Posts

The Great Argentine Central Bank Smash

Latin America is a messy, culturally-rich, and prickly place. Though it is blessed with bountiful resources in its sprawling jungles, deserts, and jagged mountains, it has for most of its history been caught in the oscillating winds of colonial powers and external forces. While the 19th century saw the withering influence of Spanish colonialism against the rise of independence movements, the first part of the…

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Split up Amazon, Prime and AWS? If Biden’s FTC breaks up Bezos’ company, consumers lose

FTC and Lina Khan think consumers need to take one for the team when it comes to sacrificing their savings, in both time and money, that Amazon creates. Lina Khan is not tired of losing. Fresh off her latest defeat in court in pursuit of antitrust enforcement against Microsoft, President Joe Biden’s Federal Trade Commission chair is reportedly ready to launch the fight of her…

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Yaël on the Steve Gruber Show: Why we should care about CBDCs in Russia, the US, and beyond

CCC Deputy Yaël Ossowski is invited on the Steve Gruber Show to discuss the launch of the central bank digital currency in Russia, similar plans in the US, and why CBDCs would be harmful to both individual freedom and financial privacy. Also, why real cryptocurrency innovations like Bitcoin render these plans moot. https://stevegruber.podbean.com/e/yael-ossowski-putin-s-new-digital-currency-launched-tuesday/ August 2, 2023

Australia’s own media law isn’t helping news consumers either

In a news conference in Ottawa earlier this month, Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez sought to provide context for the tech industry’s reaction to the recently passed C-18, which outlines a process for media organizations to arrange deals with tech companies for ad revenue. Since the bill was enacted, both Meta and Google have taken steps to remove Canadian news articles from their platforms, claiming that…

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Checking in on Michael Bloomberg’s multi-million dollar global crusade against harm reduction

For years, we’ve covered the extent of former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg’s multi-million dollar campaigns to try to shape the lives of ordinary consumers. What began as an erstwhile nanny state campaign on Big Gulps in New York City has ballooned into a massively funded operation that uses grants and NGO funding on many tobacco issues, mostly on outlawing nicotine alternatives like vaping…

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The Dynamist Podcast: Europe’s Tech Tug of War

This week I was invited on the Foundation for American Innovation’s The Dynamist podcast, hosted by Evan Swarztrauber. We discuss the delta between American and European approaches to technology regulation, and how those policies and cultural differences impact Big Tech, startups, venture capital, and artificial intelligence. Listen on Apple, Overcast. From Evan’s description: The question has become cliche: Why doesn’t Europe have “Big Tech” companies?…

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The EU’s ‘regulate first, innovate later’ mantra will sink U.S. tech firms

Last week, a bespeckled white-haired Frenchman strolled the streets of San Francisco in between high-profile meetings and uncomfortable photo ops. With his horn-rimmed round glasses, wavy hair, and tailored suit, as well as a full entourage of slickly-dressed Europeans, the European Union Commissioner for the Internal Market, Thierry Breton, made his rounds in Silicon Valley. Breton’s powerful role within the EU’s executive body is to…

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