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Reposted by Brett Frischmann

Liberal Currents @liberalcurrents.com · 3h

“There is no degree of acquiescence to Trumpism that will satisfy this administration or MAGA at large. All there is is a choice between offering a faint echo of the false reality they’re selling and creating dissonance by speaking the reality of the situation to the public.”

All In Our Heads: On Losing Our Democracy and Life Beyond Our Imaginations

Our language has to meet the moment, and we have to be relentless about dispelling the fiction MAGA is selling.

www.liberalcurrents.com

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Matthew Stiegler @matthewstiegler.bsky.social · 17h

My wife @pattyskuster.bsky.social is in Portland today. It’s a war zone, insurrectionists and sunflowers everywhere.

Pretty flowers at the downtown farmers’ market.

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Comfortably Numb @numb.comfortab.ly · 2d

wtf is wrong with these people

NYT: A Campaign to 'Bring Back Bullying'

On social media, some are arguing that bullying deserves a second look. Trolling or not, the push seems to reflect a general turn away from sensitivity.

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Andy Craig @andycraig.bsky.social · 5d

There’s no rule of journalistic neutrality that requires you to say something is “unclear” when that is objectively untrue. It would be illegal. There’s absolutely zero ambiguity about that fact. Saying it’s unclear is making a false statement in your reporting.

Eric Lipton NYT @ericlipton.nytimes.com · 5d

It is not clear that Mr. Trump’s image can be featured on a coin. An 1866 law enshrined a tradition that only deceased people could appear on U.S. currency to avoid the appearance that America was a monarchy. Trump admin is planning to do it anyway.
By Alan Rappeport

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/03/b...

Treasury Plans to Mint $1 Commemorative Trump Coin

www.nytimes.com

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Hypervisible @hypervisible.blacksky.app · 7d

OpenAI is essentially a social arsonist, developing and releasing tools that hyper scale the most racist, misogynistic, and toxic elements of society, lowering the barriers for all manner of abuse. The so called guardrails make a pinky swear look like an ironclad contract.

This social app can put your face into fake movie scenes, memes and arrest videos

The new Sora social app from ChatGPT maker OpenAI encourages users to upload video of their face so their likeness can be put into AI-generated clips.

www.washingtonpost.com

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Brett Frischmann @brettfrischmann.bsky.social · 8d

“The book’s lessons are pretty much the opposite of what its author claims, but the methods that Meta has used to maintain its power and influence demand attention.”

Tech Policy Press @techpolicypress.bsky.social · 8d

Paul Barrett reviews Nick Clegg’s new book, which is titled How to Save the Internet: The Threat to Global Connection in the Age of AI and Political Conflict.

In New Book, Nick Clegg Can't Stop Spinning Meta | TechPolicy.Press

Clegg's new book fails to accomplish its stated goals and marks a new low for Silicon Valley arrogance, writes Paul M. Barrett.

buff.ly

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Sam Brunson @smbrnsn.bsky.social · 9d

Again, not the most important thing, but ICE cosplaying SWAT is truly pathetic. The most dangerous thing in Millennium Park is the big slide.

Gregory Pratt @royalpratt.bsky.social · 9d

8-year old Dasha Ramirez was playing with her brother at Millennium Park when Border Patrol took them. They’re now awaiting deportation to Guatemala. “We never imagined our Sunday would end this way, mother Noemi Chavez said. www.chicagotribune.com/2025/09/29/i...

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Mark Lemley @marklemley.bsky.social · 9d

Another craven act of surrender by Big Tech. There is exactly zero merit to this lawsuit. For Google to pay Trump off adds it to the long list of companies that have decided to be complicit in his attack on free speech
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Google to Pay $24.5 Million to End Trump Lawsuit Over Jan. 6 Ban

Google agreed to pay $24.5 million to resolve Donald Trump’s claims that being banished from his YouTube channel after the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the US Capitol was illegal censorship, according to a c...

www.bloomberg.com

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 12d

OpenAI's rapid rush into education has been achieved by habituating users through training programs, institutional lock-ins, strategic marketing partnerships, and third party integrations that together are helping it become infrastructural to teaching and learning. It's going to be hard to get out.

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Catherine Rampell @crampell.bsky.social · 13d

"The sheer number of American elites willing to acquiesce to the destruction of democratic institutions is demoralizing. But it’s worth noting that many ordinary people seem to be made of sterner stuff."
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

Lower Than Cowards

The surrender of America’s elites

www.theatlantic.com

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Brett Frischmann @brettfrischmann.bsky.social · 13d

Updated version of Better Digital Contracts with Prosocial Friction-in-Design available at ssrn.com/abstract=491...

Download, read, share, comment, etc.

<span>Better Digital Contracts with Prosocial Friction-in-Design</span>

Contract law is supposed to enable people to reach genuine agreements and cooperate. If this ever was reality, the rise of mass market contracts and boilerplate

ssrn.com

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Blake Emerson @blakeprof.bsky.social · 14d

UCLA’s funds reinstated after yesterday’s court order! Thanks to the brave researchers and their amazing counsel, including Dean Chemerinsky, who brought suit. This is just another turn in the ongoing fight, but a great result for now.

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Brendan Nyhan @brendannyhan.bsky.social · 17d

Why Won’t America’s Business Leaders Stand Up to Donald Trump? www.newyorker.com/news/the-fin...

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Mark Joseph Stern @mjsdc.bsky.social · 18d

Check out Justice Eddins’ complete repudiation of the Roberts Court here. It’s worth reading in full. It’s quite brave—and exceedingly rare—for a sitting judge to speak so candidly and scathingly about SCOTUS’ partisan contortions of law, history, and fact.
www.courts.state.hi.us/wp-content/u...

The Supreme Court devalues democracy. Thirty-seven state
constitutions block public funds from supporting religious
entities. Richard Schragger, Micah Schwartzman & Nelson Tebbe,
Reestablishing Religion, 92 U. Chi. L. Rev. 199, 211 (2025) .
The Court aims to federally-repeal these state constitutional
provisions.
The Court's beliefs meddle with local and state
governments. Forcing states to send public funds to religious
entities federalizes public policy. By unprincipled fiat. See
also New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass'n, Inc. v. Bruen, 597
U.S. 1 (2022) (zero to superpower).
Taxpayer funds now flow to religious institutions. So, the
government collects money from nonbelievers (under the threat of
jail), and uses some of it to support religion. And since not
all religions will receive public funds, the government forces
minority faiths to support other faiths, or else.
The Court twists text, history, purpose, precedent, and
public meaning to offend the First Amendment's character-of-
government structure and the Constitution's separate sovereignty
structure.
As it steamrolls both, the Court says nothing about church-
state separation and federalism principles. The Court's
nevermind stance to the structural features of the Constitution
"has unfolded with little engagement with, and occasional

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Yashar Ali 🐘 @yasharali.bsky.social · 19d

Michael Eisner, who served as CEO of Disney for 21 years and acquired ABC while he was in charge, slams his successor Bob Iger for bending the knee.

Michael Eisner
@Michael Eisner
X.com
Where has all the leadership gone? If not for university presidents, law firm managing partners, and corporate chief executives standing up against bullies, who then will step up for the first amendment? The
"suspending indefinitely" of Jimmy Kimmel immediately after the Chairman of the FCC's aggressive yet hollow threatening of the Disney Company is yet another example of out-of-control intimidation. Maybe the Constitution should have said, "Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, except in one's political or financial self-interest." By-the-way, for the record, this ex-CEO finds Jimmy Kimmel very talented and funny.
10:17 AM • 9/19/25 • 208K Views

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Brett Frischmann @brettfrischmann.bsky.social · 19d

Antisocial friction in design to support Uniformed / misinformed consent?

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Mike Masnick @mmasnick.bsky.social · 21d

I had some thoughts about people saying that "debate me bro" trolling is somehow the height of democratic discourse.

Techdirt @techdirt.com · 21d

The “Debate Me Bro” Grift: How Trolls Weaponized The Marketplace Of Ideas

Among the attempts to create hagiographic eulogies of Charlie Kirk, I’ve seen more than a few people suggest that Kirk should be respected for being willing to talk to “those who disagree with him” as a sign that he was…

The “Debate Me Bro” Grift: How Trolls Weaponized The Marketplace Of Ideas

Among the attempts to create hagiographic eulogies of Charlie Kirk, I’ve seen more than a few people suggest that Kirk should be respected for being willing to talk to “those who disagree with him” as a sign that he was engaging in good faith. Perhaps the perfect example of this is Ezra Klein’s silly eulogy claiming that Kirk was “

www.techdirt.com

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Brett Frischmann @brettfrischmann.bsky.social · 22d

Conspiratorialism's causal chain

pluralistic.net/2025/09/17/c...

Pluralistic: Conspiratorialism’s causal chain (17 Sep 2025) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow

pluralistic.net

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E. Rosalie @erosalie.infoepi.com · 25d

Looked at my data collections for state-backed activity. If the report were a picture:

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Brett Frischmann @brettfrischmann.bsky.social · 29d

Important Ninth Circuit decision largely upholding California's Protecting Our Kids from Social Media Addiction Act (SB 976),
www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1066...

www.courtlistener.com

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Julian Sanchez @normative.bsky.social · Sep 8

Having a lot of trouble summoning sympathy for folks who now pretend they thought Trump was only going to go after violent criminal immigrants. It was alway obvious that wasn’t true. You just mean you didn’t think he’d go after white people.

Scott Horton @robertscotthorton.bsky.social · Sep 8

What Trump's Secret Police did today.

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · Sep 5

New diet app just dropped: watch this 1-minute video and you’ll be too nauseated to eat for at least two hours.

✨ A Goddess has NO KING ✨ @the-goddess-speaks.bsky.social · Sep 5

These tech CEOs are little more than vassals paying tribute to a king in exchange for favors and protections.

“We humbly kneel before your royal personage to THANK you, your highness…you have our undying loyalty for the honor of your patronage…” 👑

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Brett Frischmann @brettfrischmann.bsky.social · Sep 4

www.cafc.uscourts.gov/opinions-ord...

www.cafc.uscourts.gov

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Julian Sanchez @normative.bsky.social · Sep 3

The Trumpist majority on SCOTUS, like Trump himself, is spending down a trust fund they did not create, apparently believing it refills automatically. But it doesn’t. The whole system depends on other key institutions treating their rulings as legitimate.

Alejandra Caraballo @esqueer.net · Sep 3

It seems like federal district courts are in full revolt against SCOTUS. I've never seen such direct scathing criticism of SCOTUS like this from the bench over their shadow docket rulings quietly overturning precedent without explanation.

From the Harvard decision today.

A screenshot of page 28 of a legal document discussing the difficulty lower courts face when interpreting unclear or rapidly evolving guidance from the Supreme Court.

The following phrases and sentences are highlighted in yellow:

* "That said, the Supreme Court’s recent emergency docket rulings regarding grant terminations have not been models of clarity, and have left many issues unresolved."
* "California was a four-paragraph per curiam decision issued in the context of a stay application."
* "The outcome, which no party had requested, was, thus, inconsistent with the views of eight justices"
* "the issues are complex and evolving."
* "this Court, not the district courts or courts of appeals, will often still be the ultimate decisionmaker as to the interim legal status of major new federal statutes and executive actions."
* "...it is unhelpful and unnecessary to criticize district courts for “defy[ing]” the Supreme Court when they are working to find the right answer in a rapidly evolving doctrinal landscape, where they must grapple with both existing precedent and interim guidance from the Supreme Court that appears to set that precedent aside without much explanation or consensus."

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