Internet

Content Moderation Remedies

Sometimes users' online content or actions violate Internet service providers’ rules. Services should moderate content effectively, but should also promote free expression, competition, and community.

Twenty Years of U.S. Digital Copyright: Adapting from Analog

From 2001 to 2021, digital technologies have challenged U.S. copyright law. Key copyright concepts affected include the scope of exclusive rights, fair use, and liability of online service providers for infringement.

It’s Time to Update Section 230

The 1996 Communications Decency Act (CDA) makes online platforms immune from liability for harmful content posted by third parties. Platforms should enjoy immunity only if the platform takes reasonable steps to prevent harm.

How Do You Solve a Problem Like Misinformation?

Policymakers and the public struggle to navigate misinformation about topics like climate change, COVID, and politics. Disinformation campaigns and ideological convictions are harder to fight than ordinary mistaken beliefs.

Digital Addiction

A study of smartphone use shows that consumers’ excessive use of smartphones and social media may result from digital addiction. Self-control tools reduce usage and improve well-being.

Legal Internalism in Modern Histories of Copyright

Process concerns, including formal registration requirements and the rule of law, are important to copyright lawyers and policymakers. Recent histories of copyright law neglect these procedural elements.

Cybersecurity Hiring in Response to Data Breaches

Data on firm-level hiring shows that firms increase hiring of cybersecurity workers following data breaches, particularly when the press covers the breach.

Anticipatory News Infrastructures: Seeing Journalism’s Expectations of Future Publics in Its Sociotechnical Systems

The news media expects certain types of news and certain types of public life; these expectations can affect outcomes, if people cannot imagine alternatives to the futures described by the press.

Cross-Country Trends in Affective Polarization

Political polarization in several countries, including the United States, is increasing. Key factors include increasing polarization among elite political party members and the spread of cable news services.

Making Up Political People: How Social Media Create the Ideals, Definitions, and Probabilities of Political Speech

Facebook’s fact checking service assumes that the public is rational and seeks the truth, but people are more influenced by emotion. Some are concerned that false news is not banned, but merely ranked lower.