Tech Policy Podcast

#340: Making Sense of the SCOTUS Internet Speech Cases

17 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Three major Internet speech disputes are at, or barreling toward, the Supreme Court. In Gonzalez v. Google, the justices will consider the scope of Se...

#339: Will Tech Swallow the Fourth Amendment?

24 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Thanks to advancing technology, the police can now easily and cheaply monitor public spaces and identify, profile, and track individuals. Can the Four...

#338: Gonzalez v. Google

15 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

On February 21, the Supreme Court will hold oral argument in Gonzalez v. Google, the first Section 230 appeal the justices have ever heard. The future...

#337: China and Domestic Surveillance

06 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Liza Lin, a reporter at the Wall Street Journal, is the co-author, with Josh Chin, of Surveillance State: Inside China’s Quest to Launch a New Era o...

#336: Tech Illiteracy on the Right

24 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Bad tech policy is a bipartisan affair. Lately, though, the right has particularly excelled at it. TechFreedom’s Corbin Barthold and Ari Cohn discus...

#335: Is Screen Time Bad for Kids?

11 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Is screen time—television, smartphones, social media, video games—harming children? Elizabeth Nolan Brown, senior editor at Reason, returns to the...

#334: Snake Oil Salvation: Malcom Kyeyune on the New Internet Counterculture

21 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Malcom Kyeyune is the author of The New Gnostics, an article in the autumn issue of City Journal’s print magazine. In the piece, Malcom examines the...

#333: The FCC in Space

06 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The United States is entering a second golden age of space innovation. Can the country’s regulatory infrastructure keep up? For better or worse, the...

#332: Facial Recognition Technology

22 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Facial recognition technology is a powerful tool. Whatever we do with it—whatever rules we set around its use—we should proceed thoughtfully and c...

#331: Section 230’s Long Path to SCOTUS

31 Oct 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The Supreme Court has never heard a Section 230 case—until now. Earlier this month, the justices agreed to review Gonzalez v. Google, in which the p...

#330: The FTC & FCC in Court

12 Oct 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Independent federal agencies sit awkwardly in our constitutional structure. When they engage in aggressive overreach, therefore, they should expect to...

#329: Will Rinehart’s Wild Weird Brain

30 Sep 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Will Rinehart is a Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Growth and Opportunity. In this episode, a wide-ranging discussion of his work, he expands...

#328: What’s the Deal with European Antitrust?

19 Sep 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What is driving Europe’s aggressive antitrust enforcement against American tech companies? Are there legitimate antitrust concerns? Or are all the f...

#327: The Collapse of Complex Societies

31 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Is the end near? In the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic—and with the specters of political violence, debt crises, secular stagnation, climate change, ...

#326: Content Moderation Potpourri

16 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Content moderation is, as ever, an interesting, contentious, and fast-paced policy area. TechFreedom’s Corbin Barthold, Andy Jung, and Santana Boult...

#325: Live: Quinta Jurecic on Jan. 6, Social Media, and the Great Rage

26 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Hello from TechFreedom’s 2022 Policy Summit! The panelists at this year’s gathering discussed truth decay and misinformation, the collapse of trus...

#324: Parler Games

11 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Is “Big Tech censorship” really a thing? If so, are the social media giants facing effective competition from sites that style themselves as free ...

#323: Florida & Texas vs. the Internet

29 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Last year, Florida and Texas passed draconian social media speech regulations. Each law violates the First Amendment, and, not surprisingly, each was ...

#322: FTC Commissioner Noah Phillips

02 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Commissioner Noah Phillips joins the show for a wide-ranging discussion about the Federal Trade Commission. Topics include “unfair methods of compet...

#321: Musk’s Moderation Musings (And Beyond)

24 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Ever since his (putative) deal to buy Twitter was announced, Elon Musk has hijacked the debates around content moderation, the design of social media,...

#320: The Right and Social Media

17 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Evolving technology—not to mention evolving norms in Silicon Valley—has sparked fierce debate about online speech. Are social media platforms too ...

#319: Remember FAANG?

10 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In 2017 or so, people started to assert that the FAANG companies—Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google—were unstoppable juggernauts. Lately...

#318: The Universal Service Fund

27 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Though its goal—to help bridge the digital divide—is laudible, the Universal Service Fund is a badly structured, badly run, wasteful, much abused,...

#317: Making Progress

12 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Are we doomed to collapse, like Ancient Rome? Or will we continue to make scientific discoveries, build technological innovations, and increase our we...

#316: Putin’s War and the Internet

31 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In response to Russia’s invasion, Ukraine has lobbied the international community to impair Russia’s Internet infrastructure. The Russian state it...

#315: Social Media “Transparency” as First Amendment Violation

24 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Can the government require social media services to disclose data, or provide notifications, related to their content moderation practices? Many polit...

#314: The State of Internet Freedom

15 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The Internet can be a powerful tool for decentralization and resistance. Lately, however, authorities from across the political spectrum have been try...

#313: Responding to the Broadband Populists

03 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Activists like to shower the American broadband industry with criticism. In a new paper, Anticorporate Broadband Populists’ Real Agenda: Destroy the...

#312: Web3

22 Feb 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Web3 could lead to greater decentralization, authentication, and immutability on the Internet. But what does that mean? It’s about much more than ju...

#311: Administrative Law, and Why You Should Care

03 Feb 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Administrative law—including key administrative law principles, such as the “major questions” and “nondelegation” doctrines—deserves far g...

#310: Algorithmic Amplification

20 Jan 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Algorithmic amplification is the latest hot topic in the (seemingly endless) debate over social media content moderation. Legislators are introducing ...

#309: Conspiracy Theories and the Internet

11 Jan 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Is social media accelerating the spread of conspiracy theories? It sure feels like it: look at anti-vaxxers, claims about election fraud, and QAnon. P...

#308: All Eyes on the FTC

21 Dec 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The Federal Trade Commission is making headlines lately, as its new chair, Lina Khan, seeks to impose a “neo-Brandeisian” antitrust agenda. Adam C...

#307: Complexity Theory in One Lesson

14 Dec 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Neil Chilson has written a great new book: Getting Out of Control: Emergent Leadership in a Complex World. He and host Corbin Barthold discuss the boo...

#306: The New Space Race

23 Nov 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson, and even William Shatner have just been to space. Elon Musk is building rockets, launching satellites, and dreaming of go...

#305: FISA at the Supreme Court

03 Nov 2021

Contributed by Lukas

On November 8, the Supreme Court will hear oral argument in FBI v. Fazaga, an important case on the meaning and scope of the Foreign Intelligence Surv...

#304: Gen Z and Social Media

26 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Generation Z are the first true digital natives—people who cannot remember a time before the internet. This gives Gen Z a unique perspective, but it...

#303: Antitrust and Innovation

18 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The lively debate over the future of antitrust law continues. The Neo-Brandeisians want an aggressive, “big is bad” approach. The Chicago School d...

#302: Epic v. Apple

16 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Last year, Epic Games made a splash with its lawsuit / ad campaign challenging the rules and commission structure of the Apple app store. Last week, a...

#301: The Realignment

08 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

American politics, media, and culture are realigning in ways that are, as of yet, hard to identify and define. Marshall Kosloff, co-host of The Realig...

#300: The New Editors

26 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Because most attacks on social-media websites’ free-speech rights are dismissed under Section 230 (which is good!), there are comparatively few case...

#299: Can Apple Protect Children While Respecting Privacy?

19 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Apple recently announced that its next operating system will include new features to combat the spread of child sexual abuse material. Privacy advocat...

#298: Blood Trial: Elizabeth Holmes Goes to Court

12 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In 2015, Elizabeth Holmes and her firm, Theranos, seemed poised to revolutionize blood testing. Everything began to unravel in October of that year, h...

#297: The Latest on Section 230

29 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Section 230 is as important — and as widely misunderstood — as ever. TechFreedom’s Free Speech Counsel, Ari Cohn, joins the show to discuss the ...

#296: The Antitrust Crusade Against Big Tech

14 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Both the Democrats and the Republicans are introducing antitrust legislation targeted at tech companies. Elizabeth Nolan Brown, senior editor at Reaso...

#295: Can Social Media Be Regulated Like Common Carriage?

07 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Are social media websites more like newspapers (with strong free speech rights) or common carriers (with weaker free speech rights)? Enjoining enforce...

#294: Border Searches of Digital Devices

25 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Border agents have broad authority to search the smartphone or laptop of anyone entering the country. That might be about to change, however, if the S...

#293: The Supply of Renée DiResta Should Be Infinite

03 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Named in honor of her wonderful essay in The Atlantic, “The Supply of Disinformation Will Soon Be Infinite,” this episode is a wide-ranging discus...

#292: Is Miami the Next Great Tech Hub?

25 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Thanks in part to outreach by its mayor, Francis Suarez, Miami is becoming a tech hotspot. Matt Haggman, an executive at the Miami-Dade Beacon Council...

#291: The Facebook Oversight Board

10 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Last week, Facebook’s new Oversight Board issued a much-discussed ruling on the platform’s suspension of Donald Trump. Two of the Board’s member...

#290: The Net Neutrality Feud Heads West

22 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

“America is built on a tilt,” runs the apocryphal Mark Twain quote, “and everything loose slides to California.” So it might be said of net ne...

#289: The History, Use, and Abuse of the Fairness Doctrine

14 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Few public policies are more misunderstood than the Fairness Doctrine that briefly governed American broadcast media. If you think we need a “new Fa...

#288: The State of Data Privacy Law

07 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Data privacy is a complex and dynamic policy field. Lydia de la Torre, an inaugural board member of the new California Privacy Protection Agency, and ...

#287: No, Florida Can’t Regulate Online Speech

24 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Florida is poised to enact a law limiting social media websites’ ability to ban or moderate users. TechFreedom's Berin Szóka and Corbin Barthold di...

#286: How Algorithms Can Fight Extremism

08 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

What can social-media platforms do to address growing concerns about extremism on their sites? Research suggests that YouTube, for one, has made great...

#285: Data Rights for Criminal Defendants

24 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Data plays an increasingly important role in our criminal justice system, yet there are serious inequalities in prosecutors’ and defendants’ right...

#284: The Revolt of the Public

16 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The events of the last few years have shown the clear impact that movements beginning online can have in the real world. Social media platforms, as we...

#283: Privacy and Surveillance in China

10 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

China’s approach to surveillance, particularly its dystopian-sounding Social Credit System, has raised serious human rights concerns, particularly i...

#282: Tech and the Biden Administration

22 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

What can the tech industry expect from the incoming Biden administration? Emily Birnbaum, tech policy reporter at Protocol, joins the show to discuss ...

#281: Should companies be allowed to acquire their start-up competitors?

08 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Policymakers across the political spectrum are using antitrust law to attack established companies’ acquisitions of smaller competitors. But are the...

#280: Section 230, Antitrust, and Consumer Protection

25 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The Global Antitrust Institute’s Report on the Digital Economy is out! Berin Szóka, the founder of TechFreedom, returns to the show to discuss his ...

#279: Revising Section 230 Will Silence Marginalized Voices

08 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Social media content moderation has been a hot topic for policymakers throughout the election, with a particular focus on the liability protections of...

#278: Privacy by Design

07 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The data that we generate in our everyday lives can be immensely useful, but it’s vital that any use of that data carefully protects privacy. Sunny ...

#277: Can the DOJ Break up Google?

29 Oct 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Last week, the Department of Justice and eleven Republican state attorneys general filed a lawsuit alleging Google has used anticompetitive practices ...

#276: Nationalizing 5G?!

28 Sep 2020

Contributed by Lukas

While 5G technology is being rolled out across the country, some have been dissatisfied with the speed at which the revolutionary next step in wireles...

#275: The Future of Innovation

11 Sep 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Between heavy government regulations, a competitive marketplace, and an uncertain economy, the early stages of an innovative start-up are full of risk...

#274: Can Platforms Stop the Spread of Misinformation?

21 Aug 2020

Contributed by Lukas

With the approaching election, preventing the spread of online misinformation is especially important. Heather West, head of Americas policy at Mozill...

#273: [The] Breakup Speech: Antitrust and Free Speech

30 Jul 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Legislators on both the left and right have raised concerns over the control a few major platforms have over online speech. Is breaking up those platf...

#272: Transparency, Tech, and Surveillance with WashingTech

16 Jul 2020

Contributed by Lukas

With policing reform at the center of the country’s attention, it’s critical to examine the ways in which the state’s use of technology can enab...

#271: Pay Black Women, Pinterest

02 Jul 2020

Contributed by Lukas

This is the story of two brilliant Black women — Aerica Shimizu Banks and Ifeoma Ozoma. Pinterest, the company they gave their talents and dedicatio...

#270: Cryptocurrency and Florida’s Tech Policy

26 Jun 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The current economic and social upheaval has made cryptocurrency more important than ever, Andrea O’Sullivan, director of the Center for Technology ...

#269: Telehealth in the Age of COVID-19 – What’s Next?

15 Jun 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Given the importance of staying home to minimize the spread of the coronavirus, telehealth is more vital than ever. Recently, the federal government h...

#268: 5G Innovation w/ Samsung

08 May 2020

Contributed by Lukas

While 5G wireless technology is beginning to be rolled out, we’re only just starting to see how new innovations will affect our lives. John Godfrey,...

#267: 5G and the Spectrum Wars

29 Apr 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Spectrum allocation can make or break the development of new wireless technologies like 5G, but in recent years, interagency conflicts have held up th...

#266: The Economics of Tech Policy w/ TPI

08 Apr 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Given the importance of economic impact in informing policy decisions, the Technology Policy Institute focuses on economic analysis within the tech po...

#265: Preventing Algorithmic Discrimination

25 Mar 2020

Contributed by Lukas

While the use of algorithms has proven incredibly valuable in a range of applications, their implementation can often lead to harmful discriminatory o...

#264: Is the WHO Blowing Smoke about Vaping Dangers?

09 Mar 2020

Contributed by Lukas

E-cigarettes have provided an important harm-reduction tool in lessening the health hazards of smoking. Despite this, many government agencies and pub...

#263: A Tech Update from the West Coast

24 Feb 2020

Contributed by Lukas

California has often been among the most active states in passing new legislation to regulate the tech industry. These policies can potentially impact...

#262: Another Attack on Encryption

17 Feb 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Encryption is a vital tool, not just for privacy, but for cybersecurity as well. However, law enforcement and legislators have been pushing to undermi...

#261: Florida’s Sharing Economy

12 Feb 2020

Contributed by Lukas

As new niches in the sharing economy develop and provide consumers with new opportunities, governments at both the national and state level continue t...

#260: How America Can Keep Leading Innovation

05 Feb 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The American tech industry has led the world in innovation, in part because principled decisions by the industry. However, government officials have i...

#259: Section 230 and Online 'Censorship'

23 Jan 2020

Contributed by Lukas

The liability protections in Section 230 that make digital free speech possible have faced nearly constant threats from both sides of the aisle. Late ...

#258: Protecting creativity with Pinterest

03 Jan 2020

Contributed by Lukas

One of the largest challenges online platforms face is finding the best approach to content moderation on a large scale. Aerica Shimizu Banks, public ...

#257: The Future of 5G with T-Mobile

20 Dec 2019

Contributed by Lukas

While 5G continues to be a major buzzword within the wireless industry, 2020 will likely see important steps forward in bringing the new technology to...

#256: Driving Out Flexibility

06 Dec 2019

Contributed by Lukas

The gig economy has given workers important new opportunities to earn extra income or work a job that gives them freedom over their schedule. However,...

#255 How Much Should We Worry About Deep Fakes?

28 Oct 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Deep fake technology, which uses artificial intelligence to convincingly alter video, has become the source of the latest panic over the spread of mis...

#254: Bridging the Digital Divide through Internet Essentials

03 Oct 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Despite the fact that the Internet is more intertwined with our daily lives than ever before, far too many people in America lack a reliable connectio...

#253: The Road Ahead for Self-Driving Cars

19 Sep 2019

Contributed by Lukas

As the technology behind self-driving cars becomes increasingly viable for more widespread use, lawmakers and regulators have grappled with creating a...

#252: Harm-Reducing E-Cigs Might Go up in Smoke

31 Jul 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Despite an ever-growing body of evidence showing that e-cigarettes are far less harmful than traditional combustible cigarettes and can serve as a val...

#251: SESTA/FOSTA Hurts the Victims It Aims to Protect

18 Jul 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Last year, Congress passed SESTA/FOSTA, legislation intended to help law enforcement fight sex trafficking online. However, as numerous experts (inclu...

#250: Mapbox

14 Jun 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Apps increasingly rely on user location data as part of their services, but how private is that data kept? Ash is joined by Tom Lee, policy lead at Ma...

#249: Information Fiduciaries: The Privacy Awakens

05 Jun 2019

Contributed by Lukas

On the previous episode of the show we covered a new legal concept of information fiduciaries and how it can apply to tech policy. Today we are diving...

#248: Everything You Wanted to Know about Information Fiduciaries but Were Afraid to Ask

28 May 2019

Contributed by Lukas

The reaction against the ever-growing amount of information collected by tech giants has led to proposals ranging from self-regulation to strict GDPR-...

#247: Seeing the Silver Lining in the Current Techlash

13 May 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Growing anti-tech sentiment both in the government and the general public has led to calls for policies that threaten to stifle innovation. Despite th...

#246: Talking Privacy with DuckDuckGo

07 May 2019

Contributed by Lukas

As the consumer privacy debate rages on in the policy world, DuckDuckGo has made a name for itself by providing a range of privacy-protecting tools an...

#245: Does the Internet Actually Need Saving?

24 Apr 2019

Contributed by Lukas

The Save the Internet Act, intended to force the FCC to revert to regulating the Internet under Title II, passed the House earlier this month and will...

#244: Utah Wants a Warrant

03 Apr 2019

Contributed by Lukas

Despite a recent Supreme Court victory in Carpenter v. United States, progress in defending personal data from government snooping has been at a crawl...

#243: Will the Electric Scooter Movement Lose Its Charge?

03 Dec 2018

Contributed by Lukas

Electric scooters been popping up in cities all over the US, seemingly overnight. While many have found the scooters to be a welcome addition to their...

#242: Hybrid Networks and the Future of Wireless

26 Nov 2018

Contributed by Lukas

The proposed merger of Sprint and T-Mobile raised a plethora of concerns from both regulators and the general public. In response, the Federal Communi...

#241: Journalists v. Trump

08 Nov 2018

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump is known for his aggressive attitude toward the media, but do his actions and statements represent a violation of the First Amendment?...