Hello from Austin, Texas, where I am here for twelve days to see friends, do some business, and attend/speak at SXSW.
Let me know if you’ll be in town and want to get together.
Also, I’m hiring at Duco! We’re looking for a marketing and communications intern to help with this newsletter, the podcast (which is coming back this week!), Duco’s social media, and a lot more. If you are interested, apply here.
Before we get to the links I want to share some quick thoughts on two books I just finished reading - Zoë Schiffer’s Extremely Hardcore: Inside Elon Musk’s Twitter and Kara Swisher’s Burn Book: A Tech Love Story. I’ve got Kurt Wagner’s Battle for the Bird up next.
Zoë’s book is an easy and informative read of how Elon Musk ended up with Twitter. Kara’s was one that I expected to just be well-known rants but ended up much more than that. My favorite parts are:
Her reminders that we only have so much time on this earth so we should focus on what is important, be honest to one’s self, admit when you are wrong and don’t be afraid to pivot. Her reflections on Steve Jobs and Dave Goldberg were particularly vulnerable and poignant.
Her point that people leak because they think leaders aren’t listening to them but will listen to reporters is spot on.
The clear love and passion she has for what she does and how she built a unique brand from it.
I highly recommend both.
Finally, a happy early birthday to my mom!
Please support the curation and analysis I’m doing with this newsletter. As a paid subscriber, you make it possible for me to bring you in-depth analyses of the most pressing issues in tech and politics.
What I’m Reading
The Information: The Ultimate Insiders’ Guide to AI: How Founders, Investors and Executives Really Use the Technology
Search Engine Land: Survey: 51% of Gen Z women prefer TikTok, not Google, for search
CSG Midwest: Michigan, Minnesota laws ban 'deep fakes' in election campaigns
Economic Times: Gemini not always reliable in responding to prompts: Google after chatbot's response on PM Modi
404 Media: Tumblr and WordPress to Sell Users’ Data to Train AI Tools
Proof News: Seeking Reliable Election Information? Don’t Trust AI
BBC: An update on the BBC’s plans for Generative AI (Gen AI) and how we plan to use AI tools responsibly
Sky News: Voters braced for Facebook and Instagram messages as political ad spend rises
Reuters: Brazil Justice Moraes warns political candidates not to use AI against opponents
Associated Press: Mexican president slams YouTube for taking down his video that shared a journalist's phone number
The Guardian: US leading global alliance to counter foreign government disinformation
Meta: How Meta Is Preparing for the EU’s 2024 Parliament Elections
Reuters: Facebook owner Meta angers Australia with plan to stop paying for news content
Bloomberg: Facebook, YouTube to Face New Canada ‘Harmful’ Content Rules
Pew Research Center: Introducing the Pew-Knight Initiative
Knight Media Forum: There’s good news about the news
New York Times: Instagram’s Uneasy Rise as a News Site
Washington Post: Meet the Amazon 'influencers' making money off everything they own
NBC News: Fake news YouTube creators target Black celebrities with AI-generated misinformation
New York Times: Elon Musk Sues OpenAI and Sam Altman for Violating the Company’s Principles
Wired: Elon Musk's Lawsuit Against a Group That Found Hate Speech on X Isn't Going Well
Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister of India: A Complex Adaptive System Framework to Regulate Artificial Intelligence
The India Fix: Rising doubts over the fairness of voting in India are a bad sign for its democracy
- : Five photos that show India's transformation
Freedom House: Freedom in the World 2024 - The Mounting Damage of Flawed Elections and Armed Conflict
Journal of Online Trust and Safety: The Seventh Issue
The seventh issue of the Journal of Online Trust and Safety includes a study examining content moderation on federated platforms, research on approaches to analyzing multilingual social media data, research into the sourcing of conspiracy theories, and an experimental study that advances work on when people detect AI-generated content. This issue also includes commentaries on lessons learned for regulators from the Oversight Board, the balance between presuming good faith and mitigating malicious online actors, a normative assessment of exempting public figures from fact-checking on platforms, and an assessment of the current literature on harassment.The Future of Free Speech: Freedom of Expression in Generative AI: A Snapshot of Content Policies
Hewlett Foundation: A Threat Like None Other - The Development of Cybersecurity Policy and the Role of the Hewlett Foundation
Atlantic Council: Undermining Ukraine: How Russia widened its global information war in 2023
Forum on Information and Democracy: New report: more than 200 policy recommendations to ensure democratic control of AI
Integrity Institute: On Risk Assessments and Mitigations for Algorithmic Systems
- : What will Trust and Safety look like for LLMs and what should designers focus on?
Morning Consult: Global Political Risk Outlook, H1 2024
Mozilla: In Transparency We Trust?
Mozilla: Election Manipulation in Brazil's 2022 General Elections
International Republican Institute: China’s Approach to Influencing Elections and Political Processes to its Strategic Advantage
The Atlantic: Overwhelmed? Just Say ‘No.’
- : When the time comes, you will know - by Nic Antoinette
- : Three Simple Ways To Help A Friend In Crisis
Please support the curation and analysis I’m doing with this newsletter. As a paid subscriber, you make it possible for me to bring you in-depth analyses of the most pressing issues in tech and politics.
Thanks Katie for the shoutout :)