Articles and Columns for January 2024

• The 2024 ‘Burning Issues’ Confronting Firm Leaders – At the end of December 2023, Patrick J, Mckeena and Michael B. Rynowecer presented 200 Firm Leaders with a selection of over 40 timely and potential ‘Burning Issues’ – and asked of them “what do you anticipate as the highest priorities occupying your leadership agenda going into the new year?” The team received responses representing firms from 200 to over 2000 lawyers in size. This paper distinguishes the challenging issues for firms in 2024.
• AI in Banking and Finance, January 31, 2024 – This semi-monthly column by Sabrina I. Pacifici highlights news, government documents, NGO/IGO papers, industry white papers, academic papers and speeches 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: The Bloomberg Terminal Now Has AI-Generated Summaries of Earnings Calls; Call for papers on Artificial Intelligence in Finance: Next level of artificial intelligence is difficult for banks; Sustainable Banking: Charting The Future With AI And Data Analytics; More impactful than the internet’: How AI will reshape banking jobs; and The fight against greenwashing starts with AI. Here’s why.
• Book Review: Transformative Negotiation Strategies for Everyday Change and Equitable Futures – Jerry Lawson writes – So you think you know how to negotiate? You’ve done some deals, maybe a lot, maybe some for big bucks. Maybe attended some classes. Maybe read some books. Surely you can’t have all that much left to learn, right? You may see things differently after reading this book. It’s like no other negotiation book I’ve encountered. It’s different because it has an unusual author and an unusual genesis.
• Each Facebook User is Monitored by Thousands of Companies – By now most internet users know their online activity is constantly tracked. No one should be shocked to see ads for items they previously searched for, or to be asked if their data can be shared with an unknown number of “partners.” But what is the scale of this surveillance? Judging from data collected by Facebook and newly described in a unique study by non-profit consumer watchdog Consumer Reports and the Markup, Jon Keegan writes that it’s massive, and examining the data may leave you with more questions than answers.
• How To Handle the Growing Flood of Leaked Data – This article is an interview by Jon Keegan with Micah Lee, author of a new book on analyzing datasets that were leaked, hacked, or just accidentally left in the open.
• AI in Banking and Finance, January 15, 2024 – This semi-monthly column by Sabrina I. Pacifici highlights news, government reports, NGO/IGO papers, industry white papers, academic papers and speeches 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. Each entry includes the publication name, date published, article title and abstract. Four highlights from this post: The Macroeconomics of Artificial Intelligence; AI Tool Helps Fix Faulty Trades Amid Shift to Faster Settlement Times; Scenario Planning for an A(G)I Future; and Are ChatGPT and GPT-4 General-Purpose Solvers for Financial Text Analytics? A Study on Several Typical Tasks.
• Introducing AI Prompt Worksheets for the Legal Profession – Jennifer (Greig) Wondracek identified that her AI results are much better when she stops and thinks them through, providing a high level of detail and a good explanation of what she want the AI system to produce. So, good law librarian that she is, she created a new form of plan for those who are learning to draft a prompt. And the result is the AI prompt worksheets she shares in this article.
• What is Normal? – Kevin Novak offers an overview and context about key challenges to manage in 2024 including the “seduction of shiny new things,” hybrid work, data risk, and the 24/7 information barrage.
• Buried under the rubble: Haunted reflections at the turn of the year – The buried children have been haunting Catherine Morris. She states it’s difficult to celebrate the turning of the year while thousands of children remain lost in the rubble of humanitarian catastrophes caused by disasters, political turmoil, and armed conflicts around the world. In 2023, apocalyptic stories of children and families lost through earthquakes, landslides, wildfires, atrocities, and war crimes filled the news. The Middle East and Ukraine dominated headlines while Afghanistan, Myanmar, and other places were pushed from attention. An insistent question began to intrude. “What if it was your kids under the rubble?” In late November 2023 this question suddenly came close to my family.
• Jan. 6 was an example of networked incitement – The shocking events of Jan. 6, 2021, signaled a major break from the nonviolent rallies that categorized most major protests over the past few decades. What set Jan. 6 apart was the president of the United States using his cellphone to direct an attack on the Capitol, and those who stormed the Capitol being wired and ready for insurrection. Joan Donovan and her co-authors, a media and disinformation scholar, call this networked incitement: influential figures inciting large-scale political violence via social media. Networked incitement involves insurgents communicating across multiple platforms to command and coordinate mobilized social movements in the moment of action.
• January 1, 2024 Was Public Domain Day – Duke Law School Center for the Study of the Public Domain, Director Jennifer Jenkins heralds that on January 1, 2024 thousands of copyrighted works from 1928 entered the US public domain, along with sound recordings from 1923. They will be free for all to copy, share, and build upon. This year’s highlights include Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D. H. Lawrence and The Threepenny Opera by Bertolt Brecht, Buster Keaton’s The Cameraman and Cole Porter’s Let’s Do It, and a trove of sound recordings from 1923. And, of course, 2024 marks the long-awaited arrival of Steamboat Willie – featuring Mickey and Minnie Mouse – into the public domain. That story is so fascinating, so rich in irony, so rife with misinformation about what you will be able to do with Mickey and Minnie now that they are in the public domain that it deserved its own article, “Mickey, Disney, and the Public Domain: a 95-year Love Triangle.” Why is it a love triangle? What rights does Disney still have? How is trademark law involved? Here is just a handful of the works that will be in the US public domain in 2024.  They were first set to go into the public domain after a 56-year term in 1984, but a term extension pushed that date to 2004. They were then supposed to go into the public domain in 2004, after being copyrighted for 75 years. But before this could happen, Congress hit another 20-year pause button and extended their copyright term to 95 years. Now the wait is over.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, January 27, 2024 – Four highlights from this week: Sen. Wyden Releases Documents Confirming the NSA Buys Americans’ Internet Browsing Records; Inside a Global Phone Spy Tool Monitoring Billions; AT&T is trying to kill all landlines in California, which would have devastating effects; and the Continued Threat to Personal Data: Key Factors Behind the 2023 Increase.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, January 20, 2024 – Four highlights from this week: Privacy First: A Better Way to Address Online Harms; A Bold New Plan for Preserving Online Privacy and Security; Automakers’ data privacy practices “are unacceptable”; and Gmail is now much better at detecting spam following major upgrade.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, January 13, 2024 – Four highlights from this week: Swatting: The new normal in ransomware extortion tactics; EFF Unveils Its New Street Level Surveillance Hub; IRS has ‘unconscionable delays’ in helping identity theft victims, taxpayer advocate says; and Outlook is Microsoft’s new data collection service.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, January 6, 2024 – Four highlights from this week: Delete your digital history from dozens of companies with this app; How hackers can ‘poison’ AI; Meet ‘Link History,’ Facebook’s New Way to Track the Websites You Visit; and Google Groups is ending support for Usenet to combat spam.

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