Author archives

Has the decline of knowledge work begun?

Boston.com: “The unemployment rate for college graduates has risen faster than for other workers over the past few years. How worried should they be? When Starbucks announced last month that it was laying off more than 1,000 corporate employees, it highlighted a disturbing trend for white-collar workers: Over the past few years, they have seen …

Subjects: AI, Economy, Education, Financial System, Knowledge Management, Microsoft

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, March 29, 2025

Via LLRX – Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, March 29, 2025 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the …

Subjects: AI, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, E-Commerce, E-Mail, E-Records, Privacy, Social Media

Walking Shouldn’t Be So Dangerous in the US

Scientific American – “…According to data analyzed by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention researchers in the latest Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, about 20 pedestrians are killed each day in the U.S. by someone driving a car. That was 7,522 pedestrians in 2022. Those researchers note that other countries’ pedestrian fatality rates are going …

Subjects: Climate Change, Environmental Law, Transportation

NOAA removed 2024 Climate Literacy Guide from its website

Union of Concerned Scientist: “Yet another resource that belongs to us, the US public, has disappeared down the Trump administration’s memory hole. I just learned from the valiant Environmental Data and Government Initiative that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has removed the 2024 Climate Literacy Guide from https://www.climate.gov (though a data savior has …

Subjects: Censorship, Climate Change, Defense, Education, Energy, Environmental Law, Government Documents

Inside arXiv—the Most Transformative Platform in All of Science

Wired: “…Nearly 35 years ago, Paul Ginsparg created arXiv, a digital repository where researchers could share their latest findings—before those findings had been systematically reviewed or verified. Visit arXiv.org today (it’s pronounced like “archive”) and you’ll still see its old-school Web 1.0 design, featuring a red banner and the seal of Cornell University, the platform’s …

Subjects: Climate Change, Education, Environmental Law, Internet, Knowledge Management

Angelo Carusone on tracking Project 2025 and right-wing media

PBS News: “Project 2025, the conservative policy project, became a flashpoint during the presidential campaign. Angelo Carusone of Media Matters studied the 900-page document and spoke with Geoff Bennett for our series, On Democracy, where we hear a range of perspectives on how government should function, what led to this moment in American history and …

Subjects: Censorship, Civil Liberties, Congress, Government Documents, Health Care, Housing, Internet, Legal Research, Social Media

Internal White House document details plans to fire employees across US agencies

Washington Post – no paywall – “Federal officials are preparing for agencies to cut between 8 and 50 percent of their employees as part of a Trump administration push to shrink the federal government, according to an internal White House document obtained by The Washington Post that contains closely held draft plans for reshaping the …

Subjects: Climate Change, Economy, Education, Environmental Law, Financial System, Government Documents, Health Care, Legal Research

The Subtle Resistance of Dictionary.com

The Contrarian: “There’s something pretty interesting happening on Dictionary.com and its sister site, Thesaurus.com. Scroll down to the example usages of a given word and you’ll see what I mean. Among the example sentences for “democracy” at time of publication: “It seems this 248-year-old experiment we call American democracy may very well rest in the …

Subjects: Censorship, Civil Liberties, Education, Government Documents, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research

Cops Used the Shoplifting Panic to Buy Tons of New Equipment

The “crime panic” was a myth. But an analysis by The Appeal shows the narrative helped local police buy facial recognition software, drones, license plate readers, social media surveillance tech, and more. “Retail theft has dominated headlines, earnings calls, and political rhetoric for the last few years. Television news shows loop seemingly endless clips of …

Subjects: Civil Liberties, E-Records, Legal Research, Privacy, Social Media

Trump Hits Smithsonian With DEI Censorship – will remove ‘improper ideology’ from such properties

Executive Order Restoring Truth and Sanity to American Histor. March 27, 2025. By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered: Section 1.  Purpose and Policy.  Over the past decade, Americans have witnessed a concerted and widespread effort to rewrite …

Subjects: Censorship, Civil Liberties, Education, Government Documents, Knowledge Management

The Five Pillars Of Trumpian Repression

Via Lawfare – Benjamin Wittes has categorized the authoritarian moves by Trump so far, and they fall into similar themes as the above “autocratic legal playbook”: attack on the government’s own power to spend money; internal retributions and restructurings within government itself—most importantly, in the power agencies: DoD, FBI, and DOJ; the overt creation of …

Subjects: Censorship, Congress, Government Documents, Legal Research