Author archives

Stand Up for Science

“Stand Up for Science was born in February 2025—in the wake of devastating cuts to federal research funding and infrastructure, unprecedented government censorship of scientific work, and targeted attacks on diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility. Supported by a team of over 100 volunteers, we hosted over 30 official Stand Up for Science rallies on March …

Subjects: Censorship, Climate Change, Congress, Economy, Education, Environmental Law, Food and Nutrition, Health Care, HIV/AIDS, Medicine

AI companies start winning the copyright fight

Follow up to Anthropic destroyed millions of print books to build its AI models via The Guardian: “Last week, tech companies notched several victories in the fight over their use of copyrighted text to create artificial intelligence products. Anthropic: A US judge has ruled that Anthropic, maker of the Claude chatbot, use of books to …

Subjects: AI, Copyright, Government Documents, Intellectual Property, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Search Engines

A Pro-Russia Disinformation Campaign Is Using Free AI Tools to Fuel a ‘Content Explosion’

Wired no paywall: “Consumer-grade AI tools have supercharged Russian-aligned disinformation as pictures, videos, QR codes, and fake websites have proliferated. A pro-Russia disinformation campaign is leveraging consumer artificial intelligence tools to fuel a “content explosion” focused on exacerbating existing tensions around global elections, Ukraine, and immigration, among other controversial issues, according to new research published …

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

Law360 mandates reporters use AI “bias” detection on all stories

NiemanLab: “A new policy at Law360, the legal news service owned by LexisNexis, requires that every story pass through an AI-powered “bias” detection tool before publication. The Law360 Union, which represents over 200 editorial staffers across the 350-person newsroom, has denounced the mandate since it went into effect in mid-May. On June 17, unit chair …

Subjects: AI, Censorship, Free Speech, Freedom of Information, Government Documents, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research

AI chatbots are breaking the web—and forcing a 404 makeover

FastCompany – no paywall: “More than half of Americans now use a chatbot, with an increasing number of people replacing search engines with large language model (LLM)-powered chat queries to navigate the web and find answers. In general, the quality of these outputs is improving as the underlying models get better. However, the challenge of …

Subjects: AI, Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Search Engines

Justice Dept. Explores Using Criminal Charges Against Election Officials

The New York Timesl: “Senior Justice Department officials are exploring whether they can bring criminal charges against state or local election officials if the Trump administration determines they have not sufficiently safeguarded their computer systems, according to people familiar with the discussions. The department’s effort, which is still in its early stages, is not based …

Subjects: Censorship, Civil Liberties, E-Government, E-Records, Free Speech, Government Documents, Legal Research

That Dropped Call With Customer Service? It Was on Purpose.

The Atlantic no paywall: “…Over the days ahead, and then weeks, and then more weeks, I got pulled into a corner of modern existence that you are, of course, familiar with. You know it from dealing with your own car company, or insurance company, or health-care network, or internet provider, or utility provider, or streaming …

Subjects: E-Commerce, Economy, Financial System, Internet, Knowledge Management

Federal Judge – HHS layoffs were likely unlawful and must be halted

AP: “A federal judge has ruled that recent mass layoffs at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services were likely unlawful and ordered the Trump administration to halt plans to downsize and reorganize the nation’s health workforce. U.S. District Judge Melissa DuBose granted the preliminary injunction sought by a coalition of attorneys general from …

Subjects: Censorship, Civil Liberties, Courts, E-Records, Government Documents, Health Care, Legal Research, Medicine

NIH-funded science must now be free to read instantly: what you should know

Nature: “From 1 July, researchers funded by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) will be required to make their scientific papers available to read for free as soon as they are published in a peer-reviewed journal. That’s according to the agency’s latest public-access policy, aimed at making federally funded research accessible to taxpayers. US …

Subjects: Education, Freedom of Information, Health Care, Knowledge Management, Medicine

How the Billionaires Took Over

The New Republic: “Yes, Donald Trump is a threat to democracy. But the far bigger menace is the monstrous growth in wealth concentration over five decades that made a Trump presidency possible—and maybe inevitable. Here’s how we let it happen. Donald Trump is America’s first billionaire president. He entered the White House in 2017 with …

Subjects: Censorship, Civil Liberties, E-Commerce, Economy, Financial System, Legal Research, Social Media

Saving bees to feed the world

[Not an endorsement – this is an example of how AI is applied to a specific environmental disaster] “The increasing loss of bee colonies around the world poses a threat to approximately 75% of pollination-dependent crops that humans consume, as well as to the pollinators themselves. At Beewise, our business model is intrinsically linked to …

Subjects: AI, Climate Change, Environmental Law