Ctrl-Alt-Speech

In this sponsored Spotlight episode of Ctrl-Alt-Speech, host Ben Whitelaw talks to Oversight Board co-chair Paolo Carozza (Professor of Law and Concurrent Professor at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana) and Board member Julie Owono (Executive Director of Internet Without Borders and research affiliate at Berkman Klein Centre) about the Board’s five-year journey and its plans for the future. To...

In the first Ctrl-Alt-Speech episode of 2026, Mike and Ben look forward at the year ahead and begin building a bingo card of things that might happen. They discuss a short list of possible squares, ask for listeners to contribute more ideas, and go few a through suggestions that have already come in. Soon, we’ll release an official Ctrl-Alt-Speech bingo card for listeners to play along throughout...

In the last Ctrl-Alt-Speech of the year, Mike and Ben round up the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation with the following stories: Meta shuts down global accounts linked to abortion advice and queer content | Global development (The Guardian) Facebook is testing a link-posting limit for professional accounts and pages (Techcrunch) Meta adopts new age-check syst...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Resonant Computing Manifesto   Support Techdirt’s Uncompromising Coverage, Get Our First Commemorative Coin (Techdirt) US Ambassador Slams EU Tech Rules as Musk’s X Hit With Fine (Bloomberg) Why the X fine is causing so much transatlantic drama (Politico) Tech workers f...

In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by Vaishnavi J, former head of youth policy at Meta and founder and principal of Vyanams Strategies, a product advisory firm that helps companies, civil society, and governments build safer age appropriate experiences. Prior to founding Vys, she led video policy at Twitter, built i...

In this sponsored Spotlight episode of Ctrl-Alt-Speech, host Ben Whitelaw speaks with George Vlasto, head of the Trust & Safety division at Resolver , as the organisation marks its 20th anniversary. Their conversation looks back at two decades of Resolver’s work supporting platforms and safeguarding online communities, and explores how that legacy has shaped its newest innovations. Ben and Geo...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Meta wins FTC antitrust trial over Instagram, WhatsApp deals (CNBC) Commission eyes further simplification of tech rules after DSA review (Euractiv) Inside Europe's 'Jekyll and Hyde' tech strategy (Digital Policy) NetChoice sues Virginia to block its one-...

In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by Kenji Yoshino, who has the excellent title of Chief Justice Earl Warren Professor of Constitutional Law at New York University School of Law and the Director of the Meltzer Center for Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging. Kenji is also a member of the Oversight Board. Together Ben...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: It’s Cool to Have No Followers Now (New Yorker) Introducing Safe for Work? — all about T&S jobs (Everything in Moderation*) Kids Turn Podcast Comments Into Secret Chat Rooms, Because Of Course They Do (Techdirt) Reddit and Kick added to child social media ban (ABC N...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Character. AI is banning minors from AI character chats (Financial Times) Strengthening ChatGPT’s responses in sensitive conversations (OpenAI) Senators propose banning teens from using AI chatbots (The Verge) EU accuses Meta, TikTok of breaching digital rules (Politico...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Wikipedia Volunteers Avert Tragedy by Taking Down Gunman at Conference (New York Times) AI-Generated Content a Triple Threat for Reddit Moderators (Cornell Tech) Wikipedia Says AI Is Causing a Dangerous Decline in Human Visitors (404 Media) As social media age restricti...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Sam Altman says OpenAI isn’t ‘moral police of the world’ after erotica ChatGPT post blows up (CNBC) Where are all the women on Sora 2? This could be a nightmare for OpenAI . (Business Insider) Musk’s AI Is Being Used to Make Hardcore Porn: ‘Grok Is Learning Genitalia Re...

In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by Thomas Hughes, CEO of Appeals Centre Europe and former Director at the Oversight Board. Together they discuss: Appeals Centre Europe Transparency Report (ACE) Most people want platforms (not governments) to be responsible for moderating content (Reuters Institute)  Happy Birthda...

In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike is joined by Dave Willner, founder of Zentropi, and long-time trust & safety expert who worked at Facebook, AirBnB, and OpenAI in Trust & Safety roles. Together they discuss: Masnick's Impossibility Theorem: Content Moderation At Scale Is Impossible To Do Well (Techdirt) UK mak...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: How platforms are responding to the Charlie Kirk shooting (The Verge) Bluesky Issues Warning to Any Users Celebrating Charlie Kirk Assassination (Newsweek) Right-Wing Activists Are Targeting People for Allegedly Celebrating Charlie Kirk’s Death (Wired) Charlie Kirk Was...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Nepal to block some social media including Facebook (Reuters) Why Nepal Banned 26 Social Media Platforms And What It Means (Medianama) A parliament in flames, a leader toppled. Nepal’s Gen-Z protesters ask: What comes next? (CNN) When Trolls Take On Tyrants: 4chan and K...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Jordan escalates global tech argument, with Farage's help (Politico)  Farage’s rules for free speech: talk about anything but your lunch (The Times) Is Jonathan Haidt right about smartphones? (TES) My mom and Dr. DeepSeek (Rest of World) AI 'deadbots' are...

This is the second of our special episodes for the month of August. Last time , we talked a bit about the past and future of Ctrl-Alt-Speech; this time, Mike and Ben answer some questions from our listeners, and also share a few of the latest reviews. We're taking one more week off after this, then we'll be back in the first week of September with a return to our regular weekly news roun...

We're taking a little break from our regular weekly news roundups this month, but we've got a couple special episodes lined up in the mean time, starting with a conversation all about the past and future of Ctrl-Alt-Speech. This week, Mike and Ben talk about how the podcast got started, how we create the episodes, our philosophy about sponsorship, and what we need to make Ctrl-Alt-Speech...

Our second annual live at TrustCon recording of Ctrl-Alt-Speech! Ben was unable to make the trip halfway around the world, but Mike was joined by trust & safety influencer Alice Hunsberger from Musubi and Ashken Kazaryan, a Senior Legal Fellow at the Future of Free Speech at Vanderbilt University. They cover: As millions adopt Grok to fact-check, misinformation abounds (Al Jazeera) Analysis Of...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: a16z-Backed AI Site Civitai Is Mostly Porn, Despite Claiming Otherwise (404 Media) Hugging Face Is Hosting 5,000 Nonconsensual AI Models of Real People (404 Media) Ofcom head says age checks are ‘really big moment’ for children’s online safety (The Guardian) New online...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Jack Cable calls out Cluely over bogus DMCA (X) The cofounder of the viral AI 'cheating' startup Cluely says he only hires people for 2 jobs (Business Insider) Missouri AG: Any AI That Doesn’t Praise Donald Trump Might Be “Consumer Fraud” (No, Really) (Techdir...

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: The Misleading Panic over Misinformation (Cato Institute)  Claims that Online Misinformation Fears Are Overblown ‘Radically Understates’ the Scale of the Threat (Byline Times) EU Disinformation Code Takes Effect Amid Censorship Claims and Trade Tensions (Tech Policy Pre...

In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by guest host Bridget Todd, a technology and culture writer, speaker and trainer and host of two great podcasts, There are No Girls on the Internet and IRL: Online Life is Real Life . Together, they cover: AI Models And Parents Don’t Understand ‘Let Him Cook’ (404 Media) Trial reve...

In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by guest host Mercy Mutemi, lawyer and managing partner of Nzili & Sumbi Advocates. Together, they cover: Meta can be sued in Kenya for human trafficking and for algorithmic amplification of harm (Open Democracy) Billy Perrigo on investigating Facebook's 'ethical&apos...