James Grimmelmann

@jtlg.bsky.social

5925 Followers 131 Following

I’m a professor at Cornell Tech and Cornell Law School. One of "a number of very informative people." -WSJ

The cover of Internet Law: Cases and Problems (16th ed.) by James Grimmelmann. The cover is orange and features a photograph of hundreds of screens glowing in the dark at the Assembly demoscene LAN party.
Here I am sobered by the current state of AI in the discourse. Every day, I see smart, tech-savvy people on Twitter voice opinions which a moment’s consultation with an AI - sometimes an AI that they themselves are building or investing in - would reveal to be definitely false and stupid. We all have geniuses in our pocket willing to advise us on everything, and instead we’d rather repeat inane conspiracies without consulting them. I’m pessimistic that the rise of AI superforecasters will change this too much.
Here is one way of comparing the two: At any given time, CSLI placed Carpenter within a “sector ranging from one-eighth to four square miles,” whereas Location History pinpointed Chatrie’s location within around twenty meters, which is less than two percent of a mile.
The Supreme Court's Orders List for June 29, 2026, with some text judiciously (but not judicially) whited out so that it reads CERTORARI GRANTED in the case of LEONARD V. PEPSICO, INC.
Bernie sanders meme: "I am once again asking you to update your SSRN preprints with the final PDF and bluebook citation once they are published"
After all, users browsing an app store can see a catalog of applications, obtain additional information, and download or purchase an application. App listings propose commercial transactions, regardless of whether any monetary payment is made. In fact, the “payment” for apps that are purportedly “free” is access to user data and private information.
Picard facepalm
Sidewalk chalk pride flag
Senior Judge Beryl Howell (D.D.C.)
xkcd “Dependency” comic where the one tiny weak link is “Microsoft”
License plate reading BYE BUM
Scola, for his part, says he’s not mad about currently being banned from MSG. He’s originally from the Philadelphia area, and so wasn’t planning on seeing the New York Knicks play in the Garden during the NBA’s Eastern Conference Finals. “It's a little bit petty,” Scola says of the ban. “But I'm here to represent my client, and if representing my client means I can't go to Madison Square Garden until they pay us money or we win in trial—well then, so be it.”
It turns out that the United States and Israel went into the conflict with a particular and very surprising someone in mind: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the former Iranian president known for his hard-line, anti-Israel and anti-American views. But the audacious plan, developed by the Israelis and which Mr. Ahmadinejad had been consulted about, quickly went awry, according to the U.S. officials who were briefed on it. Mr. Ahmadinejad was injured on the war’s first day by an Israeli strike at his home in Tehran that had been designed to free him from house arrest, the American officials and an associate of Mr. Ahmadinejad said. He survived the strike, they said, but after the near miss he became disillusioned with the regime change plan. He has not been seen publicly since then and his current whereabouts and condition are unknown.
Bell curve meme Left: "Mmmm, Internet" Center: "Someone is wrong on the Internet" Right: "Everyone is wrong on the Internet"
Poster for the Netflix series Russian Doll.
Military intelligence agencies have also reported, based on information from multiple collection streams including satellite imagery and other surveillance technologies, that Iran has regained access to roughly 90 percent of its underground missile storage and launch facilities nationwide, which are now assessed to be “partially or fully operational,” the people with knowledge of the assessments said. The findings undercut months of public assurances from President Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who have told Americans that the Iranian military was “decimated” and “no longer” a threat.
This too is a book that makes an argument. I believe that Easterbrook was wrong, that Internet law is a distinct and coherent subject, and that the same few basic fact patterns crop up again and again in increasingly outlandish disguises. The book takes these premises as given.
1.26 PROPOSITION Radicals are radical
Section 1.4 Radical ideals
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
NYT headline: "U.S. and Iran Both Claim Control Over Strait of Hormuz"
The album cover for Radiohead's _OK Computer_
Their response to this was, “No, we are not going to stop.” They continued to follow me to my car and then surrounded the car, banging on the windows, blocking the car, and shouting. I waited until I saw space behind the car and then, using my car’s rear pedestrian alert and automatic braking system, was able to slowly maneuver my car from the parking space and exit the parking lot.
Nuclear waste warning sign (“This place is a message …”) but it’s designed like a cutesy “in this house we believe” sign.
An AI-generated woodcut, roughly in the style of Albrecht Durer, of a Fuggler in medieval clothing, seated at a table with piles of coins, a book, and a quill pen.
Poster for Gravity Falls, featuring Stan, Mabel, and Dipper, with a few easter eggs / clues scattered about.
Commonly, if not invariably, the honorific marks of hand labour are certain imperfections and irregularities in the lines of the hand-wrought article, showing where the workman has fallen short in the execution of the design. The ground of the superiority of hand-wrought goods, therefore, is a certain margin of crudeness. This margin must never be so wide as to show bungling workmanship, since that would be evidence of low cost, nor so narrow as to suggest the ideal precision attained only by the machine, for that would be evidence of low cost. Thorstein Veblen Theory of the Leisure Class
No, I'm not saying who this is.
The cover of Richard Kaeuper's _Chivalry and Violence in Medieval Europe_.
U.S Turns Up Pressure on Iraq to Distance Itself From Iran
White text on a red background in the typeface from posters for Everything Everywhere All At Once, but it reads "Everything Everywhere Already in Dedekind"
The cover of Garrett Graff's Watergate: A New History, featuing a black-and-white photograph of a tape recorder.
The cover of the catalog for "Circa 1492: Art in the Age of Exploration"
Coming-soon poster for Everything Everywhere All at Once
NEW Slime Borax Free
Escape room with a video screen reading "Game of Stones" in a typeface that is similar to the Game of Thrones logo.
The cover of Son of the Morning Star by Evan S. Connell, featuring a black-and-white portrait of George Armstrong Custer.
Donald Trump blather.
Album art for _Rambler_ by the Red Clay Ramblers.
This end should point toward the ground if you want to go to space. If it starts pointing toward space you are having a bad problem and you will not go to space today.
Exterior shot from the final scene of Ocean's Eleven (2001): the fountain at the Bellagio, with the cast silhouetted against it.