on losses
whilerevenue had slowed down dramatically.
So it was a very difficult time. Frankly,
(25:56):
one of the most difficult financial timesI've had since starting my firm.
And I was at that moment of, Hey,
does it really make senseto potentially shut this firm down?
And I that was the first timeand the only time
I have seriously considered shutting downmy firm was the pandemic.
And it was one of the most painful,challenging situations.
(26:16):
It was very tough.
I mean, I had a young familyand so I've got to be able to provide
and take care of them.
And so I could have gone back to big lawand working there, but
I had this dream ofI want to make this thing work.
And so I still very distinctlyremember conversations
with my wifepretty much on a daily basis about this.
(26:37):
And the analogy I'd used is the Phenix,the mythical bird
that grows,and the whole idea of the Phenix
is it dies in its ownashes, it burns and then is reborn,
but it's rebornbigger and better and stronger.
And that, luckily isis what we were able to do.
(26:58):
So when we came through the pandemic,we came back stronger financially.
We're able to hire morepeople have expanded reach and growth.
But it was all through sheerperseverance of just self-talk,
positive self-talk on a daily basis,along with talking to my wife
(27:18):
and some other close friends abouthow do we do this, you know, and
just keeping
on the path to eventually come backtowards profitability.
And luckily those insurance companiespaid many times over
when lawsuits started being set againor trial date started being set again.
And so we were able to capitalize on that.
(27:40):
And that created a nice little cushionto be able to to boost.
But I will say part of what I learned fromthe pandemic was
was really the importance of economizing
and watching your expenses very closely,
which I think many of usI mean, certainly me
weren't
(28:01):
I wasn't as careful necessarily about thatwhen things are going
well, you know,you want to spend for that growth.
You want to to invest in the growth.
But then when you're investing
and the growth isn't coming, it reallyjust feels like spending and spending.
And so
that's something I had to take a lookat in terms
of the overall expensesof like where I was spending funds
(28:22):
or I wasn't necessarily getting a return.
So I had to take a look at that.
Yeah,that's a good I remember doing that too.
I remember even like looking at allthe even like something as
simple as like software, all the softwaresubscriptions that we had because,
you know, we use a lot of automationtechnology in our practice.
And I'm just like, why are we payingfor this thing that we were like,
I would find like to like a, like,like a software platform that would like,
(28:46):
that was like very duplicativeof other platforms.
There's a
I remember like finding opportunitiesto pay of yearly versus monthly and saving
30% that way.
Yeah, definitely, definitely taking a hardlook at your expenses.
That's a good point.
Like, yeah, when things are good, you'rejust like, Yeah, let's keep this going.
You know, let's, let's keep spendingbecause it's working for us, right?
(29:07):
But no, I hundred percent agreewith you on that point.
It's definitelysomething that we had to do too.
Yeah. And you know what?
I will say that I am grateful for it,looking backwards, going through it.
Certainly one of the more painful.
Yeah.
Man parts and I thinkthe most painful part of business
as far as a lessonand getting through that.
(29:30):
But having come through it,
one of the best lessonsthat could have occurred.
So I'm a firm believer in that, that
if you find a way to take every problemor challenge
and turn it into an opportunity, there'sno stopping in, there's no stopping you
and you can't lose.
But it's just
(29:51):
persevering through thatand finding a way to turn those problems
into opportunities.
Yeah, and having the self-confidenceto be able to do it
and to be able to withstandthat pain, to be able to do it.
So yeah, I would, I would just use thisas a quick opportunity to encourage
anybody going through a tough timein their business or their life
to try to find the opportunitieswherever they might lie,
(30:13):
because they're certainly there,
if you look for them hard enoughand carefully enough and you'll find them.
And that may be the exact key that helpsyou get through and come through it
stronger and better.
Yeah, well said. Well said.
I think like let me ask you this.
When it comes to creative clients,what's a legal tip you can give to them?
That is like a common misconception,but if they just knew this,
(30:34):
it would save them either a bunch of moneyand or a bunch of headaches.
When we think about a creative businessowner, we think about
four things that are important.
We think about
setting up
your business in a way where the structurealigns with what you're trying to do.
(30:57):
That'swhen l elaborated to answer your question.
The second thing we think aboutis your brand, right?
The brand is anything that connects you,
your company, to your customers, right?
How they recognize you through your brand.
The third thing we think about
is the things that you createand how to protect them, right?
(31:19):
Whether they are artwork, illustrations,
designs, music, films, whatever,whatever you make,
you know, you have to protect it
because if you don't,you could potentially get exploited.
Someone copies you. Right.
And on the flip side, if you protect it,you also have the opportunity
to exploit itand leverage it to make more money.
(31:40):
Right.
And then the fourth
thing we think about is the relationshipsthat you have, the working relationships,
and how you protect and preservethose relationships.
Oftentimes, those relationshipscan be preserved through contracts, right?
So but those are like the four thingswe call them, the four pillars, right?
So I think you could pick anythingfrom any of those four pillars
(32:02):
and you could say, okay, well,if you don't think like creatives often
forget about this.
One thingI will say that people forget to do
and it's really easy to do, really
easy to do is register, bring a copyright.
So copyright law is the area of lawthat protects
(32:24):
the creations,the things that you create, right?
Copyright law protectsthings like your manuscripts, texts,
literature, write films,choreography, dance, art, whatever.
Right?
So what I see with a lot of creativesis they'll make something
(32:45):
and then they'll start sellingprints of it or something, right?
Or they'll write something,
and then they'll startsending it to people to pitch.
Right?
But they don't register the copyright.
Right. And here's the thing.
If you don't you know this,if you don't register in copyright
for the thing that you've createdand it's original, right?
So you create somethingthat's original and it's fixed somewhere,
(33:07):
like on a napkin even,or text or digital file, whatever.
You've created something that's original.
You're about to do somethingwith it, right?
If you don't protect it by registeringthe copyright, you legally cannot
sue someone for copyright infringement.
You can't go after copycats.
But more so, as a practical matter,you put something out there
(33:28):
and then someone on Instagram takes itand then like copies it, right?
You can't go to Instagram and say,Hey, take this down because I own this
because then they're going to say,Well, prove it.
Prove that you own this thing.
You prove itby having the copyright certificate.
Right?
So that's that's one thing that I seepeople do and they forget about it.
They forget aboutregistering the copyright.
(33:49):
And sometimes people say, well,I created it.
Don't I have copyrights in it already?
Like, yes, sure you have.
But by default,once you create something and it's done,
then the copyright law conferscopyright to you.
However, you can't access the full suiteof benefits
and rights under copyrightlaw unless you register it.
(34:13):
Sometimes people who are
writers will say,Oh, I registered with the WGA.
Doesn't that count? It doesn't count.
You have to registerwith the Copyright Office.
So that's one thing I would say.
If you're creating something
and you're trying to sell itor exploited it
or share it with someone else,you got to register the copyright.
That's like number one thing.
(34:34):
Yeah, that's really good.
So let's talk a little bit about the
the legal aspects of protecting an idea,
because I think there'sa very common misconception about this.
Peoplesay, Well, no, that I had that idea first.
That's really my idea.
And the way I've explained it is likethe law doesn't really protect the idea.
(34:55):
It's the execution of the idea.
So it doesn't matter that you came upwith some conceptual idea of what
this thing could be, It ultimatelycomes down to the expression of that idea.
So that's that's on the one hand.
But then you canyou talk a little bit about
I believe this falls in the copyrightspec, like,
(35:17):
for example, show or game formats.
So like
if, if somebody wants to create eithera new show,
whether it's like a television show
or a YouTube show or like a game
in copying the idea of someone elsein terms of the format.
(35:37):
So what, what exactly is protectedfrom that idea and how
and how does somebodythen potentially create
something that similarwithout running afoul of of copyright
or other intellectual propertyprotection laws?
Yeah, I mean, like you got it right.
Like intellectual property law exists
to protect the execution of ideas,not the ideas in and of themselves.
(36:01):
I have some thoughts on
how you can protect an idea, though,that we can maybe talk about later.
But to answer your questionfor like a format, right?
Like our game show, you were like,when you have an idea for a show, right?
Usually you express that ideainto something like a treatment.
A treatment is like a short script,basically, that kind of outlines
(36:22):
everything that's important to the storyor the idea of the format of the show
or whatever, right?
You can actually registera copyright for a treatment
because it's it's consideredliterature, it's text, right?
So let's say you punch down some ideas.
Maybe you have like you describe like,oh, yeah,
So this,this game show, it's going to have these
(36:44):
the structure, these are the rules.
I'm going to give names to certain aspectsof the show like the different events.
Again, each one is going to have a name.
There's going to be like certain thingsthat happen throughout the show
that I'll assign like a conceptand maybe a name or something.
I'll describe it right.
You can write all this down.
Yeah.
(37:05):
And once you write all it down,
that's when it becomes somethingthat's eligible copyright protection,
because it is a completethere's an app to be published.
Does it have to be out?
There just has to be done, Done and fixed
in a, say, tangible medium.
That just means somewherethat you can access it, somewhere
(37:25):
you can hold it or see it or whatever.Right?
So that would be text, maybe punch it up.
You write a microsoft
Word, you save it as a
dock file,and then I have this written down.
Then you can register the copy.
That's an easy way.
You can protect it.
So you see, you travel a lot.
So you've probably watched TVin other countries, right?
(37:49):
You see the same show in differentyou see Biggest Loser or
you see like Amazing Race, but you see itin different countries, versions of it.
You see like Top Chef or
what's the what's the big one?
Not MasterChef,but the the the one with the three chefs
that they're competing against. Iron Chef.Iron Chef.
You see Iron in different countries,right?
(38:10):
The reasonwhy is because someone created the format
and then they're licensing it outto different countries.
Right?
So in my in my world,that is a powerful place to be.
Once you create something, if youprotect it and you set up the foundation,
they're not just copyright registration,but you set up the business,
you set up the team,you set up everything,
(38:32):
the infrastructure correctly,and you have a winner,
your code,
your golden, because then you can sell itto other people, other countries,
and you make a fee,you make a royalty off of that.
Right.
And none of that starts
none of that happens unless you have thatcopyright registration first, start
with securing your unassailable
(38:53):
ownershipand rights in that thing that you created.
So it's the
show format rights that that stemmedfrom that copyright and that treatment.
Is that is that how it works.
Yeah.
Or whatever scripts, whatever it is,whatever you've secured right.
In addition to that there'sprobably a trademark registration or two.
Right.
Because you've got to protect namesand brands
(39:14):
and stuff too, that are associatedwith that thing as well.
So all in all, it's all a very like
I would say like strict
there's a strategic way of looking at itand setting things up.
But, you know,if you're just starting with an idea,
get that ideawritten down somewhere, right?
(39:34):
Get it, get it somewherethat you can actually like
so that you can actually register.
And that's a greatstarting point. Some people
will writedifferent versions of that thing, right.
And oh,I'm going to wait until the final version,
you know, and we get all this feedback inand then I'll register it.
Well,you can register the original version
and then you can just addall the different editions, right.
(39:57):
That you've done
as part of the copyright registration too,unless you materially change it.
Right? So there's there's a waythere are ways to do it.
But if you're planningon sharing your idea,
if you're planning on tryingto sell your idea, picture idea,
get it written down somewhere, get it,get it fixed in some sort of medium
where you can register the copyrightbecause that gives you that additional
(40:17):
layer of protection.
I will say this to, you know,
when you are in a positionwhere you don't encounter this as much.
But I do like with my writerswho are clients, they're
they're constantly trying to pitch ideas,the constant trying to sell their ideas.
Right? You're going in to a
(40:38):
transaction where you'renot going to have the leverage, right?
They're going to have the leverage.
The people that you're pitching to,they're the ones who are buying.
They're the ones with moneyor the resources to do the thing.
Why don't you put yourselfat a better position
from a leverage standpoint by protectingthe thing before you go in right?
Yes. Vastly overlooked by many people.
(41:00):
Yeah.
And happens everywherefrom Hollywood to Silicon Valley.
Somebody goes in and, pitches this ideaand they say, okay, thanks for the pitch.
And then they go offand remake a very similar idea.
Yeah,that actually brings me to that idea.
The thing I wanted to bring up earlier.
So, yes, you can't you can't make thesepeople sign NDAs, right?
(41:23):
Because they would never signed an NDA.
But what you can do, this is what I tellpeople is you go into a meeting,
you you have a conversation,then you leave the meeting.
Right. Well,
what's stopping you from summarizingthe meeting over email?
Hey, it was great talking to you.
Just so I understandthis is what we discussed, right.
(41:43):
And looking forwardto our next conversation.
Whatever.So now you have something documented.
If there was any sort of promisethat was made in that conversation,
like we will work with youif you do this or whatever, right.
Some something that was exchangedthat is a little bit
that could lead to like a potentiallylike a contract, right.
(42:05):
Like a verbal contract.
If you have a documented you have likesomething you can reference, Right.
So I always tell people that
even if they're not going to sign NDAand you're
you're sending themyour life's work or whatever,
but the least you can dois these practical things to kind of like
protect yourselflittle by little incrementally.
Yeah, I love that.
I think that the
the power of the recap email is somethingthat's supremely overlooked.
(42:29):
It's something I strongly
recommend done multiple videos on itto talk to my clients about this
all the time of just that onesimple email.
You know, you don't necessarilyneed a formal written agreement
for everything, especially when it comesto simpler things.
But that email can can do
a whole lotin terms of protection and clarifying
(42:50):
if something such as in disputecomes up later. Yep.
Awesome junk.So where can people find you?
If you want to find out more about you
or your law firmor that subscription package you offer.
Oh man, so many places.
You ready?
So our website iscounsel for creators dot com.
(43:10):
You can also that's counsel
at c0u and ACL for creators dot com
you can also find uson all the social media platforms.
We're very active on Instagram, veryactive on threads at counsel for creators.
We're on Tik Tok.
Don't know how long that's going to lastbecause apparently
they have to sell the companyor they may be banned in the U.S.
(43:32):
But we are active onTik Tok at Council for Traders.
We're active on Twitter,formerly X, formerly known as Twitter.
I believe it's at Creators Council.
I think we're going to move to Blue Skyat some point.
But you got to talk to Chris about that.
Are you on blue sky yet?
I am not. Yeah.
So we move thereand then join our mailing list.
(43:55):
We send a newsletter every week.
We also post interesting articlesfrom the world of arts, creative legal
business, whatever we share, articlesthat we write, content that we produce,
and then our subscription service,the creator's legal program,
you can find it on our websiteor you can go to Creator's
(44:16):
Legal program dot com creator'slegal program, dot
com and email
this email me Chuong at counselfor creators that com
I think I think that's itI think that I think that
given that your emailto everybody emails on my website it's
you can actually email me my biothat you read that you read or e-mail.
(44:38):
I look for people who really is all aboutthat.
Is that open for everybody? Email.
Okay, good. Yeah.
I mean, I might not answer your email,
but I read it to my assistant,but it'll be there every 10 minutes.
So thank you so much for joining us today.
But to all the listeners,thank you all so much for tuning in.
(45:00):
Hopefully you got a lot of value.
Zhang normally chargeshundreds of dollars an hour, so
hopefully these tips will saveyou much more than that
and could save your business.
And if you like this material, pleasemake sure you like
and subscribe so that you knowwhen the next episode is coming out
so I can continue bringing you more value
with guests such as Chuong and others.
(45:23):
Thanks so much, guys.
Thank you. All.
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