Happy New Year.

Welcome back to the Tech Policy Podcast with me, your humble host, Corbyn Barthold.

We've got the perfect episode to close out 2025 and look ahead to 26.

Scott Babwa-Brennan is the director of NYU Center on Technology Policy.

Scott and his team have just released their 2025 State technology policy report, a thorough and thoughtful

survey and analysis of the tech legislation coming out of state houses across the country.

If you want to understand how states are shaping the regulatory landscape on AI, child online safety, data privacy,

and more, this report is essential reading. It's in the show notes, and I urge you to take a look.

But before you do, please do let Scott tell you all about it here. Dr. Brennan,

welcome to the show. Thanks, Corbyn. Amazing report, very detailed. Gave me a sense of inadequacy

in terms of just trying to keep track of everything that's going on.

So I'm glad you're on top of it.

Let's start with one of your headline findings, which is that states are passing a ton of tech legislation,

but that a lot of it is narrow, narrower than some of the comprehensive

legislation we've seen in past years. And let me tell you what I want that to mean.

I want that to mean that legislators are graduating beyond the internet is a series of tubes

and climbing a learning curve and getting more realistic about what they can do and more pragmatic

about what they can do and more knowledgeable about what they are doing.

At the same time, I read this stuff and so know that maybe I'm being a little optimistic,

but what is your feel of my take and my hope? Yeah, what a good question. And I hate to say this, but I don't think it's that bad to consider the internet as a series of tubes. I mean, it is a series of tubes. All right. All right. Yeah, I mean, everyone laughs at that guy, but, but, but yeah, I mean, it's funny. I, I definitely share your hope that that's what it means. And I think that's a reasonable read of the situation.

So to back up, you're absolutely right.

States continue to pass a whole bunch of pieces of new tech-related legislation.

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