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Category Archives: Legal Research

So What Is Going On With the Supreme Court in 2024?

Slate [read 5 articles free before paywalled] – “If you’re interested in understanding more about what the high court is, how it functions, and why it seems to have recently lurched to the right, start here…The 5 Circuit Court of Appeals covers Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas. Trump appointed six judges to this bench, some of… Continue Reading

There’s a Trump Presidential Library at the National Archives and It’s Hiring

No words for this via Washingtonian – “Now here’s a fun job listing: This position is part of the National Archives and Records Administration. Incumbent serves as the Deputy Director of the Donald J. Trump Presidential Library within the National Archives and Records Administration. Serves as a principal advisor to the Library Director. At the… Continue Reading

Platform Response to Disinformation during the EU Election 2024

Fundacion Maladista.es: Analysis of the responses of very large online platforms to debunked disinformation during the EU Election 2024. 1. Executive summary – The goal of this report is to evaluate how five very large online platforms (VLOPs: Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X and YouTube) have responded to debunked electoral disinformation about the European Parliamentary elections… Continue Reading

Book bans in political context: Evidence from US schools

Book bans in political context: Evidence from US schools. PNAS Nexus, Volume 3, Issue 6, June 2024, pgae197, https://doi.org/10.1093/pnasnexus/pgae197 “In the 2021–2022 school year, more books were banned in US school districts than in any previous year. Book banning and other forms of information censorship have serious implications for democratic processes, and censorship has become… Continue Reading

Data broker shuts down product related to driver behavior patterns

The Record: “The revelation earlier this year that General Motors had been selling driver behavior patterns to data brokers — who in turn packaged and resold it to insurers — has led at least one of two major data brokers to shut down its related product.  That data broker, Verisk, disclosed last month that it… Continue Reading

What Animal Studies Are Revealing About Their Minds and Ours

TIME – “…The last few months alone have been something of a boom time for research into the intelligence and behavior of animals. German researchers discovered a sort of pre-verbal stage in finches—similar to the babbling stage in humans—that leads to their becoming fluent in song. Studies in Sweden and Vienna explored the role of… Continue Reading

Google sued by top textbook publishers over ads for pirated e-books

XM: “June 5 (Reuters) – Google was hit with a lawsuit on Wednesday by educational publishers Cengage, Macmillan Learning, McGraw Hill and Elsevier accusing the tech giant of promoting pirate copies of their textbooks. The publishers told the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York that Google has ignored thousands of copyright-infringement… Continue Reading

Catalyzing Crisis – A Primer on Artificial Intelligence, Catastrophes, and National Security

Center for New American Security: “The arrival of ChatGPT in November 2022 initiated both great excitement and fear around the world about the potential and risks of artificial intelligence (AI). In response, several AI labs, national governments, and international bodies have launched new research and policy efforts to mitigate large-scale AI risks. However, growing efforts… Continue Reading

Tracking AI-enabled Misinformation

“From unreliable AI-generated news outlets operating with little to no human oversight, to fabricated images produced by AI image generators, the rollout of generative artificial intelligence tools has been a boon to content farms and misinformation purveyors alike.  This AI Tracking Center is intended to highlight the ways that generative AI has been deployed to… Continue Reading

New Dataset of State Interest Group Policy Positions in the United States

“Research on the activities and influence of interest groups in state legislatures faces a data problem: we are missing a comprehensive, systematic dataset of interest groups’ policy preferences on state legislation. We address this gap by introducing the Dataset on Policy Choice and Organizational Representation in the United States (CHORUS). This dataset compiles over 13… Continue Reading

FBI Releases 2024 Quarterly Crime Report and Use-of-Force Data Update

“On Monday, June 10, 2024, the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program released the Quarterly Uniform Crime Report (Q1), January-March, 2024 and the National Use-of-Force Data Collection Update, March 2024, on the FBI’s Crime Data Explorer (CDE) at https://cde.ucr.cjis.gov. The Quarterly Uniform Crime Report (Q1), January-March, 2024, provides a preliminary look at crime trends for… Continue Reading