Mike Palmer

I find it a perpetual source of fascination that we have scientists, mathematicians, engineers and entrepreneurs literally reaching for the stars - using the sheer force of their brainpower to bend the universe to their will - creating space rockets and AI models. And at the same time we have a ministerial and bureaucratic class that are perhaps the lowest calibre of any time in history. In terms of raw talent, ability and brains, in the main they seem of just stunning mediocrity

It is completely backwards to suggest we can decouple young people from the digital world at home, when so much of their educational lives now revolve around the use of digital technology and apps. If politicians want to talk about the potential for online harms, they urgently need to look at how students are being onboarded into Big Tech's ecosystems from a young age via the education system. Schools increasingly funnel children directly into data-harvesting platforms, often bypassing parental consent entirely. The whole system needs a rethink.

🔥 The Kremlin is building its own "Great Firewall", plunging millions of Russian citizens into digital isolation. This is what the authoritarian playbook looks like in action. It must serve as a stark warning to us here in the UK: when our own politicians push for platform-wide bans, threaten to break end-to-end encryption, and hand ministers unchecked powers to restrict our internet access, they are playing with the exact same tools of digital control. We cannot claim to champion freedom and democracy abroad while building a surveillance state that mimics the very same totalitarian regimes we oppose.

Imagine you were a zebra, and Mark Zuckerberg shot you with a plasma rifle. QED.

This is an interesting article about the dilemmas of social media moderation: thetimes.com/uk/social-medi…

I once spoke with a top social media company about something different - actually unlawful content. And the moderation dilemma wasn't theirs, but government's. One agency of government would say "hey we found this child exploitation ring on your platform, you need to remove it," and they would. And another agency would complain they took it down because they were actively monitoring it. Content moderation is wildly complex, extremely interesting, and the nuance isn't easily conveyed. The answers for how best to handle identical situations may be opposite and may cause problems no matter what

"Anonymity is a shield from the tyranny of the majority. It thus exemplifies the purpose behind the Bill of Rights, and of the First Amendment in particular: to protect unpopular individuals from retaliation—and their ideas from suppression—at the hand of an intolerant society."

Congress can't take away the First Amendment we really really REALLY have to fix civics education in this country

People on the right like to complain that liberals come to appreciate conservative figures only after they’re dead. Well, let me play that game in reverse, about Justice William O. Douglas. I feel like I "get" him more as time passes. Indisputably a man of the left. New Dealer on economics. Absolutely fanatical environmentalist. But also a genuine anti-authoritarian and civil libertarian. He thought freedom was for eccentrics, dissenters, cranks, suspects, and loners. He *really* believed this, unlike so many of today's herd-like progressives. Said things like: “Suppression of speech as an effective police measure is an old, old device, outlawed by our Constitution.” “Thought control is not within the competence of any branch of government.” The First Amendment protects your right to “read what the Federal Government says contains the seeds of treason." Total lunatic in a lot of ways. But he really had his moments, and today's left would do well to revisit him on free speech. And yes, I bring this up because of the tech panic stuff flying around this week.

Great, so it would be fine if the government decided your ideas are harmful & prevented you from making them available to the public?

Fact check: The First Amendment absolutely protects against liability from harm caused by speech.

Moral panic status: High Social media barons are like drug pushers who target our children telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/03/2…

If you come across someone asserting there is "no scientific evidence" that social media is causing harm, please send them this link. We lay out seven lines of evidence, including RCTs, natural experiments, and testimony from victims & perpetrators of harm worldhappiness.report/ed/2026/social…

today's crusading anti-tech and anti-free speech movements perfectly track the 4-part pattern that the great Thomas Sowell identified in his 1995 book, "The Vision of the Anointed":

In case your wondering what is happening These AI companies have been operating at a MASSIVE loss this whole time trying to get people to adopt the technology. But, so far, it hasn't worked. Now, they have to raise prices to actual operating cost and its prohibitively expensive. And even then most of these platforms wont see profit before 2030, long after they completely run out of money. TL;DR Government money ran out so now they have to charge what its actually costing them and "customers" arent buying anything that expensive

Uhh no, this case was structured intentionally to circumvent 230 and the groups involved are pursuing these cases as part of a political effort to dismantle 230. The 1st thing the parents involved in the case did after the verdict announced was ahold a press conference calling for 230 repeal!

How military conscription happens in Russia—a thread Gosuslugi (the Russian digital ID system) has become a central hub without which life in Russia is almost impossible. Through it, people obtain documents, schedule doctor appointments, and more recently, receive electronic military summons. If a citizen does not confirm receipt, their rights are automatically restricted (leaving the country, selling property, driving a car) — which is a direct implementation of digitally "switching off" an individual from the system. This represents one of the most radical examples of a state transforming into a digital control mechanism in modern history. What was once a portal for paying parking fees or booking passport appointments has become a digital cage. Before this law (2023), a military summons in Russia had to be delivered in person and signed for. People would simply avoid opening the door or live at different addresses. Now, a summons is considered delivered the moment it appears in your personal Gosuslugi account — or, if you do not have an active account, 7 days after it is entered into the "Unified Register of Conscripts." The travel ban activates immediately upon delivery of the summons — before the 20-day window begins. If a citizen then fails to report to the military office within 20 days, the following additional restrictions are triggered: - Driving ban: The driver's license becomes invalid in the traffic police database. - Ban on buying/selling real estate: The land registry (Rosreestr) blocks any transactions. You cannot sell property to leave the country. - Credit ban: Banks automatically see that the applicant is subject to conscription restrictions and loan access is blocked. - Business restriction: You cannot register a company or work as a freelancer (self-employed). In Russia, it is nearly impossible to function without a Gosuslugi account. You use it to enroll your child in school or kindergarten. You receive QR codes through it (as seen during the pandemic). When people began attempting to delete their accounts in March 2023 ahead of the spring conscription drive, the authorities disabled the "delete account" option on the website. This happened proactively on March 31, 2023—the same day the Defence Ministry announced electronic summonses—rather than in response to a mass exodus already underway. The system is integrated with a network of over 200,000 cameras in Moscow equipped with facial recognition. In documented cases, the flagging has occurred specifically when a conscript contests his draft order in court—at which point the enlistment office enters him into the system as an alleged evader, triggering a facial recognition alert and enabling police to detain him on the spot. It is not confirmed as a blanket automatic trigger for anyone who has simply received a summons and not yet reported. The state can effectively cut a person off from the social and economic bloodstream—without the ability to drive, manage money, or use property. This became reality in Russia faster than almost anywhere else because the state used war as justification to merge all databases (tax, police, medical, and military) into one central system. Russia no longer uses technology merely as a service for citizens, but as an operational tool of enforcement. 🧵

"Freedom to speak is not the same as a right to go viral," I giggle to myself as I draft a bill prohibiting any bookstore from displaying Charlotte Alter's books on a shelf and any website from selling it on any indexed page.

So government can limit speech if too many people hear it? Hear how insane that sounds?

Today's post, on why a lot of knowledge is a dangerous thing