Rebecca Williams

Rather than make unwanted disclosures, many readers confronted by a publisher's age authentication request will leave the publisher's service and not complete the authentication process. This U-turn is called a "bounce." 120 Readers' tendency to bounce will be worse for startup publishers who have not yet earned readers' trust. 121 Section II.A.3 will revisit the bounce issue. Also, governments around the world want people to think twice before sharing sensitive biometric information due to the information's immutability if stolen. Mandatory age authentication teaches them the opposite lesson. Given the stakes of providing the disclosures required to age-authenticate, the reader's choice of whether to authenticate or bounce is complicated and nuanced. Most minors are still developing the cognitive and analytical skills needed to make these decisions wisely. Yet, segregate-and-suppress laws will force minors to make these decisions constantly, with potentially significant negative consequences for making a bad choice. Thus, if the policy goal is to protect minors online because of their potential vulnerability, then forcing minors to constantly decide whether or not to share highly sensitive information with strangers online is a policy

this is sweet, you wouldn't teach your child to scan their face on a site they didn't trust, would you? (I wouldn't.)

from: law.stanford.edu/wp-content/u...

I have a newfound interest in the news that is featured in an empty browser tab, who, if anyone, primarily gets their news this way? do they have an inner monologue or no? is it all ages content? is that why it is like that? etc.

Guess Who’s Eligible for Student Loan Forgiveness: New ICE Agents Thanks to the Supreme Court and the Trump administration, student loan forgiveness is out of reach for many — unless you work for ICE.

at some point, like so many things that go to the rotten, you just stop wanting it

Great to have @jacobsilverman.com back on the show! We start by discussing how influential tech figures can get away with open racism and Islamophobia, then pivot to talk about the scandalous nature of Trump’s capture by the crypto industry.

Imagining an alternate universe where I have notifications turned on & use social media DMs as my feed (channels/bulletin boards, etc.) and main messaging service.

paying for media lately (newsletters, small pubs, now PBS) feels less like a subscription and more like a GoFundMe emergency, the institutional safety nets are gone and we’re rescuing media; it also feels more like joining a small club

the republican party hates public goods and wants to force feed you and your family slop produced by its billionaire allies

I like to do sad face emoticon in the group chat and then link to the saddest news that has ever existed, when you see :(, be careful with that url

I didn’t initially realize the threat here, but as Erin makes clear in the thread, prosecutors often rely on evidence of what clothes you own to link you to appearances at illegal protests and the like.

I wait patiently for him to use a sharpie to make the jobs graph shoot up so I can add it to my little collection as the world suffers

YouTube video by Taylor Lorenz Age Verification Will Kill Free Speech Online

I did an hour long beginner’s breakdown on why age verification is extremely dangerous, bad, and leading to mass censorship, with tech policy expert @ericgoldman.bsky.social. What’s happening in the UK can and will happen here if we don’t fight it!

it feels like folks are downplaying or failing to recognize the classic racism (blue eyes w/ the blue genes) to own the outrage cycle / advertisers

don’t own them that way

advertisers absolutely consider reaction upswells to controversial ads in their grand schemes, but white supremacy rhetoric for American eagle in these times IS eugenics propaganda, people should critique it, just because you’re a pawn in a marketing scheme doesn’t mean it’s not problematic content

This was a bad bill in 2023 when we helped lead a letter objecting to it. It's still bad in 2025, which is why lawmakers are trying to rush it through.

If you're going to push anti-transparency litigation at least be transparent about it.

‘Crypto.gov’ domain registered by Trump White House The new government URL comes as the administration rolls out a digital assets report and fintech executive order.

not good

if age verification somehow was the undoing of Spotify I’d be so happy

Spotify Is Forcing Users to Undergo Face Scanning to Access Explicit Content Submit to biometric face scanning or risk your account being deleted, Spotify says, following the enactment of the UK's Online Safety Act.

getting my phrenology checked by my laptop camera before I can listen to WAP, a future I always wanted www.404media.co/spotify-uk-a...

I Watched AI Agents Try to Hack My Vibe-Coded Website RunSybil, a startup founded by OpenAI’s first security researcher, deploys agents that probe websites for vulnerabilities—part of a new AI era for cybersecurity.

Vibe Hacking for Good? (there is definitely Vibe Hacking happening)

the thing is it’s mostly faces & licenses (from gov credentials) right now (with its own risks!), but it’s becoming more & more privatized/big data/ai scoring

of course

it seems impossible to understand the world now without understanding the internet, luckily I am online constantly

Vibe Coding for Good (calling it now)

Substack is simply lying to creators about how much their “internal discovery system” works.

They make a ghost profile for EVERY ONE OF YOUR READERS so yeah at this points its pretty likely a new person also subscribes to another substack so they just give themself a little point in your analytics

UK Users Need to Post Selfie or Photo ID to View Reddit's r/IsraelCrimes, r/UkraineWarFootage “If visibility of r/IsraelCrimes is being restricted under the Online Safety Act, it’s only because the state fears accountability,” moderators say.

Age verification has a bias that diminishes how cruel, bloody, and inhumane the world can be, and that's going to have real consequences www.404media.co/uk-users-nee...

I had a tweet years ago (the last time the uk was trying to verify age for porn) that said something like “everything is digital id now” and I wish I could RT it now

Age verification? I regularly say “videotape” (verb) and “answering machine” to young people confusing & bewildering them

this is a great one ⤵️

me, to the fool, who is not a fool at all: I have actually been vibe coding myself lately, but not with people's licenses

this thread forever and always

Fake IDs for Members of Parliament; art

uhhh I’ll send you my source