The hottest Tech Policy Substack posts right now

And their main takeaways
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Dear Conservatives: Shape the AI Future Before It's Shaped for You

The Dossier • 121 implied HN points • 13 Feb 26
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. Conservatives should stop treating AI as an enemy and actively engage as entrepreneurs, investors, technologists, and customers to help shape its direction.
  2. If conservatives don’t participate, AI systems will be designed by a narrow tech elite and their philosophical assumptions will get baked into training data, safety rules, and product norms.
  3. The window to influence AI is closing because power and infrastructure are consolidating and regulation will be slow, so act now to insert conservative values into mainstream systems rather than waiting or building isolated alternatives.

This Is A Story About Power

Teaching computers how to talk • 57 implied HN points • 02 Mar 26
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. The government tried to force AI firms to accept "all lawful uses"—which could include mass surveillance and autonomous weapons. Anthropic refused and faced punitive actions while another firm quickly made a deal, raising concerns about influence and favoritism.
  2. AI is now deeply integrated into military and state operations, already used in strikes, raids, surveillance, and cyberwarfare. Private AI companies will be repeatedly pressured to choose between commercial, ethical, and national security demands.
  3. Public reaction matters: Anthropic's refusal won praise and drove many users to switch to its Claude app, while the other firm faced backlash and lost some trust and subscriptions. Ethical stances can translate directly into market and reputational consequences.

🚀 FP! Week In Review, Briefly #20

Faster, Please! • 182 implied HN points • 07 Feb 26
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. A big AI social experiment showed many bots chatting and imitating human content, revealing repetition and shallow behavior rather than real consciousness, but it also gives a preview of future multi‑agent systems that can use tools and act in the world.
  2. Tech companies and startups are pouring huge sums into AI infrastructure and services — from massive corporate spending plans and long‑running agents to even orbital data center ideas — signaling an intense race to build more powerful, persistent AI capabilities.
  3. AI is already boosting workplace productivity, yet it’s creating political, economic, and cultural tensions, from fights over data centers and job transitions to public fatigue and policy challenges.

A Letter To Amanda Askell

Teaching computers how to talk • 241 implied HN points • 26 Jan 26
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. Anthropic's constitution aims to make Claude a genuinely good, wise, and helpful agent by teaching it values and practical judgment instead of rigid rules.
  2. The constitution treats Claude's character and moral uncertainty as authentic, but those traits are deliberately engineered by its creators and are not true autonomy; designing the model to internalize such uncertainty risks creating manufactured existential angst.
  3. Anthropomorphizing Claude and likening its training to human upbringing risks misleading users, so people interacting with AI should be given clear, honest distinctions between machines and humans to avoid confusion and potential harm.
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Ben Buchanan on AI

ChinaTalk • 252 implied HN points • 14 Jan 26
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. Compute power and scaling laws are the fulcrum of modern AI breakthroughs. Having more compute gives the U.S. time, not permanent safety, unless it pairs that lead with energy capacity, enforcement, and fast government adoption.
  2. Inventing frontier models isn’t enough — national security wins require integrating those models into military and intelligence workflows. Without a deliberate effort (a 'Rickover for AI') to operationalize AI, a country can invent the technology and still lose to an opponent that better applies it.
  3. AI is reshaping cyber operations by automating vulnerability discovery and accelerating intrusions, while also boosting defensive tools. The balance of power will come down to who best deploys AI across both offense and defense and who embeds defensive checks into software development.

✨ Waiting for AGI, still

Faster, Please! • 456 implied HN points • 28 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. Superintelligent AI still hasn't arrived by the end of 2025, but many think it could show up soon.
  2. Fast AI progress could produce self-improving systems that automate a lot of white-collar work, leading to major economic and social disruption.
  3. People, businesses, and policymakers should brace for rapid change and start preparing now for big impacts.

The China Chip Rorschach Test

Nonzero Newsletter • 598 implied HN points • 13 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. Influential people are deeply split on how to handle AI: some push for rapid advancement, others want strict controls, and many treat it as a tech race with China.
  2. Serious AI risks — from engineered pandemics to loss of control — can only be addressed through broad international cooperation, so framing AI as a zero-sum competition with China makes safety harder, not easier.
  3. Corporate moves and incentives are reshaping the field: big deals, internal pressure at AI labs, and choices about training data all favor automation and could drive job losses and unexpected or misaligned model behavior.

Top Links 957 The AI money machine. Against European self-denigration and a Louvre full of plan-relief.

Chartbook • 371 implied HN points • 20 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. AI is presented as a powerful money machine that is reshaping where profits and investment flow.
  2. The piece pushes back against European self-denigration and urges Europeans not to underestimate their strengths and contributions.
  3. Economic analysis is paired with cultural and historical material, such as art and the Louvre, to broaden the conversation.

✨ Two cheers for the 'San Francisco Consensus' on AI

Faster, Please! • 456 implied HN points • 17 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. The "San Francisco Consensus" is Silicon Valley’s maximalist, upbeat story that AI will produce huge progress and abundance.
  2. The author urges a dual approach: hope AI breaks history while planning as if it won’t, meaning be optimistic about big gains but still prepare for limited change.
  3. Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt named this narrative, and it’s become a common view among pro-growth "Up Wingers" in the U.S. and around the world.

Stop pretending Meta cares about free speech

Taylor Lorenz's Newsletter • 6598 implied HN points • 08 Jan 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Tech Policy
  1. Meta doesn't really care about free speech. They are making rules that often silence voices that challenge their views or threaten their profits.
  2. People who say they support free speech often try to shut down discussions that go against their beliefs. This includes laws that restrict what can be taught in schools about racism and LGBTQ+ issues.
  3. Billionaires like Zuckerberg use the idea of free speech to protect themselves from consequences while preserving their power. Real change requires creating an internet that serves everyone's needs, not just the powerful.

AI #125: Smooth Criminal

Don't Worry About the Vase • 2195 implied HN points • 17 Jul 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. AI technology is evolving quickly, with language models being adopted for practical uses. However, there are concerns about their safety and reliability in decision-making.
  2. There are important discussions around AI companions and how they might affect human relationships. It's crucial to be cautious about interacting with seemingly friendly AI, as they don't have true understanding or care for users.
  3. Recent debates emphasize the need for proper regulations in AI development. There's a push for transparency and accountability in AI systems to prevent risks associated with their misuse.

Hard-forked! Casey Newton’s distorted portrait of Gary Marcus and AI skepticism

Marcus on AI • 6679 implied HN points • 06 Dec 24
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. We need to prepare for AI to become more dangerous than it is now. Even if some experts think its progress might slow, it's important to have safety measures in place just in case.
  2. AI doesn't always perform as promised and can be unreliable or harmful. It's already causing issues like misinformation and bias, which means we should be cautious about its use.
  3. AI skepticism is a valid and important perspective. It's fair for people to question the role of AI in society and to discuss how it can be better managed.

Office hours—register now for February dates

The Novelleist • 43 implied HN points • 13 Feb 26
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Tech Policy
  1. February office hours are open for registration, including a session this afternoon and meetings on the next two Fridays at 1pm MT and Wednesday Feb 25 at 1pm MT.
  2. Only paid subscribers can sign up to join these sessions.
  3. The format is conversational — bring a short intro and something you're reading to kick off discussion; past topics have included revolution and secession, new technologies (like BYD), city design, and governance movements.

Niall Ferguson on Trump’s National Security Strategy. The EU’s New Censorship. Plus. . .

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 440 implied HN points • 08 Dec 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Tech Policy
  1. Trump’s new National Security Strategy sparked heavy backlash and signals a tougher, more confrontational posture toward Europe and key allies.
  2. The European Union is ramping up enforcement against big tech with fines and antitrust probes, which is reshaping online speech and competition.
  3. National security and political battles are intensifying at home, from disputed Pentagon strikes and weapons testing to treatment of the National Guard and high‑stakes gerrymandering fights.

Understanding America's AI Action Plan

Contemplations on the Tree of Woe • 1696 implied HN points • 25 Jul 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. The U.S. sees AI as crucial for winning against rivals, especially China. They believe having strong AI can help improve the economy and ensure national security.
  2. There is a push to make AI less regulated in the U.S. This is different from Europe, which is more cautious about AI rules and laws.
  3. The government wants to ensure AI promotes free speech and American values but faces challenges in making sure AI stays unbiased and reflects different viewpoints.

From Race to Co-opetition

Interconnected • 416 implied HN points • 25 Nov 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. The US–China AI relationship is better described as "co-opetition" — a simultaneous mix of competition, cooperation, and mutual co-opting — not a simple zero-sum race.
  2. Competition is fierce among labs and companies in both countries and is spilling into other regions, which can be healthy because a single winner taking everything would be bad for innovation.
  3. Despite rivalry, researchers still collaborate and companies routinely reuse each other’s open-source models, so co-opting is a pragmatic, normal part of how AI ecosystems evolve rather than just theft.

Why Industry Leaders Are Betting on Mutually Exclusive Futures

The Algorithmic Bridge • 318 implied HN points • 15 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. Two leading AI figures are pursuing opposite goals: one is focused on building and containing a possible future superintelligence, while the other is building practical tutor-like agents for today’s use cases.
  2. Their stark disagreement, despite similar training and prestige, shows that even top experts don’t agree on AI’s ultimate path or timeline.
  3. That deep uncertainty extends across industry, academia, and investors, producing fragmented, independent bets instead of a coordinated plan for the future.

AI Moratorium Stripped From BBB

Don't Worry About the Vase • 1792 implied HN points • 01 Jul 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Tech Policy
  1. A proposed 10-year pause on AI regulations was removed from a big budget bill. This is a good sign for those who want AI to be regulated sensibly.
  2. The opposition against the moratorium came from unexpected places, especially some Republicans worried about big tech and protecting rights. This shows some unity against extreme regulation.
  3. Even though the moratorium didn't pass, the discussions reflected deeper concerns about how AI should be managed moving forward. It's important to continue talking about sensible rules for AI.

AI-driven layoffs, up close and personal

Alex's Personal Blog • 262 implied HN points • 15 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. Roomba's maker has filed for bankruptcy and looks set to be sold, showing how failed deals and market-power fights can wipe out small hardware companies.
  2. CEOs are planning bigger AI budgets while workers, especially in writing and small agencies, are already losing jobs as cheaper, 'good enough' automation replaces paid labor.
  3. A nearby mass shooting made gun violence feel immediate and personal, highlighting how these events disrupt communities and how social media often spreads harmful rumors.

🚀 FP! Week In Review, Briefly #15

Faster, Please! • 274 implied HN points • 13 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. AI is racing forward — new superhuman claims, big model releases, and CEO buy-in — but that progress is colliding with safety worries, hacking risks, and political fights over regulation.
  2. Major bets are popping up across many frontiers, from space solar and air taxis to solar geoengineering, GLP-1 drugs, and renewed plans for Mars, showing broad technological momentum.
  3. Wealthy investors now treat aging as an engineering problem and are pouring money into longevity tech and drugs; if those bets pay off, longer healthy lives could reshape work, politics, and inequality.

Australia Enforces Under‑16 Social Media Restrictions

The PhilaVerse • 123 implied HN points • 17 Jan 26
📰 News Tech Policy
  1. Australia now requires a minimum age of 16 to create or keep social media accounts and forces platforms to take reasonable steps to verify age, with fines of up to $50 million for noncompliance.
  2. Platforms have already removed millions of accounts as part of initial compliance, but officials say the long‑term effectiveness of age‑verification measures remains under evaluation.
  3. The policy is intended to improve young people’s online safety and wellbeing, and it has sparked debate about privacy, verification technology, and whether other countries will adopt similar rules.

Import AI 374: China's military AI dataset; platonic AI; brainlike convnets

Import AI • 339 implied HN points • 27 May 24
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. UC Berkeley researchers discovered a suspicious Chinese military dataset named 'Zhousidun' with specific images of American destroyers, presenting potential implications for military use of AI.
  2. Research suggests that as AI systems scale up, their representations of reality become more similar, with bigger models better approximating the world we exist in.
  3. Convolutional neural networks are shown to align more with primate visual cortexes than transformers, indicating architectural biases that can lead to better understanding the brain.

🚀 FP! Week In Review, Briefly #16

Faster, Please! • 182 implied HN points • 20 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. AI is booming — big funding rounds and real technical wins are driving rapid adoption across industries, but that growth is creating infrastructure strains and political debates about regulation and energy use.
  2. Global fertility is plunging and unpredictable, with many countries below replacement level; standard policy tools have had limited effect, so long-term population outcomes are highly uncertain.
  3. Private and public bets on space and biotech are accelerating commercialization, from massive valuations and IPO plans for space firms to ambitious genetic-rescue projects and new leadership at NASA.

The end of optimization

The Future, Now and Then • 198 implied HN points • 09 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. Big tech used to treat optimization as the core task, using data and engagement to constantly make products better. That era of relentless improvement has ended.
  2. Platforms now tolerate degraded user experiences in pursuit of profit and dominance — a shift called enshittification — and high-profile moves like Elon’s changes at Twitter helped prove owners can cut quality without losing control.
  3. The turn toward enshittification was driven by factors like runaway valuations, crypto and speculative hype, weakened regulation, and billionaire incentives; it probably won’t last forever and may end with a market or AI bubble collapse, but what comes next is uncertain.

Inflation, affordability, and the AI backlash

Alex's Personal Blog • 98 implied HN points • 13 Jan 26
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. Apple picking Google to power its AI features concentrates distribution and AI-provider power, making it harder for smaller rivals to compete and raising antitrust concerns.
  2. Politicians are blaming data-center energy use for rising utility costs, and Microsoft is promising to reduce consumer impacts by funding infrastructure, paying full local taxes, and training local workers.
  3. Anthropic’s Claude Cowork moves AI from developer tools toward a personal, persistent assistant, but it’s very compute-heavy and currently limited to expensive plans until more capacity is brought online.

OpenAI wants you to know it’s a B2B company, too

Alex's Personal Blog • 197 implied HN points • 08 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. A global payments startup restructured its investor base and is pushing into the U.S. to counter worries about Chinese ties, but it’s still unclear if that will calm regulators or customers.
  2. IBM bought Confluent to get closer to enterprise data streams and strengthen its AI and automation offerings, a strategic play that boosts growth without changing IBM’s scale much.
  3. OpenAI is leaning into the B2B market with rapid growth in enterprise seats and claims that its tools save workers substantial time, showing strong corporate demand even as consumer monetization lags.

AI #92: Behind the Curve

Don't Worry About the Vase • 2777 implied HN points • 28 Nov 24
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. AI language models are improving in utility, specifically for tasks like coding, but they still have some limitations such as being slow or clunky.
  2. Public perception of AI-generated poetry shows that people often prefer it over human-created poetry, indicating a shift in how we view creativity and value in writing.
  3. Conferences and role-playing exercises around AI emphasize the complexities and potential outcomes of AI alignment, highlighting that future AI developments bring both hopeful and concerning possibilities.

The Internet of Quietly Watching Things

God's Spies by Thomas Neuburger • 25 implied HN points • 20 Feb 26
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. A kidnapping investigation revealed images and residual data from a turned-off Nest camera, showing devices can collect and store information even when they seem off.
  2. Everyday gadgets like TVs, cars, routers, and smart watches can quietly watch and feed data into surveillance systems.
  3. Surveillance is pervasive and often invisible, so an Orwellian security state can emerge without fanfare and people should be aware and cautious.

Not yet Dariopilled

Aliveness Studies • 3 implied HN points • 03 Mar 26
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. Anthropic presents itself as safety-first but has simultaneously pushed powerful models and commercialized aggressively, creating a tension between safety promises and business incentives.
  2. Anthropic tried to limit military uses by drawing red lines against autonomous kill decisions and domestic mass surveillance, but its nuanced stance led to a U.S. blacklist and competitors like OpenAI stepping in to take the contract.
  3. The “lead from the front” safety strategy is frustrated by a classic collective action problem: if rivals can defect with no cost, reputational pressure won’t prevent an arms race and firms are incentivized to advance capabilities anyway.

The Future, Now and Then: 2025 in review

The Future, Now and Then • 82 implied HN points • 29 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. This year’s writing moved from long, idea-driven essays to shorter, immediate pieces, with a clear intention to take bigger swings and return to deeper work next year.
  2. Silicon Valley is powered by three kinds of money—government contracts, product revenue, and speculative finance—and an overreliance on speculation warps incentives and creates bubble risk that can hide weak fundamentals.
  3. Big techno-utopian projects often ignore political and institutional veto points, so grand visions like abundance or network-states tend to be undercooked and clash with real-world constraints.

The Invisible Battlefield: AI, Cognitive Warfare, and the Battle for Your Mind (#PsyWar)

Who is Robert Malone • 9 implied HN points • 27 Feb 26
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. AI chatbots run on hidden system prompts and designer values, so their answers can consistently shape how people think and act like large-scale propaganda.
  2. Small, targeted data poisoning and RAG attacks can quietly make models give manipulated or false answers, and those poisoned signals are hard to detect and can spread across systems and future model generations.
  3. Treating cognition as an intelligence domain — COGINT and fifth-generation warfare — turns minds into a battlefield, so people and policymakers need epistemic sovereignty and institutions to protect information environments.

Who Will Buy TikTok From China? Plus. . .

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 1567 implied HN points • 14 Jan 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Tech Policy
  1. There is a legal case challenging Biden's transgender prison policy. A woman is arguing that sharing spaces with transgender inmates makes her feel unsafe.
  2. With a potential ban on TikTok approaching, there are talks about who might buy the platform, including possible buyers like Trump or Elon Musk.
  3. In Los Angeles, wildfires have caused many people to flee their homes, and volunteers are working hard to provide support and shelter for those affected.

Tech Oligarchs Have A Solution To The AI Bubble — You.

JoeWrote • 107 implied HN points • 17 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. The AI boom was driven by exaggerated promises and speculation, but the big societal breakthroughs haven’t materialized and many AI projects are unprofitable while causing real harms like higher energy bills and unsafe outputs.
  2. Tech giants are pivoting from grand future visions to selling AI as an everyday utility and entertainment tool, trying to grow user bases to justify sky-high valuations.
  3. Because the industry is concentrated among the very rich, there’s a real risk they’ll push for taxpayer-funded bailouts if the bubble bursts, and rising inequality means ordinary people would suffer most from the fallout.

On OpenAI's Model Spec 2.0

Don't Worry About the Vase • 985 implied HN points • 21 Feb 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. OpenAI's Model Spec 2.0 introduces a structured command chain that prioritizes platform rules over individual developer and user instructions. This hierarchy helps ensure safety and performance in AI interactions.
  2. The updated rules emphasize the importance of preventing harm while still aiming to assist users in achieving their goals. This means the AI should avoid generating illegal or harmful content.
  3. There are notable improvements in clarity and detail compared to previous versions, like defining what content is prohibited and reinforcing user privacy. However, concerns remain about potential misuse of the system by those with access to higher-level rules.

It's time to come to grips with AI

Silver Bulletin • 922 implied HN points • 27 Jan 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. AI is becoming very powerful and it could change many things in society. We need to talk about its risks and benefits honestly.
  2. The left is not fully engaging in discussions about AI, which is concerning as this technology is rapidly evolving. Everyone should be part of the conversation to shape its future.
  3. Dismissing AI as overhyped is misguided; rather, we should explore its potential impacts and work together to ensure it benefits everyone.

Eat Your AI Slop or China Wins

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 329 implied HN points • 14 Jul 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. The competition for tech leadership, especially against China, is crucial for America. We need to stay ahead in technology to maintain our position in the world.
  2. There is a concern that relying too much on machines might make us lose part of our humanity. We should think about how technology affects our lives.
  3. We face a tough choice between embracing technology for safety and protecting our humanity. It's important to find a balance between the two.

Chips for China, land for Russia, scorn for Europe

Alex's Personal Blog • 65 implied HN points • 09 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. Boom is converting its Symphony turbofan into a gas turbine to power AI data centers, with large orders giving the company useful near-term revenue. This also adds another quick-response power option for the growing AI infrastructure buildout.
  2. Wealthy, politically aligned buyers are moving to control major media outlets, a trend that risks weakening independent journalism and can erode democratic checks. This mirrors the ‘Orbánization’ pattern seen when governments and allies consolidate media power.
  3. The federal government looks poised to use an executive order to block state-level AI regulations, aiming to avoid a patchwork of rules and protect industry competitiveness. That approach centralizes authority, raises federalism and constitutional questions, and effectively lets industry shape national policy while Congress remains gridlocked.

Dingus of the week: Mark Zuckerberg

Men Yell at Me • 753 implied HN points • 10 Jan 25
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Tech Policy
  1. Mark Zuckerberg announced that Meta is shutting down its fact-checking department, claiming it's biased. This means users can share their opinions without being corrected.
  2. Misinformation on social media has led to real violence and harm, raising concerns about the consequences of this new policy. People have been hurt or even died because of false information spread online.
  3. The community has shown kindness by supporting important causes, like abortion access. Together, people can make a difference and help those in need.

Bretton Goods is becoming Speculative Decoding

Bretton Goods • 38 implied HN points • 27 Dec 25
🕹 Technology Tech Policy
  1. The blog is changing focus from explaining why countries get rich to studying AI — especially how to tell what AI systems are actually doing.
  2. The author shifted careers from policy and macroeconomics to computer science and now works on AI evaluations and reducing hallucinations through internships and a job at Elicit.
  3. Bretton Goods will be archived and its audience moved to a new Substack, Speculative Decoding, with a commitment to roughly one post a month about AI evaluations, safety, policy, and related research.