Texas voter ID law reinstated in victory for Republican-backed measures

US Justice Department has criticised Texas law as being the states latest tool to suppress minority voters in elections

A federal appeals court on Tuesday reinstated Texas tough voter ID law for the November election, which the US Justice Department had condemned as the states latest means of suppressing minority voter turnout.

The ruling by the New Orleans-base fifth circuit court of appeals temporarily blocks last weeks ruling by US district judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos in Corpus Christi, who determined the law unconstitutional and similar to a poll tax designed to dissuade minorities from voting.

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Artificial Intelligence, Al Gore, Modern Blogging and More: Where to Find ATD at SXSW

Time again for app-flicking, party-hopping, BBQ-eating and, somewhere in between all that, panel-picking.

The interactive portion of the SXSW festival — known as "South By" to hip conference goers — kicks off Friday in Austin, Texas.

And speaking of panels, members of AllThingsD will be moderating a few key ones throughout the fest that you won't want to miss. (We promise not to call you out if we see you hungover and sleeping in the back row. Just come.)

First off, nobody knows more about blogging than the boss, Kara Swisher, who has literally made liveblogging Yahoo's earnings calls an award-winning venture. So on Saturday, March 9, at 12:30 pm local time, she'll be interviewing Mr. WordPress, Matt Mullenweg, about the current state of blogging. More details here.

Later that afternoon, AllThingsD’s other boss, Walt Mossberg, will interview former vice president and New York Times bestselling author Al Gore about his new book, “The Future: Six Drivers of Global Change” — described as “a frank and clear-eyed assessment of the emerging forces that are reshaping our world.” That panel takes place at 3:30 pm local time.

Early risers, reporters who snoop and sources who snitch should add Peter Kafka's panel to the calendar: At 9:30 am Saturday, he’ll be joined by panelists Ed Lee of Bloomberg News, Greg Galant of MuckRack and Joe Ciarallo of Salesforce.com (formerly of Buddy Media) to discuss the shifting dynamics between reporter and source in the age of social media. Here are the details on Peter’s panel.

And on Monday, March 11, I'll be moderating a panel on artificial intelligence — think robots, "smart" calendars and natural-language search apps — with Dror Oren, executive director at SRI International; Raj Singh, founder of Tempo AI; and Nadav Gur, co-founder and CEO of Desti. That panel takes place at 3:30 pm.

And, of course, if you see us elsewhere — at the Mailbox/Dropbox/Highlight cocktail hour Sunday, at the Path/Spotify/A-Grade party that same night, at the Funny or Die + Team Coco’s Comedy Climax Party on Monday, or just hanging around the GroupMe Grill — come say hello.

(Feature art courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons.)