Education

Tomas Lipinski attended the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts in 1981 and a Master of Library and Information Science in 1990. He also studied at Marquette University. There Lipinski earned a Juris Doctor degree in 1984. He also got a Master of Laws at John Marshall Law School in 1986 and a Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1998.

Career

Tomas Lipinski has worked in a variety of legal settings, including the private, public, and non-profit sectors. From 1981 to 1990, he worked as an attorney and an instructor at American Institute for Paralegal Studies in 1989-1993. Lipinski also served at Syracuse University. He was an associate librarian and associate director of H. Douglas Barclay Law Library in 1990-1992 and an adjunct professor of law in 1992. In 1992 he became a librarian at the Milwaukee Public Library, where he spent two years. In 1994 Lipinski joined the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. In the begging, he served as an adjunct instructor in 1994-1997, then as an assistant professor of information studies and co-director of Center for Information Policy Research in 1998-2003.

In 2003 he became an associate professor, then a professor in 2008. Lipinski also held the position of director of a Master of Library and Information Science Degree Program. Since 2014, he serves as a dean and professor. Lipinski was an instructor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1997. Since 1998, he is a visiting assistant professor. Lipinski also was a guest lecturer at the Free University of Brussels, a visiting professor at the University of Pretoria from 1999, and a guest speaker at Wisconsin Indianhead Technical College and Northeast Wisconsin Technical College. From 2000 to 2002, he was a member of the library school educators advisory board of the West Group. In 2011, Lipinski started to work at the Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis as an executive associate dean and professor until 2012. Then he served as a director of the School of Library and Information Science in 2013 and professor in 2013-2014 at Kent State University.

In addition to his educational career, Tomas Lipinski is a presenter at conferences in the United States and abroad, a guest on media programs, a consultant to the Cooperative Educational Service Agency, and testifies as an expert witness on copyright issues related to distance learning. Besides, Lipinski is a writer. Additionally to authoring books, he is the author of numerous articles to periodicals, including American Journal of Distance Education, Education Law into Practice, Ethics and Information Technology, Journal of Business Ethics, Libri, Richmond Journal of Law and Technology, Informing Science, Education Law Reporter, Brigham Young University Education and Law Review, and Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Technology and Society. He was a guest co-editor to the Journal of Information Ethics and also a contributing editor to the Technicalities in 2000. Lipinski's book, The Librarian's Legal Companion for Licensing Information Resources and Service, was called the "Bible for librarians" in one review. Another review referred to him as "one of the great legal authorities in American librarianship."

To date, Tomas Lipinski is currently a member of the American Library Association's Office for Information Technology Policy, chair of its Copyright Education Subcommittee, and chairs the Association of College & Research Libraries Copyright Discussion Group. He is also a member of the Copyright and Other Legal Matters Committee of the International Federation of Library Associations.

Achievements

• A lawyer as well as a professor of information studies, Tomas Lipinski is a nationally known expert in copyright, information law, and intellectual property issues related to privacy and free speech, ethics, freedom of inquiry, and distance education. He is currently the author of six books and numerous articles and invited chapters on these issues.
  
  As an educator, he teaches for more than thirty years. At the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, he twice received the Web-based Information Science Education Faculty of the Year Award for Excellence in Online Education from the Association for Library and Information Science Education.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The Librarian's Legal Companion for Licensing Information Resources and Services

    (Legal expert Lipinski offers a definitive sourcebook for ...)

    2012
  • The Library's Legal Answers for Meeting Rooms and Displays

    (When your public library invites the community to its spa...)

    2016
  • The Library's Legal Answers for Makerspaces

    (Organized in Q & A format for quick reference, this conci...)

    2016
  • Libraries, Museums, and Archives

    (This in-depth treatment provides concrete background and ...)

    2002
  • The Complete Copyright Liability Handbook for Librarians and Educators

    (This must-have comprehensive guidebook covers copyright i...)

    2006
  • The Library's Legal Answer Book

    (Libraries are in the thick of legal issues as new technol...)

    2002

Membership

• 

  Association for Information Science and Technology , United States

• 

  American Association of Law Librarians , United States

• Tomas Lipinski is the president of the Wisconsin chapter of the Association for Information Science since 2000.

  American Society for Information Science , United States

• 

  Education Law Association , United States

• 

  Thomas More Lawyers Society , United States

• 

  Tomas Lipinski is an affiliate member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.

  Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers , United States

• 

  State Bar of Wisconsin , United States

• 

  Phi Alpha Theta , United States

• 

  Beta Phi Mu , United States