In his latest “drain the swamp” move that will actually flood the entire ecosystem, Trump demanded the Democratic members of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB) resign immediately. This may sound like just more petty partisan BS, but it could have huge unintended consequences, including for Trump’s own companies. Sometimes it helps to […]
The Trump Administration is apparently going to be a law unto itself. There have been plenty of people put up against the wall in recent days, but the weekend concluded with Donald Trump — perhaps illegally — firing at least 15 Inspectors General. This mass firing leaves the Defense Department, State Department, Department of Veterans […]
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Disclosure: I’m on the board of Bluesky, so feel free to take as many grains of salt as you want in reading it, though all of it applies equally to other decentralized social media ecosystems. The internet was supposed to liberate us. Instead, it’s left us feeling helpless, waiting for billionaires, governments, and tech giants to save […]
Late last year eight major U.S. telecoms were the victim of a massive intrusion by Chinese hackers who managed to spy on public U.S. officials for months. The “Salt Typhoon” hack was so severe, the intruders spent much of the last year rooting around the ISP networks even after discovery. AT&T and Verizon, two of the compromised […]
This week, both our winners on the insightful side come in response to our post about the meteorologist who was fired for criticizing Elon Muk’s nazi salute. In first place, it’s Maura with a reaction to the whole ridiculous situation: I hate that Elon Musk’s fans are using his autism diagnosis to excuse his behavior. […]
Despite all that has happened (and boy does it seem like too much), the fact is we’re still less than one month into 2025 — and that means there’s still time to enter the latest edition of our public domain game jam, Gaming Like It’s 1929! The jam is open through January 31st, and you […]
And now this whole thing gets even messier. What started off as something of a Streisand Effect post about Justin Baldoni’s decision to amplify the accusations made against him by Blake Lively has now simply ballooned into something much, much larger. Keep in mind that Lively’s accusations can essentially be distilled down to two main […]
Numerous articles on Walled Culture have chronicled the struggles to turn the aspirations of open access to knowledge into reality. The central reason people do not have free digital access to all academic knowledge is that publishers have been successful in subverting attempts to provide it. Publishers are strongly motivated to undermine open access, since its successful […]
The Detroit PD has made this sort of thing its unofficial brand. It has even shelled out at least $300,000 to ensure people most often think of the Detroit PD when discussing false arrests aided and abetted by facial recognition tech. But there are plenty of others in the US law enforcement industrial complex vying […]
After King Trump’s dutiful Supreme Court recently refused to hear the case, a New York State law has taken effect requiring that ISPs provide low-income, state residents affordable $15 broadband. It’s a big win for digital equity activists and consumer groups that have long argued that America’s heavily monopolized (and barely competitive) broadband industry results […]
Back in November, I explained in great detail how Trump’s new FCC chair Brendan Carr was signaling loud and clear that he intended to be Trump’s top censor. This was in contrast to both his and Trump’s declaration that Carr was some sort of “free speech warrior.” Instead, he has given every indication that he’s […]
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Well, well, well: let’s get this circuit split started! In completely unexpected news, the DC Court of Appeals has ruled [PDF] that compelling someone to unlock a device using their finger is a violation of Fifth Amendment protections that disallow forcing someone to testify against themselves. (h/t Gabriel Malor on Bluesky) Most courts have ruled […]
We’ve talked repeatedly how one way to boost lagging U.S. broadband competition is the support of “open access” fiber networks that allow numerous ISPs to compete over a centralized fiber network. In ideal implementations, like Ammon, Idaho or in parts of Utah, residents have the option of switching between multiple, competing ISPs, sometimes in a […]
Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly podcast about the latest news in online speech, from Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderation‘s Ben Whitelaw. Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Pocket Casts, YouTube, or your podcast app of choice — or go straight to the RSS feed. In this week’s round-up of the latest news in online […]
To borrow a phrase famously used by the world class philosophers called Green Day, Elon Musk is something of a walking contradiction. He touts the so-called “Twitter Files” as some kind of damning report on government weaponization against critical content and is then accused of doing exactly the same thing himself. He’s a “free speech […]
For all the hype and warnings about how TikTok is clearly a “national security threat” from China, the Trump administration has effectively kneecapped the investigation into one of the most serious cybersecurity breaches in US history — a genuine, proven threat to national security. In what Team Trump probably thinks is a move to “destroy […]
Despite a lot of bullshit about how Trump is super “populist,” “supports antitrust reform,” and will “carry on the legacy of monopoly busters like Lina Khan,” none of that has ever been true. Trump’s first administration was jam packed with the rubber stamping of plenty of terrible mergers. Streaming, media, and telecom companies are very […]
In Trumpworld, loyalty trumps all — even deeply held beliefs about crime and punishment. Shower Trump with praise and you can get away with murder (or at least drug trafficking). But dare to criticize him, and no punishment is too harsh. Making decisions based on who most inflated your ego may not seem like the […]
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