(This is by Cory Doctorow, who I always vaguely feel like we're supposed to hate but maybe not?) The enshittification of things like Google, Twitter, Facebook, etc:

HERE IS HOW platforms die: First, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die.

Clearly the examples are mostly not dead, and if you browse dead technology, they generally just never took off in the first place. So the last line is a little facile. Nevertheless, the progression of how products get worse over time is broadly right.

(You know what works pretty stably over time? Ventures where profit is off the table.)

Way down and not really the point:

And policymakers should focus on freedom of exit--the right to leave a sinking platform while continuing to stay connected to the communities that you left behind, enjoying the media and apps you bought and preserving the data you created.

This reminds me of how it was legislated that you'd be allowed to keep your phone number when you switched carriers, in the aughts, and what it was like before that.

Via Rob HC, on a decaying platform

Sometimes when the blogging well runs, I just check in with my own mental chatter, which of late has been incredibly dull and focused on trying to get a handle on the clutter in the house. I'm mostly failing. The problem is that every item is a tiny, unique decision. It's both tiring and dull, and even when I'm doing my best, we still have so much crap coming in the house.

I do have a note that we haven't actually had a George Santos thread, but that ship probably sailed.

LW writes:

A former top FBI official was charged on Monday with working for sanctioned Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, as U.S. prosecutors ramp up efforts to enforce sanctions on Russian officials and police their alleged enablers.

Comey appointed him just before the Giuliani leaks began.

He apparently led the FBI investigation into Trump-Russia links, before either of the charges brought against him (Albanian money 2017, Deripaska 2018). Deripaska roughly speaking owned Manafort , who was basically a piece of lint before becoming wealthy as a consultant in Ukraine under Yushchenko and Russia, then this.

Maybe a thread for spirited and informative discussion? What a bunch of maggots.

Heebie's take: "Bunch of maggots" is a great phrase, and well-deployed.

NickS writes: A group of artists has filed suit alleging copyright violation, and I'm curious what the commenteriat makes of the case.

I'm sympathetic to the artists, but, as a first reaction, hope they don't win.

This seems like a complicated issue, which has to be litigated and I am also dubious about the ability of the court to evaluate the technical issues, and curious to see what happens.

Heebie's take: Not entirely unrelated, I saw this article yesterday about an app that is supposed to be able to detect work written by ChatGPT, in particular with an eye on rooting out plagiarism in the classroom.

I'm not quite rooting for AI as much as Nick, mostly due to the vertiginous feeling AI has been giving me lately.

Minivet writes: Fascinating law review article from last year, Delegation at the Founding, by Mortenson and Bagley.

Shows that both the Continental Congress and the early US Congress delegated vague goals for the executive branch to flesh out like crazy. Big examples post-1789:
* Territorial officials told to write the entire lawbook for their territory
* Three cabinet secretaries told to figure out together what made an invention "sufficiently useful and important" to merit a patent
* The president given sole authority to license people to trade with Indian tribes, setting whatever standards he saw fit
* The president authorized to figure out pretty much the entire wounded / disabled veterans' pension system
* Courts authorized to determine whether a white alien seeking citizenship was of "good character", no criteria given

It lays out the case pretty well that non-delegation - the doctrine the Supreme Court may be poised to start using to tear down the administrative state - is not even an outdated concept, but complete and utter fantasy, built up on a puffing-up of a few broad philosophical statements. (It was very occasionally used to critique certain policies in the political arena, but it was clearly bullshit those few times too.)

Of course it also sucks that originalism is now presumed to be so foundational to the Supreme Court majority that you have to make an originalist argument to combat other harmful theories they're brewing. The actual originalists not caring about how well their assertions hold up to scrutiny, since it's all instrumental to them.

Heebie's take: This patient disassembling of an argument made in bad faith reminds me of the aughts of blogging. I didn't have to get very far to feel my temper rising:

These originalist arguments have recently found a receptive audience at the Supreme Court. In Gundy v. United States, Justice Gorsuch penned a long dissent bristling with citations to originalist scholars and calling on the Court to revive the nondelegation doctrine. (4) Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Thomas joined the opinion, and Justice Alito wrote separately to signal his "willing[ness] to reconsider the approach we have taken for the past 84 years." (5) Although Justice Kavanaugh didn't participate in Gundy, he issued a short opinion some months later suggesting his openness to reviving the nondelegation doctrine. (6) For the first time in modern history, a working majority on the Supreme Court may be poised to give the nondelegation doctrine real teeth.

I recognize the need for the thorough rebuttals, so that the opposition is built on a sound foundation. But it really is that quote about playing chess with a pigeon, where they shit all over the board and strut around like they won.

This is intended to be our system for checking in on imaginary friends, so that we know whether or not to be concerned if you go offline for a while. There is no way it could function as that sentence implies, but it's still nice to have a thread.

Episode Kobe fifty