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"We are ready to sign the minerals agreement."

President Donald Trump on Saturday signed an executive order making English the official language of the US

The complaint was lodged after a lesbian woman received the promotion Ames, who worked at the department since 2004, was also pursuing, with Ames being demoted and her old position being given to a gay man.

During Donald Trump’s first Cabinet meeting, his Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick claimed that issuing “gold green cards” as a path to citizenship could generate a huge sum of money to help pay off the national debt. He estimated that if they sell 200,000 of the cards for $5 million each, they will see $1...

Customers in Jersey City are getting a taste of the technology for the first time.

When I helped create the United States Digital Service (USDS), it was not on my bingo board that it would become the U.S. DOGE Service a mere decade later. As a lifelong libertarian, the years I spent trying to make government more efficient at the Department of Veterans Affairs (V.A.) and USDS required a lot of patience. Now I'm fresh out.

We have been making tiny, barely perceptible "improvements," paid for with years of compromise and hand-holding in endless pointless meetings, and then celebrating this as success. I can't get Alana Newhouse's description out of my head: "Half the time our institutions feel like molasses, and the other half like concrete." I'm fed up with a government that can't implement its way out of a paper bag. 

Apparently most of America is fed up, too.

I care deeply about trans people, immigrants, and others who are targets of so much hate right now. I do not support the harmful actions being taken against them. At the same time, I could not possibly care less that someone plugged in a server to create a new email list without a Privacy Impact Assessment. If no one ever adheres to FIPS 140-2 again—great, it's about time we took that "kick me" sign written in Mandarin off our back. Much of the current system hurts everyone and needs to go.

When I was chief technology officer of the V.A., a highlight of my career was persuading our inspectors general (I.G.) to allow cloud computing. At the time, most of our websites had business hours, and/or ran on servers that sat in mop closets under a fire sprinkler without backups. I wish I was exaggerating. Cloud would allow us to offer modern online services to America's 20 million veterans.

I spent countless meetings, demos, and lunch-and-learns overcoming I.G. arguments. One objection became a favorite interview question for new hires: "But how do you put the cloud in an evidence bag?" I cheekily baked cloud-shaped sugar cookies and distributed them—in evidence bags—around the office. More than two years later, the I.G. issued a memo approving the use of the cloud.

But you know what? I shouldn't have had to waste two and a half years of my life on this, while millions of veterans went without health care and other benefits they had earned. People in charge of regulating computers should know how computers work. They should even be good at computers.

As we got closer to launching a modern website, I was thwarted in a new and creative way. The Department of Labor bought the domain veterans.gov—the one we intended to use—and said they would only give it to us if they got to approve every page of our website. 

Not going to happen. Beyond the delays this would add, the labor department sucks at websites. Their "My Next Move for Veterans," a multi-million-dollar website that every individual separating from the military is required to use, is one of the worst you could ever see. It tells veterans their primary skills are that they can "communicate by speaking" and "use [their] arms and/or legs together while sitting, standing, or lying down." Thanks for your service. If you don't believe me, look for yourself. 

The White House got involved, requiring months of in-person mediation meetings. I was never able to get the domain back. (To this day, the labor department owns veterans.gov.) How exactly are we qualified to intervene in foreign wars if our processes can't even stop one agency from squatting on another's domain name?

Getting a government position description for a technologist approved—for what later became USDS—was even worse. On my first attempt, I posted a senior role for a graphic designer on USAJOBS. Human resources selected a candidate with multiple PhDs from the University of Phoenix with zero graphic design experience. I still lie awake at night and wonder: What would they have done if I approved that hire? How many other serious jobs are held by people with zero qualifications? 

It took years of back and forth, questioning and fixing virtually every step of the hiring process with the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) before we hired our first qualified technologist. I recently learned, in Bureaucracy by James Q Wilson, about the "China Lake OPM Demonstration Project." Facing a dearth of technical talent, China Lake sought to streamline the process for hiring technologists into government—in 1979. How many generations should it take to update a position description?

I hope DOGE will obliterate the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) from space. This law, which was written in 1980—before computers were common in homes—requires that every government form, and every change to every government form, must go through the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA). This office has no expertise in user research or form design. It has no ability to check whether a form is asking for information that the agency has already asked for 100 times or whether multiple agency forms ask for the same information in different ways (making it harder to reuse or cross-reference). Agencies self-report how many "burden hours" it takes to fill out their forms, and OIRA has no way to check this either. 

Some of the most talented people I've ever worked with have spent years of their own getting OIRA to agree to, and write down, such novel concepts as "legal things are legal." I'm not kidding—OIRA issued guidance last year that agencies are allowed to get feedback from the public, something which has always been legal, yet threats of going to "PRA jail" for doing exactly this persist today.

As part of the aforementioned new website, I wanted to have one form "wizard" that would allow a veteran to enter their information once, and automatically apply for all the benefits for which they were eligible. OIRA told me that to do this, I would first have to submit every possible permutation of this wizard for approval—a request I would have found delicious to comply with, were there enough trucks on the planet to deliver that amount of paper.

The PRA creates dramatically more paperwork and makes agencies ask for the same information more times, and in more confusing ways. It also kills people. It took OIRA over a year to approve the addition of a single checkbox to a disability application form. This checkbox would enroll veterans with serious conditions like PTSD in health care for their disability. Instead, these veterans sat in a backlog of unprocessed paper health care applications. The I.G. of the V.A. may not know how to computer, but if you believe they know how to math, 307,000 veterans died in that backlog, waiting to enroll in the agency's health care that surely would have saved some of their lives. 

The death toll continues: Transplant surgeons identified and approved life-critical form updates to the organ donation matching process in 2022, which OIRA is still sitting on today. OIRA has no medical expertise of any kind.

We were told this labyrinth of rules and regulations was required for democracy, fairness, and delivering services to a user base that couldn't exclude anyone. So we worked within the system. We respected it. We followed every rule or dutifully changed the rule before we moved forward. 

The system blocked us from helping people at every turn. Yet today, it's totally rolling over in the face of actually harming our most vulnerable while people cheer on its collapse. The system is not coming to save you or anyone—because the system is not currently designed to do much of anything at all.

Let's fight for an America where you are free to live as yourself without fear—but let's not waste any time fighting to keep the status quo of molasses and concrete.

The post I Tried To Fix Government Tech for Years. I'm Fed Up. appeared first on Reason.com.

How should the law handle manipulative AI content, like bots that encourage self-harm or give explicit instructions for it? The U.S. First Amendment protects speakers, and AI companies might justifiably claim its protections. But does the user of AI content have any right to a safe or truthful information environment, unpolluted by content aimed at changing their thoughts and actions?

The Right to a Flow of Information – Free From Thought Process Distortion

Inyoung Cheong, a CITP post-doc, argues that we do. In a recent speech at the inaugural conference of the International Association for Safe and Ethical AI in Paris, Cheong argued for a “Human- Centered First Amendment” (see video: February 7, 2:30 p.m. session; minute 28:00). Building on U.S. Supreme Court precedents like Island Trees School District v. Pico – which established a student’s right to receive information from a school library – she argued that a First Amendment speaker’s right is perfectly consistent with a user’s right to decide on ideas, beliefs, and public issues themselves. That right, Cheong argued, includes the right to a “flow of information” within which we formulate our ideas – reading, thinking, etc. – free from manipulative content that distorts our thought processes.

Many have suggested that torts brought against the AI companies – like the ongoing case against Character.ai asserting that their bots played a role in a teen’s suicide – will force them to take action to assure the truthfulness of content and protect the freewill of hearers. However, Cheong argues that will not be sufficient, because such cases (based on product liability law) will have to prove that the companies both foresaw the risk and the AI’s outputs were the direct cause of the harm. Companies could plausibly claim that the risk in any specific instance was unpredictable, and at any rate, they took due caution to mitigate the general risk to hearers.

Harm Reduction or Breach of the First Amendment?

Others argued that regulations like those in the EU can reduce the potential for harm. The Digital Services Act includes a clause protecting users against content that “deceives or manipulates” them, or content that “materially distorts or impairs” their ability to make “free and informed decisions.” The EU AI Act forbids the use of “systems to infer emotions” in workplaces or schools, fearing that such systems will manipulate.  

Cheong argues that in the U.S. system, companies could plausibly challenge such regulations on First Amendment grounds, arguing for their own speech rights and editorial discretion. And they may well win, given that corporate’s editorial discretion has been increasingly protected by the Supreme Court.

Because torts and regulations won’t work, Cheong recommended that we recall an alternative strand in First Amendment Law. Rather than focusing solely on the expressive freedom of any speaker, she suggests we also value the rights of hearers to formulate their own ideas. The U.S. Supreme Court has recognized, for instance, the right of a hearer not to be the “captive audience” of a speaker allowing them no escape. Given the concentration of power in about seven major AI companies, Cheong suggested, we may already be “captive” to their speech.

Envisioning a “Human-Centered First Amendment”

Cheong calls for our attention to the Supreme Court’s nuanced attitude towards speech-facilitating institutions, namely, religious institutions, schools, libraries, advertisers, and the media. These institutions, a French sociologist Louis Althusser would call “Ideological State Apparatuses”, possess a power to influence our ability to read and think freely. They host and select information and knowledge, or make their own speech. According to Cheong, the Court has acknowledged these institutions’ free speech rights, but almost always on the grounds for protecting free speech rights of the public (e.g., students, patrons, believers and non-believers, consumers). 

This is what Cheong called a “Human-Centered First Amendment.” Cheong argues for extending this framework to AI – the next influential speech facilitator. Even though the design of AI systems or AI outputs may revoke some First Amendment protections, they must be constrained to promote the public’s collective freedom to formulate and express ideas. 

The new AI era is one full of what Cheong called “cognitive threats.” As she warned, we could all be subject to the gradual disempowerment of our ability to think independently. AI could intrude on our most intimate thoughts, exploit our emotional and cognitive vulnerabilities, and alter our beliefs. The Court might acknowledge the rights of AI companies to produce algorithms and generate algorithmic content. However, a Human-Centered First Amendment would allow reasonable protections against the worst of these cognitive threats.

TechTakes is a series where we ask members of the CITP community to comment on tech and tech policy-related news. TechTakes is moderated by Steven Kelts, CITP Associated Faculty and lecturer in the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), and Lydia Owens, CITP Outreach and Programming Coordinator.

The post Balancing Free Speech & Safety: Envisioning a Human-Centered First Amendment for AI Regulation – TechTakes appeared first on CITP Blog.

Within the first minute of my recent video on trade and protectionism, I remarked that”Trump simply does not understand trade.”

Today, I want to give another example of why “Tariff Man” has the wrong approach.

He just announced that he will be imposing a 25 percent tax on American manufacturers who buy foreign steel and aluminum.

Trump did the same thing in his first term, so this is –  as Yogi Berra said, – “deja vu all over again.”

Let’s look at some research that measured whether those tax increases in his first term were successful.

For the 1,000 people who were estimated to have gained jobs in the protected industries, the answer might be yes. But, as shown by the chart, there were an estimated 75,000 workers who would say no.

The reason for the net loss of 74,000 jobs is that there are far more jobs in the metal-using sectors than there are in the metal-making sectors.

Consider the case of steel. Here are some excerpts from a news story about Trump’s first-term mistake.

There are more than 12 million jobs in industries that use steel in their production process. Almost 2 million of these jobs are in industries that use steel intensively, where “intensively” means that steel inputs represent 5 percent or more of the industry’s total (input) requirements. This criterion includes both the industry’s direct use of steel and its indirect use through inputs made of steel, like machinery and equipment. Steel-intensive U.S. industries include manufacturers of auto parts and motorcycles; household appliances; farm machinery; machinery used in mining, oil extraction, and construction; batteries; and military vehicles. …Estimates from a study…by Aaron Flaaen and Justin Pierce at the Federal Reserve Board of Governors show that by mid-2019, increased input costs due to the steel and aluminum tariffs are associated with 0.6 percent fewer jobs in the manufacturing sector than would have been the case without the tariffs. …this amounts to about 75,000 fewer jobs in manufacturing attributable to the March 2018 tariffs on steel and aluminum, not counting additional losses among U.S. exporters facing tariffs other countries levied in retaliation.

There are fewer than 100,000 Americans in the steel-producing sector, so Trump is using the coercive power of government to help them, but simultaneously hurting the much larger group of workers in the steel-using sectors.

So why would Trump repeat this mistake?

Frederic Bastiat has part of the answer, and Alex Tabarrok has the rest of the answer.

P.S. Interestingly, the economic damage from the new taxes on steel and aluminum will be twice as large for states that supported Trump in 2024 compared to states that supported Kamala Harris.

I don’t care about the politics, so I’ll make a final point about the damage caused by protectionism.

The $11.4 billion cost of Trump’s tax increase means that Americans will have $11.4 billion less to use in other parts of the economy. In other words, it’s not just the metal-using sectors that are hurt. There are negative ripple effects throughout the economy.

P.P.S. We saw similar damage when Trump imposed tax increases on foreign-produced dishwashers during his first term.

P.P.P.S. And don’t forget the damage caused when other countries retaliate.

A New Jersey police officer has been hailed a hero after jumping into frigid waters to save an 11-year-old boy who walked out onto a frozen pond and fell through.

The new brush fire sparked near 2350 North Solar Drive, between Nichols and Runyon Canyon.

The woman pleaded with Newsom for any answers on what help he's going to give, but Newsom got into his SUV to leave.

The sentencing cements the president-elect's status as a convicted felon 10 days before he returns to the White House.

The controversial white nationalist is coming for your stoner snacks. Rep. Miller's new bill would snuff out the legal cannabis delta-8 THC market.

In MAGA land, "freedom" is a politician's shorthand for "you are forbidden from doing anything I don't like." — Read the rest

The post Eight facts about hemp-hating, Hitler-heiling MAGA weirdo Mary Miller appeared first on Boing Boing.

On Monday, Nvidia announced Project DIGITS, a small desktop computer aimed at researchers, data scientists, and students who want to experiment with AI models—such as chatbots like ChatGPT and image generators—at home. The $3,000 device, which contains Nvidia's new GB10 Grace Blackwell Superchip, debuted at CES 2025 in Las Vegas. It will launch in May and can operate as a standalone PC or connect to a Windows or Mac machine.

At CES on Monday, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang described the new system as "a cloud computing platform that sits on your desk." The company also designed Project DIGITS as a bridge between desktop development and cloud deployment. Developers can create and test AI applications locally on Project DIGITS, then move them to cloud services or data centers that use similar Nvidia hardware.

The GB10 chip inside the Project DIGITS computer combines an Nvidia Blackwell GPU with a 20-core Grace CPU based on Arm architecture. Nvidia developed the chip in partnership with MediaTek, and it connects to 128GB of memory and up to 4TB of storage inside the Project DIGITS enclosure.

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"Glad to know I'm not the only one," one commenter said of the bizarre practice. "I do this a lot! Sometimes it's so bad I actually cry and have my heart beating extremely fast," added another.

Also donating to the inaugural fund are OpenAI’s Sam Altman, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, and Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg.

Any potential buyer would get the brand name, a video library, and a user base of millions — but have to create the algorithmic technology from scratch.  

Some on the list of GOP lawmakers took issue with the proposed spending package suspending the debt ceiling.

Last week, Bezos announced a $1 million donation through Amazon to President-elect Trump's inaugural fund.

"United is the [indecipherable] largest company in the US by market cap, behind only Apple, Google, Walmart. It has grown and grown, but [has] our life expectancy?"

"Mystery Drone sightings all over the Country. Can this really be happening without our government’s knowledge," Trump wrote. "I [don’t] think so! Let the public know, and now. Otherwise, [shoot] them down!"

Zuckerberg is one of several tech executives who are looking to make nice with Trump just weeks before he begins his second term.

On Tuesday, the US Federal Bureau of Investigation advised Americans to share a secret word or phrase with their family members to protect against AI-powered voice-cloning scams, as criminals increasingly use voice synthesis to impersonate loved ones in crisis.

"Create a secret word or phrase with your family to verify their identity," wrote the FBI in an official public service announcement (I-120324-PSA).

For example, you could tell your parents, children, or spouse to ask for a word or phrase to verify your identity if something seems suspicious, such as "The sparrow flies at midnight," "Greg is the king of burritos," or simply "flibbertigibbet." (As fun as these sound, your password should be secret and not the same as these.)

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