• The Trump Administration’s Continued War Against Science, Research, Public Health, and the Rule of Law – Part 6 – As we approach January 20, 2026, the one year mark of the second Trump administration, Americans are witnessing the exercise of vast, often illegal and unconstrained presidential powers, unprecedented in our history. The impact of these powers, within our government, the private sector, and around the globe, continue to resonate. Part 6 of this series gives special attention to how operationalizing the full scope of actions outlined in the “Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise” has impacted the lives of ordinary Americans, regardless of where they live, with which party they may be affiliated, their age, ethnicity or gender. Consistent with the previous five parts of Sabrina I. Pacifici’s series, this article examines only one month, December 2025, of the Trump administration’s war on every aspect of our democracy.
• Make 2026 Your Best Year Yet: The Best Tips for Lawyers on AI, Marketing, IT Security and Productivity – Jerry Lawson advocates consulting more than one AI app when dealing with important issues. Multiple AI perspectives help with high-stakes questions, unsettled law, or anything involving tax regulations. When two models agree, you gain confidence. When they disagree, you gain a warning sign. Lawson also addresses cybersecurity issues, technology risks, legal marketing, and choosing the best hardware and software for your work configuration.
• Like Lawyers In Pompeii: Is Legal Ignoring The Coming AI Infrastructure Crisis? (Part I) – Stephen Embry and Melissa Rogo Rogozinski identify the multiple risk factors involved in the increasing usage of AI in the legal sector, including infrastructure gaps between chip capacity, demand for energy sources and building new data centers, as well as vendor dependencies, promises and deliverables.
• Like Lawyers In Pompeii: Is Legal Ignoring The Coming AI Cost Crisis? (Part II) – Stephen Embry and Melissa Rogo Rogozinski challenge the assumption fueling the explosion of AI use in legal is that it will save gobs of time. These savings will inure to the benefit of lawyers and clients, will lead to fairer methods of billing like alternative fee structures, will get better results, improve access to justice, and lead to ‘world peace’. Well, maybe even the vendors would not go so far as to guarantee the last one. But vendors do seem to be guaranteeing everything but that. And pundits talk as if AI will transform legal from the ground up. Law firms are buying into the hype, investing in expensive systems that do things they barely understand. See also Part I of their article here.
• How to Spot AI Hallucinations Like a Reference Librarian – AI has flooded the zone, overwhelming one on one human knowledge sharing. In this article Hana Lee Goldin returns the focus to the art of the reference interview. When someone has a research or information based request, librarians are trained to figure out what they actually seek and require. The first question asked most often does not encompass the scope of the information sought. Good reference librarians ask follow-up questions. This skill translates directly to AI. The better you understand what you’re actually looking for before you prompt, the better your results.
• The Librarian as a Trusted (Human) Assistant – Jennifer Chapman concisely conveys the importance of identifying for patrons that AI’s confidence doesn’t equal competence. Chapman states that as law librarians we are naturally skeptical of certainty. The law teaches us to question everything, and library school teaches us how to verify everything. We, not generative AI, are the trusted human assistants that need to help our patrons effectively use technology tools.
• NotebookLM for Lawyers: AI That Focuses on Your Documents – This comprehensive article by Bonnie Shucha explores and demonstrates the capabilities of Google’s NotebookLM, a free document-grounded AI tool designed to work exclusively with the materials you upload, and discusses what it means for an AI to be document grounded, why that matters for legal work, and how to use it effectively while keeping privacy and confidentiality in mind.
• January 1, 2026 is Public Domain Day: Works from 1930 are open to all, as are sound recordings from 1925! – This annual Domain Day review is by Jennifer Jenkins and James Boyle from the Center for the Study of the Public Domain. On January 1, 2026, thousands of copyrighted works from 1930 enter the US public domain, along with sound recordings from 1925. They will be free for all to copy, share, and build upon. The literary highlights range from William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying to Agatha Christie’s The Murder at the Vicarage and the first four Nancy Drew novels. From cartoons and comic strips, the characters Betty Boop, Pluto (originally named Rover), and Blondie and Dagwood made their first appearances. Films from the year featured Marlene Dietrich, Greta Garbo, the Marx Brothers, and John Wayne in his first leading role. Among the public domain compositions are I Got Rhythm, Georgia on My Mind, and Dream a Little Dream of Me. We are also celebrating paintings from Piet Mondrian and Paul Klee. In this article you will read lists of some of the most notable books, characters, comics, and cartoons, films, songs, sound recordings, and art entering the public domain. After each of them, the authors have provided an analysis of their significance.
• AI in Finance and Banking, December 31, 2025 – This semi-monthly column by Sabrina I. Pacifici highlights news, government documents, NGO/IGO papers, conferences, industry white papers and reports, academic papers and speeches, and central bank actions on the subject of AI’s fast paced impact on the banking and finance sectors. The chronological links provided are to the primary sources, and as available, indicate links to alternate free versions. Six highlights from this post: How the AI ‘bubble’ compares to history; Artificial intelligence and growth in advanced and emerging economies: short-run impact; Generative economic modeling; The Emerging Market for Intelligence: Pricing, Supply, and Demand for LLMs; Macroeconomic productivity gains from Artificial Intelligence in G7 economies; and AI boom adds $500bn to net worth of US tech billionaires in 2025.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, December 28, 2025 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Five highlights from this week: Google will finally allow you to change your @gmail.com address; Those Epstein Redactions Weren’t So Redacted; How Russia could attack Elon Musk’s Starlink satellites; Microsoft Teams to let admins block external users via Defender portal; and NIST warns of Network Time Protocol inaccuracy after blackouts across Colorado.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, December 20, 2025 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Four highlights from this week: Online Shoppers Beware — Study Finds Fake Delivery Sites Exploding Ahead of Holiday Rush; FBI Couldn’t Read Data Pointing to Pipe Bomb Suspect; Medicare.gov to deploy ID.me for beneficiary verification; and How to spot videos created by artificial intelligence.
• AI in Finance and Banking, December 15, 2025 – This semi-monthly column by Sabrina I. Pacifici highlights news, government documents, NGO/IGO papers, conferences, industry white papers and reports, academic papers and speeches, and central bank actions on the subject of AI’s fast paced impact on the banking and finance sectors. The chronological links provided are to the primary sources, and as available, indicate links to alternate free versions. Five highlights from this post: FCA sets out plans to help build mortgage market of the future; GDP Nowcasting Performance of Traditional Econometric Models vs Machine-Learning Algorithms: Simulation and Case Studies; UK banks turn to AI for fraud prevention and to improve services. Tools help detect organised crime, automate lending checks and deliver personalised financial offerings; Firms harness AI tools in search for competitive edge.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, December 13, 2025 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Five highlights from this week: Your Boss Has More Ways Than Ever to Monitor What You’re Doing at Work; How to break free from smart TV ads and tracking; Every Legal Team Needs to See This LLM Leak; U.S. Plans to Scrutinize Foreign Tourists’ Social Media History; and A New Anonymous Phone Carrier Lets You Sign Up With Nothing but a Zip Code.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, December 7, 2025 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, finance, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Six highlights from this week: Admins and defenders gird themselves against maximum-severity server vulnerability; WhatsApp closes loophole that let researchers collect data on 3.5B accounts; Real or AI? The 7 Telltale Signs Every Fake Image Still Can’t Hide; Does a VPN really slow down your internet? I measured it; Google Starts Sharing All Your Text Messages With Your Employer; and Yep, Cloudflare died again. Here’s what happened.

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