Prepare For A New Dodgy Trump-Era Tax On Netflix And Other Streaming Services Two weeks ago the Supreme Court rejected an effort by a dodgy right wing activists to destroy an $8 billion FCC program that connects poor and rural communities to the internet. The plaintiff in the case, a fake right wing “consumer group,” had tried to argue that the bipartisan subsidy (the Universal Service Fund, or […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/11/prepare-for-a-new-dodgy-trump-era-tax-on-netflix-and-other-streaming-services/

Despite A Flood Of New State Laws, Most Industries Still Suck On ‘Right To Repair’ Washington State recently became the eighth U.S. state to pass new right to repair legislation making it cheaper and easier to repair technology you own. At this point, roughly one-third of Americans now live in a state where some form of right to repair law has been passed, usually with broad, bipartisan, overwhelming public support. […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/10/despite-a-flood-of-new-state-laws-most-industries-still-suck-on-right-to-repair/

Idaho AG Office Forces Schools To Take Down ‘Everyone Is Welcome’ Signs For Being ‘Political’ It’s been interesting to watch the current administration and its GOP backers contort themselves into logical pretzels to explain to Americans why their policies, which are clearly either steeped or tinged with racist elements, are not in fact racist. Immigration policies and practices that are conducted without such annoyances as due process are waved off […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/10/idaho-ag-office-forces-schools-to-take-down-everyone-is-welcome-signs-for-being-political/

Missouri AG: Any AI That Doesn’t Praise Donald Trump Might Be “Consumer Fraud” (No, Really) Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey just sent threatening letters to Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, and Meta, claiming their AI chatbots violated Missouri’s consumer protection laws. The crime? When asked to rank presidents on antisemitism, some of the AIs had the temerity to suggest Donald Trump might not be great on that front. Yes, you read that […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/10/missouri-ag-any-ai-that-doesnt-praise-donald-trump-might-be-consumer-fraud-no-really/

Daily Deal: Headway Premium Unlock a world of knowledge with a Headway Premium subscription. This exclusive deal gives you unlimited access to Headway’s massive library of 1500+ book summaries, with 30-50 new ones added monthly. Cover any topic you can imagine, from personal development and business strategies to health and wellness. It’s on sale for $60. Use the code READ20 at […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/09/daily-deal-headway-premium-20/

El Salvador Throws DOJ Under The Bus: Tells UN That US Has “Exclusive” Jurisdiction Over Renditioned Detainees For months, the DOJ has insisted to US courts that it has no jurisdiction over the people it rendered to Salvadoran detention facilities. But when the UN came asking, El Salvador told a very different story: these detainees are “exclusively” under US jurisdiction and legal responsibility. The contradiction is so blatant it’s almost insulting to […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/09/el-salvador-throws-doj-under-the-bus-tells-un-that-us-has-exclusive-jurisdiction-over-renditioned-detainees/

Nestle Petitions To Cancel ‘Seattle Strong’ Coffee Trademark, Arguing It Owns Seattle Nestle certainly hasn’t been shy about engaging in aggressive trademark enforcement in the past, but this one is something different. We’ve already covered several stories in which a person or company has attempted to trademark the name of a city for a particular market designator. Not use the name of the city in a larger […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/08/nestle-petitions-to-cancel-seattle-strong-coffee-trademark-arguing-it-owns-seattle/

The New York Times Runs Interference For A Racist To Manufacture A Fake Scandal About Zohran Mamdani The New York Times has had a rough few decades when it comes to being manipulated by bad actors. But their latest embarrassment—a complete non-story about NYC mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani’s college application to Columbia University from 2009—represents a new low in journalistic malpractice that combines hacked materials, racist sources, and a breathtaking willingness to […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/08/the-new-york-times-runs-interference-for-a-racist-to-manufacture-a-fake-scandal-about-zohran-mamdani/

ICE Using Repurposed Border Facial Recognition Tech To ID Protesters, Activists, And Migrants On US Streets The Trump Administration’s constant escalation of its mass deportation programs now means ICE, CBP, and other federal agencies must come up with thousands of arrests a day. This never had anything to do with removing criminals from the country and, even if you once believed that might be the case, an unending string of raids […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/07/ice-using-repurposed-border-facial-recognition-tech-to-id-protesters-activists-and-migrants-on-us-streets/

Trump Budget Bill Turns ICE Into A Superpredator Men in masks kidnapping people off streets or turning businesses into ghost towns is now nothing more than an everyday occurrence in the United States. The Trump administration never actually cared whether or not the people it ejected from the country due to their race, color, or creed were, in fact, criminals. All it ever […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/07/trump-budget-bill-turns-ice-into-a-superpredator/

Oregon Appeals Court Says Bullet Cartridge Matching Is Just More Junk Science This isn’t the first state court to reach this conclusion, but so few courts bother to examine the science-y sounding stuff cops trot out as “evidence” that this decision is worth noting. There’s no shortage of junk science that has been (and continues to be) treated as actual science during testimony, ranging from the DNA […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/11/oregon-appeals-court-says-bullet-cartridge-matching-is-just-more-junk-science/

The Magical Thinking That’s Killing Our Humanity There is an epidemic of magical thinking. An unwillingness to confront reality. Because reality is scary. This affliction cuts across all ideological lines, manifesting in different forms but serving the same function: allowing us to avoid the difficult truths about what it will actually take to preserve human dignity, meaning, and freedom in the face […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/11/the-magical-thinking-thats-killing-our-humanity/

America’s Measles Counts Surpass 2019 Outbreak, Highest In Over Three Decades We haven’t talked about the numbers in America’s measles outbreak in a couple of months, but that certainly doesn’t mean the problem has gone away. It was back in April that we wrote about how the numbers were on pace to eclipse the outbreak in 2019, which was largely driven by unvaccinated religious groups in […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/11/americas-measles-counts-surpass-2019-outbreak-highest-in-over-three-decades/

Crowd-Sourced ICE Tracking Alerts Aim To Provide Local Communities With Early Warning Of Immigration Raids Techdirt has just written about how people are using Ring doorbell cameras to warn others in the area about the presence of ICE agents and the risk of possible ICE raids. That’s a good example of using existing technology to monitor the increasingly widespread and brutal activities of ICE teams. But driven by a desire […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/11/crowd-sourced-ice-tracking-alerts-aim-to-provide-local-communities-with-early-warning-of-immigration-raids/

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Trump Administration Sends In The Marines… To Do Paperwork? Martial law still appears to be the plan. The rollout has been limited, but the wholly unnecessary deployment of military troops to California sent a message our performative president wanted to get across. Trump sent an even more explicit one days later, following up on DHS boss Kristi Noem’s quasi-declaration of war on this “democrat” […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/11/trump-administration-sends-in-the-marines-to-do-paperwork/

Comcast Forced To Retreat From Broadband Data Caps (Sort Of) Due To Competition From 5G Wireless And Community Fiber Techdirt has always made it very clear that broadband usage caps on fixed-line broadband are bullshit. The costly and confusing restrictions serve no legitimate technical function. They don’t help your ISP “manage congestion.” They exist simply as a way for giant companies like Comcast to nickel-and-dime captive customers in uncompetitive broadband markets. Market failure created […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/11/comcast-forced-to-retreat-from-broadband-data-caps-sort-of-due-to-competition-from-5g-wireless-and-community-fiber/

CA Sheriff Who Ran As A Reformer Now Facing An Indictment, Potential Removal From Office Sheriff Christina Corpus is on the cusp of being an ex-sheriff and the first sheriff removed from office in San Mateo County via a county board vote. But her term as sheriff started a lot more promisingly. Running as a reformer, Corpus won the primary and the job, defeating Carlos Bolanos, who had definitely done […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/10/ca-sheriff-who-ran-as-a-reformer-now-facing-an-indictment-potential-removal-from-office/

Ctrl-Alt-Speech: Move Fast And Mistake Things Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly podcast about the latest news in online speech, from Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderation‘s Ben Whitelaw. Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Pocket Casts, YouTube, or your podcast app of choice — or go straight to the RSS feed. In this week’s round-up of the latest news in online […] https://www.techdirt.com/2025/07/10/ctrl-alt-speech-move-fast-and-mistake-things/