Antitrust, Competition Law, Consumer Protection
Arts, Books, Entertainment, Music
Big Data, Cybersecurity, the Digital Economy, and Privacy
1. The CHIPS and Science Act: Here’s what’s in it
2. The White House released a blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights, which some have already called toothless against the private sector
3. Farhad Manjoo says in the battle with robots, human workers are winning
4. Nasa's Dart spacecraft 'changed path of asteroid'
5. Man fools relatives into thinking he has a girlfriend, but she’s not real
6. 20 years of top trending Google searches
7. Xbox prices may rise after the holidays. Microsoft says economic pressures are very real
8. A report from the Tech Transparency Project warns that “crypto firms have hired hundreds of ex-government officials” to lobby on their behalf — which could risk the same kind of regulatory capture politicians have criticised in industries from defence to pharma to “powerful Wall Street interests.”
9. Tyler Cowen argues that AI will force us to re-learn how to use the internet
10. Mozilla’s podcast, IRL: Online Life is Real Life, looks at the perils (and promise!) of how AI is used in key areas of our lives, including healthcare, the workplace, elections, and even on the battlefield
11. The USB-C will be the standard European charger in 2024
12. "I didn't sit down and write 40,000 words to tell you that crypto is dumb and worthless and will now vanish without a trace.
13. The UK’s CMA has accepted commitments offered by Google that address the CMA’s competition concerns resulting from investigating Google’s proposals to remove third party cookies and other functionalities from its Chrome browser
14. Meta will sell Giphy, a popular online database and search portal for GIF files, following UK CMA’s antitrust ruling. Internal Giphy estimates suggest the platform reaches 700 million daily active users via its various channels
15. The US FTC files slimmed-down complaint in fight with Meta over its Within acquisition
16. But Meta files to dismiss FTC complaint over acquisition of VR fitness company Within
17. Ketan Ahuja says that innovation “often arises from sharing information across firms and combining capabilities across the public and private domains in new ways” in Innovating Antitrust Law: How Innovation Really Happens and How Antitrust Law Should Adapt
18. Judge blocks $2.2B merger of Penguin Random House and Simon & Schuster. The joining of two of the world’s biggest publishers could “lessen competition” for “top-selling books.”
19. Around 30 senior FTC officials — nearly 1 in 4 of the agency’s top officials — owned or traded stocks of companies such as Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, and Oracle that were being scrutinised by the agency, according to The Wall Street Journal
20. Amazon faces $1 bln lawsuit in UK for 'favouring its own products'
21. The U.K. Financial Conduct Authority said it would solicit views on the potential competitive harms of Big Tech’s expansion into financial services. In a 61-page discussion paper, the financial regulator outlined its thinking on the matter, with scenarios exploring how Big Tech could impact the payments, deposits, consumer credit, and insurance industries
Arts, Books, Entertainment, Music
22. Can music really influence your workout?
23. Three new books on the science of reading minds
24. Bono on the birth of U2, that iTunes album, and Live Aid, in his forthcoming book, Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story
25. No tune, no words, no dancing: why white noise – sounds of bonfires, waves, and rainfall – is the music industry’s newest hit are helping us relax – and making millions
26. Stephen King on what authentic Maine cuisine means to him
27. What counts as a bestseller? It turns out that bestseller lists, like the one published by The New York Times, aren't a neutral record of what everyone's reading; instead, they're a product of editorial decisions
28. The 150 best albums and 250 best songs of the 1990s and why streaming doesn’t pay the artists well
29. Paul McCartney's freakish memory and what it tells us about his creativity
Big Data, Cybersecurity, the Digital Economy, and Privacy
30. The world’s most surveilled cities
31. Cars are now computers—and the auto industry’s cyber defences may not be ready
32. Biden administration unveils new EU-U.S. transatlantic privacy pact. A European court wasn’t thrilled with how easy it was for US intelligence agencies to access the data, so the new deal has more safeguards. Having a deal in place is important for US companies, and for maintaining what the administration noted is a $7.1 trillion economic relationship with the EU
33. Who should win the Tug-of-War over user data? It’s not always clear whether businesses or consumers should have more control. Research offers a new way of thinking through the problem
34. If your phone needs fixing, make sure your secrets are safe first. Don’t take it in for repairs until your personal data is secure
35. Morning Consult’s Most Trusted Brands™ is the definitive measure of brand trust, showcasing the companies and products that have earned consumer trust in 2022
36. Amazon to invest over €1 billion to boost electric vehicle fleet and 'micromobility hubs' in Europe
37. And…a parents' lawsuit accuses Amazon of selling suicide kits to teenagers
38. The Top 100 Most Valuable Brands in 2022
39. Uber whistle-blower calls on Europe to tackle ‘undemocratic’ power of tech companies. Mark MacGann tells MEPs Uber had ‘almost unlimited finance’ to silence drivers with legal disputes
40. McDonald’s and Krispy Kreme are teaming up to sell doughnuts in a small-scale test at nine McDonald’s in Louisville, Kentucky. The nine McDonald's will sell three kinds of doughnuts: the Original Glazed, Chocolate Iced with Sprinkles and Raspberry Filled Doughnut. It’s an unexpected move since the two chains are competitors, especially for breakfast with both serving coffee and pastries
41. Many companies are thinking of scaling down their workforce to adjust for current economic uncertainty
42. Uber whistle-blower Mark MacGann told reporters at Web Summit that Uber’s culture appears to be improving, but he doesn’t have faith in its current business model…and Uber scales back in Pakistan
43. Raghuram Rajan and Viral Acharya ask where has all the liquidity gone? After two years of quantitative easing, central banks have begun to shrink their balance sheets, and liquidity seems to have vanished in the space of just a few months – revealing acute financial-system vulnerabilities
44. 6 trends shaping the global supply chain in 2023 explain why the supply chain is still kind of a mess—and when experts expect it will finally return to normal
45. 12 reasons why it is impossible for any rational person to be optimistic about the U.S. economy at this point
46. Fighting inflation without jeopardising jobs
47. The “Econ 101” story is misleading at best and flatly contradicted by the evidence at worst
48. Five industrial policy lessons we’ve learned
49. Nobel Prize in economic sciences awarded to former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, University of Chicago professor Douglas Diamond, and Washington University in St. Louis professor Philip Dybvig à details
50. Explaining the rationale for the 2022 Nobel Prize in Economics
51. Economic future of U.S. depends on making engineering cool and filling workforce gap that threatens reshoring effort
52. We don’t have a hundred biases, we have the wrong model. Behavioural economics has identified dozens of cognitive biases that stop us from acting ‘rationally’. But instead of building up a messier and messier picture of human behavior, we need a new model.
53. Dancers' moves help to power Glasgow music venue
54. Is co-operation always a force for good? What looks like altruism through one lens could be seen as corruption through another
55. Republican lawmakers introduce anti-ESG bill in House
56. Electric vehicles are changing the way Americans fuel up. Will it mean the end of the gas station?
57. The level of democracy enjoyed by the average global citizen in 2021 is down to 1989 levels. The last 30 years of democratic advances are now eradicated. Dictatorships are on the rise and harbour 70% of the world population – 5.4 billion people. There are signals that the nature of autocratisation is changing, says the Democracy Report 2022 by Varieties of Democracy
58. Angus Deaton asks who broke American democracy?
59. And Mariana Mazzucato on new missions for Latin America
60. Check out the Good Country Index
61. Concern about climate change shrinks globally as threat grows – study
62. What should be called ‘white-collar crimes’ could kill more people than combat itself in the Russia-Ukraine war
63. Meditation reorganises the brain’s spatial topography - meditators invert the relationship between the layers of self-processing
64. Looking at where emotions are found in the body and how to release ‘emotional baggage’ and the tension that goes with it
65. Demanding employees turn on their webcams is a human rights violation, Dutch Court rules
66. 4 business ideas that changed the world: disruptive innovation
67. The power of networking in the new economy
68. A study shows that ‘weak ties’ make a difference in finding a job online. LinkedIn quietly conducted social experiments on 20 million users for nearly five years until the New York Times reported on it. The social network tweaked its algorithm to determine what kinds of connections best served job seekers using the platform, and as it turns out, close friends are less likely to help you find your next dream job. But they’re still more likely to ask you to help them move.
69. Leadership lessons from Liz Truss’s downfall. While her economic policy clearly doomed her, she also failed as a leader
70. Are you working for work’s sake or creating value? And If you’re having trouble getting motivated at work, Fast Company has some tips for reframing a tough task or an impossible project
71. And…are people happy at work?
72. Can you learn a language in your sleep? You may be able to pick up some words
73. Children have biases toward different accents, new research shows
74. MIT research finds acquaintances can be more helpful in finding employment than close contacts, particularly for jobs in the digital realm
75. A collection of signed historic photos. Some good ones here
76. The 5,000-year history of writer's block
77. Here’s convenient, clear cheat sheet shows you the words and phrases most likely to help you close your deal
78. Harvard negotiator explains how to resolve difficult conflicts and what triggers procrastination, and how you can overcome it
79. What Kara Swisher has learned from decades covering tech
80. The worst Nobel Prizes ever awarded in science (and one in literature)
81. Nobel peace prize goes to Belarusian, Russian, and Ukrainian human rights activists
82. Why are so many politicians embracing conspiracy theories? Conspiratorial thinking has always been attractive in times of uncertainty—but it’s become more mainstream
83. Charles Walker, the Conservative politician, spoke candidly with the BBC about his frustrations with his party. “I've had enough of talentless people”
84. After just 44 days in office, Liz Truss is eligible to collect a £115,000 allowance for the rest of her life
85. Free world class education for anyone anywhere: Sal Khan on the powerful theory behind Khan Academy
Policy & Regulation
86. A conversation with Cédric O, the former French minister of state for digital: the US and EU are splitting on tech policy. That’s putting the web at risk
87. U.S. electric-vehicle tax breaks rile Asian, European allies, who say that favouring domestic industries could violate WTO rules
88. ‘Gig work’ rule is in Biden administration’s crosshairs, sending DoorDash and Lyft stocks to all-time lows
89. Alphabet, Amazon, and Meta hired an outside lobby group but failed to disclose it in the EU, says The Washington Post. Members of EU parliament say the tech giants broke transparency rules by failing to disclose the funding, which was being directed to influence the Digital Markets Act and Digital Services Act
90. The FTC is forcing Uber subsidiary Drizly to boost its security posture after a breach exposed the information of 2.5 million people. It’s one of the first times the agency successfully made an executive personally responsible for the firm’s conduct
91. Supreme Court to scrutinise U.S. protections for social media
92. Pew Centre report on The Role of Alternative Social Media in the News and Information Environment
93. Twitter seeks documents related to federal investigation of Elon Musk but in the end, it didn’t matter as Musk agreed to go ahead with the deal (his legal team was losing confidence after suffering defeats in pretrial decisions). See also Elon agrees to buy Twitter at his intended price. Twitter deal acts as accelerant for his planned WeChat rival, the ‘X’ app
94. Twitter’s top executives are set to exit with $100 million payout as Musk takes over
95. Twitter workers brace for cuts. Twitter temporarily closes offices as layoffs begin as does a class action lawsuit
96. Elon Musk’s covert war on free speech - the platform will be overrun by toxic disinformation, including deep fakes, insipid propaganda, calls for violence, doxing, and other forms of illiberal anti-speech acts
97. Everything you need to know about Meta’s moderation controversy in India
98. Why you must get off Facebook immediately. The platform makes you, your friends, and family vulnerable to robbery
99. How connected do people feel in the age of social media?
100. It had to come to this. An anonymous app called Gas is taking high schools by storm, letting teens say nice things about each other anonymously
101. WhatsApp is now a spammers’ paradise in India. Revenue pressures forced to turn to e-commerce, and now it’s contending with a plague of spammers.
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