Hosting a podcast is immense fun. It gives you an excuse to email random people you admire. Better yet, it gives those random people you admire a reason to respond to your random email. Best of all, it enables you to ask those random people you admire the random questions floating around in your head.
I’m grateful to host TechFreedom’s Tech Policy Podcast. And I’m pleased to report that we’ve just revamped the show. New theme song. New branding. New platform. New energy!
We have a fantastic episode to mark the relaunch. I invited Daphne Keller and Agustina Del Campo on the program to take me on a tour of content moderation law around the world. That they did—we covered recent developments in Europe, Brazil, and India. But the conversation turned into so much more. This one’s an instant classic. Tune in.
I hope, in this new era, to do a lot. More episodes. New segments. More new guests. But I can’t do it without you. If you want to see a bigger, better Tech Policy Podcast, I need you to clap if you believe. Subscribe to the show at our new home, Simplecast—or at your preferred podcast outlet. Give us a five-star rating. And tell your friends about us.
To everyone who’s listened to the show: thank you. To anyone who has yet to check us out: please do! Here, to get you started, are some of my favorite episodes so far:
#284: The Revolt of the Public (February 2021). Guest: Martin Gurri, Mercatus Center. Subjects: Martin’s invaluable book The Revolt of the Public. How the Internet and social media have undermined institutional control over societal narratives. Elite/populist competition over the flow of information.
#294: Border Searches of Digital Devices (June 2021). Guest: Orin Kerr, UC Berkeley Law. Subjects: The history of the border search exception. The limits of reasoning by analogy. Criminals, encrypt your data! Fourth Amendment + smartphones = sparks fly. See also: #339: Will Tech Swallow the Fourth Amendment? (February 2023). Guest: Nathan Wessler, ACLU.
#295: Can Social Media Be Regulated Like Common Carriage? (July 2021). With the Supreme Court set to hear the NetChoice cases next term, this episode remains a very timely one. Guests: Eugene Volokh, UCLA Law, and Berin Szóka, TechFreedom. Subjects: Social media platforms and editorial discretion. Law schools, parades, and shopping malls. Section 230 and constitutional conditions. See also: #323: Florida & Texas vs. the Internet (June 2022). Guest: Ari Cohn, TechFreedom.
#301: The Realignment (September 2021). I’ve done a “big picture” episode late each summer—and hope to continue to do so! This one was the first. Guest: Marshall Kosloff, Hudson Institute and Realignment Podcast. Subjects: The post-2016 realignment of American politics, and how political parties, tech firms, and other institutions are (or are not) adapting.
#304: Gen Z and Social Media (October 2021). Guests: Rachel Altman, then of TechFreedom, and Kir Nuthi, then of NetChoice. Subjects: How today’s teens use social media. How we used it back in the day. Different platforms’ different niches. Remember TV and newspapers? Online advertising. The eternal moral panic over “kids these days.”
#325: Jan. 6, Social Media, and the Great Rage (July 2022). My only live episode so far. Recorded at TechFreedom’s 2022 Policy Summit. Guest: Quinta Jurecic, Lawfare and Brookings. Subjects: The Jan. 6 Committee. Trump’s election “Big Lie.” The difficulty of combatting online extremism. The insanity that is Steve Bannon. The fraying of American civic life.
#331: Section 230’s Long Path to SCOTUS (October 2022). Guest: Emma Llansó, Center for Democracy & Technology. Subjects: The “moderator’s dilemma” faced by early Internet platforms. The passage of Section 230, and how it protects free speech online. The problems with FOSTA-SESTA. The Supreme Court’s first Section 230 case, Gonzalez v. Google.
#342: Save the Children (From State Social Media Laws) (April 2023). Guest: Mike Masnick, Techdirt. Subjects: California’s insanely stupid Age Appropriate Design Code. Parents: parent your kids! Scary fairy tales. Curfews in Utah. The benefits of social media. Why the kids are mostly alright.
#344: TikTok and the First Amendment (May 2023). Guest: Ari Cohn, TechFreedom. Subjects: Is TikTok a national security threat? (Show us the evidence!) Has anyone tried Nyquil chicken? Crazy old First Amendment cases. The perils of vibes-based legislating. The CCP sucks.
More to come.