The New Yorker, Fergus McIntosh [unpaywalled]: “What is truly extraordinary about any fact-checking department is that it exists at all. At the time of writing, nearly 30 people work in Checking at The New Yorker, “It is labor, at scale, that produces accuracy.”…“Fake news” is not a new concept, but many Americans now register displeasure… Continue Reading
Accurate, Focused Research on Law, Technology and Knowledge Discovery Since 2002
Category Archives: Legal Research
FOIA Fellows as Freedom Fighters
Jack Wroldsen, FOIA Fellows as Freedom Fighters: An Independent and Privately Funded FOIA Commission of Rotating Professionals (Oct. 31, 2024). 108 Marquette L. Rev. (forthcoming 2025), available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=5043146 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.5043146. “The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is a hallmark of U.S. democracy, designed as an outsider element that foists transparency on a government… Continue Reading
The Depths of Wikipedians
Asterisk Interview with Annie Rauwerda – The Depths of Wikipedians – Asterisk: You’re famous for the Depths of Wikipedia account, where you share factoids from some of the most arcane, interesting, and surprising pages on Wikipedia. But you’re also now a part of the broader Wikipedia community. How did you first get interested in the… Continue Reading
LA wildfire damages set to cost record $135 Billion – 10,000+ buildings destroyed
Semafor – “JPMorgan said this morning, more than double an earlier estimate. That comes as those companies are still rebuilding their reserves from the 2017 and 2018 wildfire seasons, which included the deadly Camp Fire in California. Insurers have been fleeing California in recent years as weather-related catastrophes become more common, pushing more homeowners to… Continue Reading
Here is a list of every app on your phone selling your location data
Via Austin Corbett @austincorbett.bsky.social– Here is a list of every app on your phone selling your location data to advertisers, interested unknown 3rd parties, and the US government. Thanks to 404 Media and @josephcox.bsky.social There are 12, 373 apps on this Google doc as of today – the apps are used by children and adults… Continue Reading
What the data says about federal workers
Pew Research Center – “President-elect Donald Trump has focused much attention on shrinking the size and scope of the federal government for his second administration. Most notably, Trump has appointed tech mogul Elon Musk and GOP-primary-rival-turned-ally Vivek Ramaswamy to lead an advisory task force dubbed the “Department of Government Efficiency.” Musk and Ramaswamy have said… Continue Reading
Power of Community Posts: Conversation is the New Influencer
Research by Reddit, about Reddit – At CES 2025, Reddit released research outlining how conversation is becoming an influencer throughout the purchase journey. “In the last year, our research has shown that 47% of social media users say “irrelevant search terms” are the most frustrating aspects of their product research). That is in part why… Continue Reading
Announcing the Public Domain Image Archive
“After the hundreds (thousands?) of hours trawling through online image collections since the PDR’s inception, we’ve decided it was time to create one of our own! We are really excited to share with you the launch of our new sister-project, the Public Domain Image Archive (PDIA), a curated collection of more than 10,000 out-of-copyright historical… Continue Reading
Territorial Courts, Constitutions, and Organic Acts, Explained
State Court Report – “Over 3.5 million people reside in the five inhabited U.S. territories of American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Each territory has its own court system and constitution or similar governing document. This explainer provides a brief overview of territorial courts and constitutions, including… Continue Reading
Experian Conducted ‘Sham Investigations’ Into Errors in Its Credit Reports
Gizmodo: “Experian has routinely provided inaccurate information in credit reports that help determine whether consumers are approved for loans, jobs, or housing and failed to properly investigate or correct errors when consumers disputed the mistakes, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. CFPB data shows that last year the agency… Continue Reading
Opioid settlement spending
Data is Plural: “KFF Health News, working with researchers at Johns Hopkins and Shatterproof, has published “a first-of-its kind database” tracking how states and local governments are using the billions of dollars received via opioid settlements in recent years. The database, drawing from “dozens of interviews, thousands of pages of documents, an array of public… Continue Reading
On The Fragility of Our Knowledge Base
JSTOR Daily: “Historian Glenn D. Tieffert shows how state interests in the People’s Republic of China can be protected by editing online databases and collections. Digital databases are vulnerable to authoritarian regimes. In fact, argues historian Glenn D. Tiffert, “no corner of the knowledge economy lies beyond their reach.” “Digital platforms offer [censors] dynamic, fine-grained… Continue Reading
