On behalf of the Search Engines and Society Network (SEASON), we invite submissions for the 2026 edition of the Search Engines and Society Annual Conference (SEASON 2026), to be held at HAW Hamburg, Germany, from 15–17 September 2026. Following the success of SEASON 2025, which brought together an engaged and diverse international community of researchers, […]
Social media platforms are increasingly shaped by the integration of generative AI alongside long-standing analytical and predictive models. Today’s algorithmic systems are moving from the background infrastructure to the forefront of digital social life – where autonomous AI agents operate in coexistence with (or independently of) human users. They intervene in the content feeds as […]
We are pleased to announce a Call for Papers for a forthcoming special issue titled “AI, Algorithmic Media, and Digital Governance: Power, Control, and Technological Transformation,” to be published in the journal Global Media and China. The accelerating integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into digital infrastructures represents a profound transformation in contemporary media environments and governance […]
What if viral cultural moments were not just entertainment, but strategic entry points for influence? High-visibility events, from major entertainment events to viral online controversies, are increasingly used within the information environment as opportunities for influence and narrative shaping. This webinar explores how Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI) actors exploit these moments to inject […]
In 2025, the first PAIRSx Africa webinar was held alongside the Global AI Summit on Africa in Rwanda. The session brought together policy experts, practitioners, developers, and academics to advance the practice of participatory AI across Africa. It served as a critical point for defining Africa’s participatory needs and establishing a community capable of formulating […]
Join the Tech Impact and Policy Center on May 12th from 12PM–1PM Pacific for a seminarwith Jennifer Heifferon & Alanna Powers-O’Brien. About the Seminar: As adolescence becomes increasingly digital, public discourse tends to focus on screen time, platform design, and online harms. Yet alongside these concerns, a parallel transformation has unfolded: the steady erosion of physical spaces meant […]
The increasing availability of digital behavioral data and computational tools has transformed how communication researchers study media use, exposure, and effects. These developments offer unprecedented analytical depth – but also introduce new complexities in measurement, theory-building, and ethical practice. This year’s conference of the Methods Division invites contributions that advance and critically engage with computational […]
In late September, 2024, Hurricane Helene made landfall in the continental United States, churning its way up the Atlantic seaboard. The storm devastated North Carolina with massive rainfall and flooding of towns such as Asheville. All told, the damage from Helene totaled over 50 billion dollars and the loss of entire communities. But Hurricane Helene […]
The AI Index, currently in its ninth year, tracks, collates, distills, and visualizes data relating to artificial intelligence. What is changing in the field of AI? Join Stanford HAI’s AI Index Lead Sha Sajadieh for an exclusive look into this trusted source of AI intelligence. Learn about the year’s major AI breakthroughs, changes in the […]
João C. Magalhães (University of Manchester, UK), Klara Matusewicz (University of Manchester, UK), and Robert Gorwa (WZB Berlin Social Science Center, Germany) are organising a two-day workshop, The Politics of GenAI Governance, at MANCEPT 2026 in Manchester, 2–4 September 2026. The workshop treats GenAI governance as a collective and contested political practice — asking which […]
Democracies today face profound challenges, including the proliferation of fake news and online disinformation, the rise of digital authoritarianism and digital fascism, the big tech monopolies of online platforms such as Google, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Amazon, WhatsApp, ChatGPT, etc., post-truth and algorithmic politics, the danger of a new world war, political polarisation, the breakdown […]
AI companion bots are reshaping how people connect, confide, and cope, with children and adolescents among their most active users. Even as evidence of their potential social and developmental harms grows, these products face limited regulatory oversight. On May 26, the Center for Universal Education at Brookings will host a conversation on whether AI companion […]
Generative AI is changing how misinformation is produced, circulated, and perceived. What does the evidence tell us specifically about this cycle, opportunities to mitigate it, and what we don’t know yet? The IPIE is pleased to invite you to our upcoming webinar, presenting findings from our major new meta-analysis drawing on studies that involved more than 33,000 participants. […]
The GLOBAL SUMMIT ON DISINFORMATION is a space for global interaction where journalists, researchers, academics, fact-checkers, media and government representatives, civil society organizations, professors, and students meet annually to discuss, and present actions, proposals, and success stories on the challenges of fighting disinformation at the global level. Learn more and register to attend here. Note: […]
Article 38 of the EU Digital Services Act could be described as a masterpiece of legal drafting – 57 words to say very large online platforms must provide a version of their service not based on profiling. Meta provided a sludgy, unusable option. In the absence of action from the European Commission, Dutch NGO Bits […]
In the late nineteenth century, the U.S. government and American corporations generated an unprecedented amount of paper records. The data complex emerged as a national network of repositories built to house all those documents. Over the next several decades, the data complex expanded from traditional archives and libraries to bombproof bunkers and securitized data banks. […]
The DSA establishes a hybrid enforcement framework. The European Commission holds exclusive competence to supervise and enforce DSA obligations on Very Large Online Platforms (VLOPs) and Very Large Online Search Engines (VLOSEs). National authorities — Digital Services Coordinators (DSCs) — handle all other intermediaries established in their territory. This centralized exclusive competence creates a real […]