Law in Cyberspace
-
Annals of garbage “reporting” about law schools
No, it's not from the trashy online tabloid Above the Law (their garbage reporting wouldn't be news to anyone), but rather the right-wing Washington Free Beacon and its reporter Aaron Sibarium. Mr. Sibarium has become well-known for his selective interest in free expression issues on campus, and especially at law schools. But his latest is…
-
“Operant conditioning” via Twitter (or “Twitter poisoning”)
I thought this was interesting and perceptive: Behavioral changes occur as a side effect of something called operant conditioning, which is the underlying mechanism of social media addiction. This is the core mechanism analogous to the role alcohol plays in alcoholism. In early operant conditioning, pioneered by famous behaviorists like B.F. Skinner, animals were…
-
Leading student-edited law reviews issue statement on new requirements for data and code transparency in empirical legal scholarship
Here. (Thanks to Andrew Granato for the pointer.)
-
Keith Whittington (Princeton) on academic freedom and the work of the Academic Freedom Alliance
An illuminating Twitter thread here, that deserves to be widely read; some excerpts: It is unfortunate that you are so willing to mislead your followers on the fundamental & longstanding precepts of academic freedom that protect professors across the country from being fired for, e.g., bad tweets. But perhaps some of your followers will want…
-
“The Epistemology of the Internet and the Regulation of Speech in America”
A draft of this paper is now available, which will be presented at Georgetown next month. It picks up on some ideas first mentioned in an earlier blog post and presentation in Turin, which generated a lot of interest: finally there is a shareable paper. Here is the abstract:
-
President Trump uses scuffle at Berkeley as pretext to pressure universities into promoting views he endorses (Michael Simkovic)
A recruiter for a far-right group that maintains a "Professor Watchlist" was recently punched in the face while using slogans about "hate crime hoaxes" to recruit (or perhaps to intentionally provoke an incident) at the University of California Berkeley. The FBI and Department of Education have both found that serious (at times deadly) hate crimes…
-
A fascinating history of conservative activism on college campuses (Michael Simkovic)
A fascinating, albeit intemperate and sensationalist, perspective on the history of conservative activism on college campuses is available here. The essay discusses strategies such as top-down national campaigns funded by wealthy donors, programming crafted by national organizations staffed by well compensated and experienced political operatives with ties to the Republican party, and executed on particular…
-
Samuel Moyn (Yale): Law schools are too focused on public law to serve the public interest (Michael Simkovic)
In a thought provoking essay in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Professor Samuel Moyn argues that law schools' focus on judge made law in general, and the Supreme Court in particular, is counterproductive especially when justified on ostensibly progressive grounds. Offline, Professor Moyn suggested that, to better help students understand how the legal system influences…
-
Taking the LSAT will soon become more convenient (Michael Simkovic)
LSAC is rolling out several initiatives to make the LSAT more accessible, including a tablet-based version of the test that will increase the number and type of facilities that can serve as test administration centers, and will pave the way for more frequent test administration. LSAT takers will also be able to take the essay…
-
Financial Times: White House Considered Blanket Ban on Student Visas for Chinese Nationals, partly with goal of hurting Universities (Michael Simkovic)
From the Financial Times: "White House hawks earlier this year encouraged President Donald Trump to stop providing student visas to Chinese nationals, but the proposal was shelved over concerns about its economic and diplomatic impact. . . . Stephen Miller, a White House aide who has been pivotal in developing the administration’s hardline immigration policies,…
-
Should Online Education Come with an Asterisk on Transcripts? (Michael Simkovic)
The ABA recently voted to permit a dramatic expansion of online legal education. Online education is controversial in higher education. It is even more controversial in legal education, which relies more on classroom interaction and less on lectures than most forms of higher education. Widespread perceptions that online education is lower quality than live instruction…
-
Have education advocates sold out students’ and educators’ privacy for money from technology firms? (Michael Simkovic)
The Department of Education's failures to safeguard student data against leaks have led to repeated Congressional hearings over the last few years. (see here, here, and here). Even some of the best state education agencies have also suffered data breaches. Privacy advocates, student and parent groups, and educators are therefore understandably concerned about sharing even more…
-
Anti-university “free speech” legislation will divert education funds to demagogues and facilitate monitoring, intimidation, and harassment of academic communities (Michael Simkovic)
The Goldwater-Koch legislation is profoundly hostile to the vision of universities as special institutions—places of learning, of the pursuit of knowledge for the betterment of society, of refinement and culture. Anyone with an affinity for this vision of universities should actively and unequivocally oppose the Goldwater legislation and related proposals to strip universities of autonomy…
-
Skeptical academics and journalists reject Koch-Brothers-backed claims of “free speech crisis” on campus (Michael Simkovic)
Few would consider Stanford University left-wing. Stanford University hosts the controversial, conservative Hoover Institution.[1] Stanford has raised more than $40 million from conservative donors. Stanford is a major military contractor. Stanford’s last acting president (and long-time provost) argued for affirmative action in hiring in favor of conservative faculty, deploying barely coded, neo-McCarthyist phrases like “the threat…
Giovanni Molteni Tagliabue (Italy) Rationalized and Extended Democracy – The REDemo Project. Foreword by Gilberto Corbellini. Firenze University Press 2023.…