March 1, 2023 TikTok Ban would repeal free speech protections A House Committee is set to vote on their attempt to ban TikTok. The bill empowers the president to impose sanctions on any entity that operates a “connected software application” subject to the influence of China, but tries to skirt...
February 16, 2023 The search landscape is shifting Search platforms are in fierce competition to integrate large language model-based generative AI in an effort to better understand users’ natural language queries, provide more informative search results, and differentiate in other regards (e.g., accuracy, privacy). Most attention has focused on Microsoft...
February 2, 2023 DoJ’s pointless swing at Google adtech On Jan 24, the Justice Department, along with the Attorneys General of eight states, filed a civil antitrust suit against Google for monopolizing multiple digital advertising technology products, including its ad publisher, exchange, and advertiser network platforms. The complaint is the...
January 16, 2023 IGP paper on TikTok makes waves On January 9 IGP released a threat analysis of TikTok that debunked claims that the popular short video app is a national security threat. Until now, the “ban TikTok” debate has never been subjected to critical scrutiny, and no one has...
We speak endlessly of the value of "data" in the digital economy, and the platforms' alleged "extraction" of value from it. But this emphasis on data, data, data can be misleading. Platforms compete for users, for larger "audiences," not for "data." I say "audiences" for lack of a better word....
Elon Musk completed his acquisition of Twitter last week. This process was accompanied by a fascinating public process, which reveals how politicized and polarized American social media have become. We have two factions competing for power; one has captured the Democratic party, the other has captured the Republican Party. The...
A Chinese law that went into effect six months ago required online service providers to file details of the algorithms they use with China’s centralized regulator, the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC). In mid-August, CAC released a list of 30 algorithms used by companies such as Alibaba, TenCent and Douyin,...
China Hawks Revive Trump’s Tiktok Gambit FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr is trying very hard to revive former President Donald Trump’s TikTok ban. Even as the House January 6 Committee explores the details of a real threat to national security created by the very man who appointed Carr to the FCC...
Tracking, privacy and platform competition Can a platform offer zero-price services that simultaneously preserve user privacy and business relationships across websites/applications? This is a puzzle the major platforms are trying to solve. There are legitimate concerns on all sides with users wanting subsidized services without creepy tracking, and businesses wanting...
As Congress passes legislation designed to onshore and re-nationalize the production of semiconductor-based integrated circuits, the hype of the industry backers of this plan proclaims that “The Future is Built on Semiconductors.” Is it, now? It would be more accurate to say that the “The Present is built on Semiconductors”...
Declaring Independence in Cyberspace tells the story of the struggle between governments and the global Internet community over control of the Internet registries (IANA). It offers new insights into a pressing question with profound implications: is state sovereignty the immutable foundation of global governance, or can new technological capabilities change the model?
“This is a book that needed to be written, and no one is better placed to write it than Milton Mueller. This full, rigorous account provides researchers and policymakers with a precious resource on global internet governance.”
