My newest published paper is out! It's about TikTok. It's also about the constitutionality of U.S. data privacy regulation. I don't know which topic is more popular - could someone with a teen ask?

If you're interested in either, download it below.

papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

I’m honored to be giving this upcoming lecture at my alma mater. Go Bears!

Public service announcement: In iOS26, you can make those incessant political fundraising texts stop. Go to Settings>Apps>Messages>Screen Unknown Senders and enable it. Now you won’t get a notification when someone random texts you and their message will go to a separate folder you can always check.

New book out now from ‪@universitypress.cambridge.org‬! Law and the 100-Year Life, co-edited by Solomon Center scholars, reimagines how laws and the institutions they shape—from labor to healthcare—must evolve in a world where more of us than ever will live to 100. law.yale.edu/solomon-cent...

We just posted a major new study of AI models and books, showing that some (but not all) models memorize large portions of some (but not all) books after training on the books3 database

With A. Feder Cooper and Amy Cyphert, among others

arxiv.org/pdf/2505.12546

Aziz Huq and @thelior.bsky.social shared legal insights alongside Chicago Quantum Exchange director David Awschalom at a panel moderated by Robert W. Karr Jr., a partner at Barnes & Thornburg LLP. The discussion kicked off an interdisciplinary CQE–led effort aimed at strengthening the growing field.

Big news on the constitutionality of tower dumps / geofence warrants…

In light of the conflicting intra-circuit views and the split with the Fifth Circuit’s Smith case the issue now seems completely ready for SCOTUS to weigh in. I’m teaching the 5th Circuit opinion tomorrow; the students will be happy to have dodged all these lengthy Fourth Circuit concurrences.

You never know who you are going to run into on the UChicago campus. Thanks to Transportation Secretary @petebuttigieg.bsky.social for spending time teaching our students at the Institute of Politics and cheerfully indulging our faculty paparazzi.

I enjoyed two recent empirical papers on AI+Law, but realized they have somewhat different implications—in particular, about whether AI tools are actually useful for lawyers, or are too likely to err. I wrote up a blog post thinking through how to reconcile them: www.wilftownsend.net/p/is-ai-actu...

Picking a fight with Susman Godfrey is “land war in Asia” levels of foolish.

So happy for you!!!

The Authoritarian Commons by Shitong Qiao

"Documents and insightfully analyzes how the development of homeowners’ associations (HoAs) in China generated an ongoing democratic revolution in hundreds of thousands of neighborhoods."

Out Now #LawSky

Brilliant (as always) piece by @bridgetfahey.bsky.social on why gov’t control over data is of constitutional moment. Yes it implicates societal and individual privacy concerns but also structural, constitutional grabs of power. Brava. Read www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

This is a massive setback for US transportation policy and yet another blow to environmental protection.

Landlords around the U.S. would be allowed to give tenants three days’ notice or less before evicting them, under federal legislation introduced last week that would strip away tenant protections put in place during the pandemic.

Thanks Andres!

My new book, You Can't Kill a Man Because of the Books He Reads: Angelo Herndon's Fight for Freedom, is out today. lithub.com/josephine-ba... Thanks to my family, friends, colleagues, and @wwnorton.bsky.social for helping me write about Herndon's fight for free speech and assembly.

Sarah Lee Best, Penn Law '21, was among the other brilliant and much-loved souls taken from us by this tragic plane crash. Sarah simply radiates kindness. She transforms classrooms, schools, and ultimately anything and anyone lucky enough to meet her. 1/3
www.bbc.com/news/article...

I’m so sorry, Maggie. What a devastating loss for all of the families and friends of those who died. May Sarah’s memory be a blessing.

Something like Progressive Snapshot is opt-in and, as I understand it, many of their consumers plausibly understand the privacy versus cost-savings trade offs at least somewhat well. I’ve not seen evidence that either of those things are true for Subaru’s data collection.

This scandal isn’t about aggregated and anonymized data collection. It’s that a hacker could identify everywhere any individual Subaru had been for at least a year, in addition to dangerous stuff like remote engine starts by malicious actors.

I don’t know whether the text is accurate. You’d have to ask the journalists. But storing at least a year’s worth of precise geolocation info for every car is likely contrary to customers’ expectations. And the assumption that Subaru drivers will comb through all terms & conditions is unrealistic.