Digital Commons Network^™

Distinguishing Privacy Law: A Critique Of Privacy As Social Taxonomy, María P. Angel, Ryan Calo

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What distinguishes privacy violations from other harms? This has proven a surprisingly difficult question to answer. For over a century, privacy law scholars labored to define the elusive concept of privacy. Then they gave up. Efforts to distinguish privacy were superseded at the turn of the millennium by a new approach: a taxonomy of privacy problems grounded in social recognition. Privacy law became the field that simply studies whatever courts or scholars talk about as related to privacy.

Decades into privacy as social taxonomy, the field has expanded to encompass a broad range of information-based harms—from consumer manipulation to algorithmic …

The Self-Fitting Of Contact Lenses, Claire E. Mcdonnell

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In this article Claire Mc Donnell discusses the phenomenon of first time contact lens wearers fitting themselves with contact lenses without any input from an eyecare professional.

Feedback Loops: Going Negative, Patrick Barry

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Aelet Fishbach is a professor at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business who has studied how people seek out and process negative feedback. One of the ways she has done this is through a classroom exercise in which she divides the students into two groups: feedback givers and feedback receivers. The givers are told to pair up with a receiver and communicate the following feedback in a one-on-one setting: The person's performance s unsatisfactory; improvement is needed; and there are concrete ways they can get on the right track.

Chevron And Stare Decisis, Kent Barnett, Christopher J. Walker

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This Term, in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo and Relentless, Inc. v. U.S. Department of Commerce, the Supreme Court will expressly consider whether to overrule Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc.—a bedrock precedent in administrative law that a reviewing court must defer to a federal agency’s reasonable interpretation of an ambiguous statute that the agency administers. In our contribution to this Chevron on Trial Symposium, we argue that the Court should decline this invitation because the pull of statutory stare decisis is too strong to overcome.

Calculating The Harms Of Political Use Of Popular Music, Jake Linford, Aaron Perzanowski

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When Donald Trump descended the escalator of Trump Tower to announce his 2016 presidential bid, Neil Young’s “Rockin’ in the Free World” blared from the loudspeakers. Almost immediately, Young’s management made clear that the campaign’s use of the song was unauthorized. Neil Young was not alone. Trump drew similar objections from dozens of artists during his first two presidential bids. But as a matter of copyright law, it is unclear whether artists can prevent their songs from being played at campaign rallies.

Taxing Fat Cats Abroad, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah

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On January 12 the IRS announced that it was able to collect $482 million from a new initiative focused on taxing millionaires: The IRS has ramped up efforts to pursue high-income, high-wealth individuals who have either not filed their taxes or failed to pay recognized tax debt, with dozens of revenue officers focused on these high-end collection cases. These efforts are concentrated among taxpayers with more than $1 million in income and more than $250,000 in recognized tax debt. In an initial success, the IRS collected $38 million from more than 175 high-income earners. The IRS last fall began contacting …

Modelling Hoe Performance With An Extended Source; Experimental Investigation Using Misaligned Point Sources, Jorge Lasarte, Kevin Murphy, Izabela Naydenova, Maria Victoria Collados, Jesús Atencia, Suzanne Martin

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Holographic optical elements (HOEs) have the potential to enable more compact, versatile, and lightweight optical designs, but many challenges remain. Volume HOEs have the advantage of high diffraction efficiency, but they present both chromatic selectivity and chromatic dispersion, which impact their use with wide spectrum light sources. Single-color light emitting diode (LED) sources have a narrow spectrum that reduces these issues and this makes them better suited for use with volume HOEs. However, the LED source size must be taken into consideration for compact volume HOE-LED systems. To investigate the design limits for compact HOE-LED systems, a theoretical and experimental …

Sex-Dependent Effects Of Chronic Circadian Disruption In Aβpp/Ps1 Mice., Jesse Britz, Emmanuel Ojo, Nazmul Haque, Asmita Dhukhwa, Erin R Hascup, Kevin N Hascup, Shelley A Tischkau

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BACKGROUND: Chronic disruption of the circadian timing system, often reflected as a loss of restful sleep, also includes myriad other pathophysiological effects.

OBJECTIVE: The current study examined how chronic circadian disruption (CD) could contribute to pathology and rate of progression in the AβPP/PS1 mouse model of Alzheimer's disease (AD).

METHODS: A chronic CD was imposed until animals reached 6 or 12 months of age in AβPP/PS1 and C57BL/6J control mice. Home cage activity was monitored for a period of 3-4 weeks prior to the endpoint along with a single timepoint measure of glucose sensitivity. To assess long term effects of …

The Case Against Expensing R&E, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah

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On January 16 Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and House Ways and Means Committee Chair Jason Smith, R-Mo., introduced a bipartisan tax package that would revive the child tax credit and modify three provisions in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Under the proposal, the 30 percent limit on interest deductions would be relaxed by including depreciation and amortization in calculating deductible interest, expensing of corporate investment would be extended, and expensing of research and experimentation would be restored in lieu of amortization.

Counterfeit Contact Lenses, Claire E. Mcdonnell

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This article covers how counterfeit cosmetic and corrective contact lenses potentially reach the end user and the dangers of counterfeit lenses.

Why Can't I Have A Robot Lawyer? Limits On The Right To Appear Pro Se, Jessica Gunder

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Some rights are more favored-and some rights are more disfavored than others. The right to self-representation is a disfavored right Despite its historic roots, the right has been subjected to judicially imposed limits that have reduced its scope. The limits on the right to self-representation include restrictions on the type of litigant that can avail themselves of the right, bars regarding the personal characteristics of litigants, barriers on the types of assistance a pro se litigant may receive, and procedural limitations on how a litigant may invoke the right. This Article is the first to study these established limitations on …

Integrating Interference Theory, Daiquiri J. Steele

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Robust retaliation protections are an essential component of any effective enforcement regime. Recognizing this, Congress has included a provision prohibiting retaliation in nearly every workplace statute passed in the past century. In statutes more than a century old, like the Civil Rights Act of 1866, where Congress neglected to include an explicit anti-retaliation provision in the statutory language, the Supreme Court has found an implied proscription against retributory behavior. Anti-retaliation protections are undoubtedly integral to effective enforcement. However, they have an equally important counterpart that is often overlooked in compliance discussions-interference protections.

Several workplace statutes contain interference provisions-statutory language that …

Sidewalk Government, Michael C. Pollack

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This Article is about one of the most used, least studied spaces in the country: the sidewalk.

It is easy to think of sidewalks simply as spaces for pedestrians, and that is exactly how most scholars, policymakers, and laws treat them. But this view is fundamentally mistaken. In big cities and small towns, sidewalks are also where we gather, demonstrate, dine, exercise, rest, and shop. They are host to commerce and infrastructure. They are spaces of public access and sources of private obligation. And in all of these things, sidewalks are sites of under-appreciated conflict. The centrality of sidewalks in …

What Do Consumers Understand About Predispute Arbitration Agreements? An Empirical Investigation, Roseanna Sommers

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The results of a survey of 1,071 adults in the United States reveal that most consumers do not pay attention to, let alone understand, arbitration clauses in their everyday lives. The vast majority of survey respondents (over 97%) report having opened an account with a company that requires disputes to be submitted to binding arbitration (e.g., Netflix, Hulu, Cash App, a phone or cable company), yet most are unaware that they have, in fact, agreed to mandatory arbitration (also known as “forced arbitration”). Indeed, over 99% of respondents who think they have never entered into an arbitration agreement likely have …

European Union/Oecd/International - Klaus Vogel Lecture 2023: The Past, Present And Future Of Destination-Based Income Taxation., Reuven S. Avi-Yonah

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A significant obstacle to the unilateral adoption of the OECD’s Pillar One are tax treaties since many countries cannot override tax treaties unilaterally. In his Klaus Vogel Lecture for 2023, Professor Reuven Avi-Yonah asks what are the chances for adopting a true multilateral convention for income taxation?

Modular Bankruptcy: Toward A Consumer Scheme Of Arrangement, John A.E. Pottow

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In the world of cross-border corporate insolvency, those in the know are familiar with the increasingly popular scheme of arrangement, the British quasi-reorganization procedure that allows a company to restructure some, but not all, of its debt. The typical scheme effects a corporate balance sheet reshuffling by supermajoritarian approval (and judicial "sanction") but often leaves other debt, such as the trade, untouched. A key conceptual component of the scheme mechanism is its intentional modularity, called by some its "selectivity." It does not require a comprehensive reckoning of all claims against a given debtor, only some. The scheme has proved popular-so …

Immigration - Lifeboat Earth - Is The Boat Full, Thomas Power

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The Lifeboat Earth metaphor requires western liberals to consider answers to those normative questions posed by Hardin. But the answer to them possibly depends on the economic effects of immigration and this can come from both economic theory and research.

Hygrothermal Risk Assessment Of External Wall Insulation Retrofit To Non-Traditional Wall Types In An Irish Context, Using The Glaser Method And A Heat, Air And Moisture Transient Model, Gareth Mcdonnell, Joseph Little

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The Climate Action Plan 2019 targets the low-energy retrofit of 500,000 existing Irish homes before 2030.1 Up to 80 per cent of building failures can be attributed to moisture risks.2 The literature indicated that external wall insulation (EWI, ETICS) failures are mostly due to moisture ingress at junctions and interfaces. A hygrothermal risk assessment of EWI on three walls with rendered concrete/concrete blockwork/cavity walls in Dublin, Belfast and Belmullet was undertaken using transient numerical simulation and the Glaser method. The guidance, common practice indicates a preference for Glaser. The initial simulation results were compared to assess the appropriateness of Glaser. …

Ai And 6g Into The Metaverse: Fundamentals, Challenges And Future Research Trends, Muhammad Zawish, Fayaz Ali Dharejo, Sunder Ali Khowaja, Saleem Raza, Steven Davy, Kapal Dev, Paolo Bellavista

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Since Facebook was renamed Meta, a lot of attention, debate, and exploration have intensified about what the Metaverse is, how it works, and the possible ways to exploit it. It is anticipated that Metaverse will be a continuum of rapidly emerging technologies, usecases, capabilities, and experiences that will make it up for the next evolution of the Internet. Several researchers have already surveyed the literature on artificial intelligence (AI) and wireless communications in realizing the Metaverse. However, due to the rapid emergence and continuous evolution of technologies, there is a need for a comprehensive and in-depth survey of the role …

Pillar 2 And The United States: What's Next, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah

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January 1 marked the official effective date of the 15 percent global corporate minimum tax imposed by pillar 2 as part of the G-20/OECD/ inclusive framework base erosion and profitshifting 2.0 project. Pillar 2 went into effect in Australia, Canada, the EU, Japan, Norway, South Korea, and the United Kingdom, with more countries expected to adopt it soon, including low-tax countries like Barbados, Ireland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. Critics have argued that pillar 2 violates tax treaties, customary international law, or bilateral investment treaties. But it seems unlikely that legal challenges against it will succeed. Most of the countries …

Lost & Found (Game Series) [Book Chapter], Owen Gottlieb

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Description of game series for use in the classroom with best practices.

Planning Report For The University Of Washington Center On Intimate Partner Violence Research, Policy And Practice, Mary A. Kernic, Avanti Adhia, Anna E. Bender, Natalie Dolci, Alice M. Ellyson, Mary Fan, V. Kalei Kanuha, Jennifer Piel, Dana Raigrodski, Ali Rowhani-Rahbar, Kiana Swearingen, Denise Walker, Carolyn West

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This report is respectfully submitted to fulfill the legislative mandate pursuant to Section 602 of Engrossed Second Substitute House Bill 1715 (2023) to generate a plan for the establishment of a University of Washington (UW) center on intimate partner violence (IPV) research, policy and practice. The goals of the center are to conduct IPV research, widely disseminate evidence-based and other high quality research to best inform policy and practice-based efforts in IPV prevention and harm reduction, and to ensure these efforts are informed and responsive to the needs of survivors and others impacted by IPV in Washington State.

Why Did The Irs Win? A Remarkable Year In Tax Litigation, Part 2, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah

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In my previous column, 2023 was a remarkably good year for government litigators in tax cases. That column focused on two transfer pricing cases (3M and Coca-Cola). This column will focus on two other government victories (YA Global and Liberty Global).

Kinetic Modelling Of The Cellular Metabolic Responses Underpinning In Vitro Glycolysis Assays, Nitin Patil, Zohreh Mirveis, Hugh Byrne

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This study aims to demonstrate the benefits of augmenting commercially available, real-time, in vitro glycolysis assays with phenomenological rate equation-based kinetic models, describing the contributions of the underpinning metabolic pathways. To this end, a commercially available glycolysis assay, sensitive to changes in extracellular acidification (extracellular pH), was used to derive the glycolysis pathway kinetics. The pathway was numerically modelled using a series of ordinary differential rate equations, to simulate the obtained experimental results. The sensitivity of the model to the key equation parameters was also explored. The cellular glycolysis pathway kinetics were determined for three different cell-lines, under nonmodulated and …

Navigating The Conundrum Of Mandatory Reporting Under The Pocso Act: Implications For Medical Professionals, Nanditta Batra

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To address the under reporting of sexual offences against children, the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, 2012, makes reporting of such offences mandatory. The duty to report such offences has been extended to healthcare professionals. The inclusion of healthcare professionals within mandatory reporting, however, strikes at the very foundation of the doctor-patient relationship based on trust and confidentiality and conflicts with the patient confidentiality safeguards of the Mental Healthcare Act, 2017. It also has unintended public health consequences, such as denial of medical termination of pregnancy due to fear of prosecution under POCSO. An urgent reassessment of …

Where An Issuer Fails To Make Disclosures Required By Item 303, Is That Omission Actionable As Securities Fraud?, Wendy G. Couture

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The Court will consider whether a securities fraud claim under the Securities Exchange Act can be premised on a company’s omission of mandatory Management Discussion and Analysis (MD&A) disclosures. MD&A disclosures, which are required by Item 303 of Regulation S-K, are intended to provide investors with a view of the company through the eyes of management, including a description of any known trends or uncertainties that are reasonably likely to have a material impact on the company’s continuing operations.

Biobased Construction From Agricultural Crops: Paper 1 - A State Of Play Of Commercial Solutions In Europe, Patrick Daly, Paula G. Barril

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In response to environmental concerns and the global warming issue in particular there is a growing drive to decarbonise the building sector and transition it to more circular practices.

Biobased construction materials, products and systems are an important low carbon and circular strategy as they can enable low to negative carbon construction and have strong circularity advantages notably being able to enter the bio cycle, using renewable, low to zero toxic resources and provide a range of other performance benefits, including moisture and vapour regulation.

This novel research presents a unique state of play on the commercial application of biobased …

Theorising Political Legitimisation: From Stasis To Processes, Paddy Dolan, Stephen Vertigans, John Connolly

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Legitimacy remains a key concept in political sociology, and perhaps even more so in lay understandings of political processes and structures, as evidenced by conflict over territories and regimes around the world. However, the concept suffers from a rather static representation, and even when addressed in processual form, in terms of specific moments in the process, such as conditions favouring legitimacy or its effects. Building from an Eliasian perspective, we argue for a more processual concept of legitimisation to encompass the dynamic social networks (figurations) that constitute the more unintentional context for deliberate legitimation claims. As networks expand and intensify, …

Inclusive Counterfactual Generation: Leveraging Llms In Identifying Online Hate, M. Atif Qureshi, Arjumand Younus, Simon Caton

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Counterfactually augmented data has recently been proposed as a successful solution for socially situated NLP tasks such as hate speech detection. The chief component within the existing counterfactual data augmentation pipeline, however, involves manually flipping labels and making minimal content edits to training data. In a hate speech context, these forms of editing have been shown to still retain offensive hate speech content. Inspired by the recent success of large language models (LLMs), especially the development of ChatGPT, which have demonstrated improved language comprehension abilities, we propose an inclusivity-oriented approach to automatically generate counterfactually augmented data using LLMs. We show …

Explainable Ai For 6g Use Cases: Technical Aspects And Research Challenges, Shen Wang, M. Atif Qureshi, Luis Miralles-Pechu{\'A}N, Thien Huynh-The, Thippa Reddy Gadekallu, Madhusanka Liyanage

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Around 2020, 5G began its commercialization journey, and discussions about the next-generation networks (such as 6G) emerged. Researchers predict that 6G networks will have higher bandwidth, coverage, reliability, energy efficiency, and lower latency, and will be an integrated “human-centric” network system powered by artificial intelligence (AI). This 6G network will lead to many real-time automated decisions, ranging from network resource allocation to collision avoidance for self-driving cars. However, there is a risk of losing control over decision-making due to the high-speed, data-intensive AI decision-making that may go beyond designers’ and users’ comprehension. To mitigate this risk, explainable AI (XAI) methods …