Robert J. Shapiro advised senior members of the Obama administration on economic policy, and served as an Under Secretary of Commerce under Bill Clinton. Now a senior fellow at the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown, he’s suspicious of the surge in GameStop’s stock price:
Allegedly, this is the tale of scrappy, small online day traders buying shares of a beleaguered company…
Tag: Obama
How the NSA’s Hubris Left America Vulnerable
A new book promises “the untold story of the cyberweapons market — the most secretive, invisible, government-backed market on earth — and a terrifying first look at a new kind of global warfare.” Its author — a New York Times cybersecurity reporter — shares the book’s story about David Evenden, a former National Security Agency analyst who later worked in Abu…
Biden Orders Sweeping Review of Government Science Integrity Policies
sciencehabit shares a report from Science Magazine: President Joe Biden today created a task force that will conduct a 120-day review of scientific integrity policies across the U.S. government, including documenting instances in which “improper political interference” interfered with research or led to the suppression or distortion of data. The review is part of a lengthy memorandum from Biden on his…
In Hidden Message on White House Website, Biden Calls For Coders
The recently updated website for President Joe Biden’s White House carried an invitation for tech specialists savvy enough to find it. From a report: Hidden in the HTML code on www.whitehouse.gov was an invitation to join the U.S. Digital Service, a technology unit within the White House. “If you’re reading this, we need your help building back better,” the message said….
Spotify’s Big Bet On Podcasts Is Failing, Citi Says
An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNBC: Spotify’s multimillion-dollar bet on podcasting may not be working out, Citi analysts wrote in a note to clients Friday. “The cadence of Premium gross additions (through 3Q20) and app download data (through 4Q20) do not show any material benefit from recent podcast investments (that began in 2019),” the analysts wrote. The firm downgraded…
US President-Elect Biden Starts New Twitter Account, Criticizes Policy on POTUS Account
“This will be the account for my official duties as President,” tweeted U.S. president-elect Joe Biden on Thursday — but from a new account at @PresElectBiden (which will transition to @POTUS after Wednesday’s inauguration). But Bloomberg reports Biden is still “clashing with the social media company over its decision to deny the incoming administration millions of existing White House followers.” Biden’s…
How will the U.S. space program fare under Joe Biden?
Joe Biden is the United States presidential election winner, but his plans for NASA remain unclear. And while citizens digest the election results, the space industry is left wondering what comes next. Source: https://earthsky.org/human-world/how-will-the-u-s-space-program-fare-under-joe-biden…
Open-Source Developer and Manager David Recordon Named White House Director of Technology
An anonymous reader quotes a report from ZDNet: President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team announced that David Recordon, one of OpenId and oAuth’s developers, has been named the White House Director of Technology. Recordon most recently was the VP of infrastructure and security at the non-profit Chan Zuckerberg Initiative Foundation. Before that, Recordon was Facebook’s engineer director. There, he had led Facebook’s…
Is the US Government’s Cybersecurity Agency Up to the Job?
CNN reports that some critics are now questioning whether America’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) is equipped to protect the integrity of government systems from adversaries: Some of the nearly half-dozen government agencies affected by the hack have recently reached out to CISA for help with addressing the known vulnerabilities that were exploited in the attack but were told the…
Global Digital-Tax Detente Ends, as US and France Exchange Blows
Detente is ending in the global fight over tech taxes. Earlier this year, France agreed to suspend collection of a tax on digital revenue from large technology companies such as Facebook, Amazon and Alphabet’s Google. Meanwhile, the U.S. delayed the application of tariffs it was putting on French goods in retaliation for the tax. But now France has resumed collecting what…