Francesco Bailo
@francescobailo.bsky.social
I am a Lecturer in Data Analytics in the Social Sciences at the University of Sydney where I am also deputy director of Centre for AI, Trust and Governance. francescobailo.net
Communication & Media Studies
48%
Political science
10%
Pinned
Affording Fragmented Audiences: Multi-Platform Deliberation within the Five Star Movement
We examine how multi-platform digital environments influence intra-party dynamics within political organizations, focusing on the Italian Five Star Movement (M5S) as a paradigmatic case of extreme ...
doi.org
We have a 🚨 new open access paper 🚨 with @polcommjournal.bsky.social We show how platforms can simultaneously concentrate and fragment political power. We analysed Italy's Five Star Movement across 5 platforms to understand multi-platform dynamics in political organisations. doi.org/10.1080/1058...
Just realised that the lost and found service is called “found items” in French and “lost items” in Italian. This tells you everything you need to know about the deep differences in trust towards institutions and social capital across the Alps.
World Bank Open Data
Free and open access to global development data
data.worldbank.org
Yes we are getting older on average but we are also more likely to live in urban areas. data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP...
Homicide statistics are hard to relate to personally, unless you live in a war zone, you’re very unlikely to experience it directly. I think what actually shifts people’s perception for the worse is moving to complex cities and the sense of background disorder that comes with urban life.
Reposted by Francesco Bailo
Working on the world map for Prelude to the Deep. The procgen uses warped simplex noise to create organic continents and coastlines, then simulates a climate by using a Whittaker biome model to realistically place environments from deserts to rainforests and more
#proceduralgeneration #roguelike
#proceduralgeneration #roguelike
There’s a lot of bad stuff happening in the world today, so anyway I finally did the thing and started developing video games for fun and enjoyment. If that’s your thing at all please check out @timgames.bsky.social. Steam page coming soon for my open world roguelike battling a fascist dictator
Duncan McDonnell
@duncanmcdonnell.com
· Sep 1
Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Grade 1
Company Description: Every institution values excellence. What matters most is why.
Griffith was created to be a different type of university. You’ll find we’re about leading research, academic excel...
jobs.smartrecruiters.com
3-year, full-time post-doc position with my @griffith.edu.au friend & colleague, Ferran Martinez i Coma.
Ferran is one of the key people who has made our department the top comparative politics research cluster in Australia.
Please apply, share, etc.
jobs.smartrecruiters.com/GriffithUniv...
Ferran is one of the key people who has made our department the top comparative politics research cluster in Australia.
Please apply, share, etc.
jobs.smartrecruiters.com/GriffithUniv...
This multi-year collaboration across continents (and timezones!) with Francesco Marolla, Marilù Miotto and Giovanni Cassani has been incredibly rewarding - proud of what we accomplished together.
This study has greatly benefited from the work of @paologerbaudo.bsky.social ...
This study has greatly benefited from the work of @paologerbaudo.bsky.social ...
#4 Both leadership and grassroots influenced candidate selection via different channels. Meetup network centrality boosted success while Forum activity had no effect. Leadership used voting interface design and curation mechanisms. Digital democracy involves multiple simultaneous power dynamics.
#3 Leadership influence didn't align with platform design. Grillo's blog comments barely echoed his messaging, while grassroots Meetup showed strongest leadership influence. Affordances indicate potential, not outcomes - user behaviour matters more than platform design.
#2 Platform boundaries limit cross-platform communication. Most users stayed on single platforms, but grassroots users (Forum/Meetup) crossed platforms more than centralized users (Blog/Facebook). These "bridges" may maintain cohesion during growth but amplify fragmentation in decline.
#1 Different platforms create distinct power distributions. Facebook/Blog enhanced global visibility for top-down broadcasting. Meetup/Forum fostered local visibility for grassroots coordination. Organisations can simultaneously maintain centralised messaging AND decentralised participation.
Methodological contribution: We developed network-based measures for platform "affordances" - visibility (how widely you can be seen) and associability (how easily you can connect). Local vs global variants create different power dynamics.
🔎 We find that 🔎 ...
🔎 We find that 🔎 ...
Within these constraints, leadership retains network-making power for collective action while grassroots audiences harness connective action. However, both must surrender networking power (access control) and network power (rule-setting) to platform owners.
Theoretical contribution: Platforms wield three forms of power over political actors - instrumentarian (shaping behavior), curation (filtering content), and system administration (controlling access).
Proof day! What a journey this has been... So proud of this work and amazing travel companions.
Reposted by Francesco Bailo
Trump fires labor statistics boss hours after the release of weak jobs report
The president implied that the BLS commissioner, longtime federal employee Erika McEntarfer, manipulated the data "for political purposes."
www.nbcnews.com
“The politicization of economic data and potential interference with it by political appointees is something that's typically seen in non-democratic countries like Russia, Venezuela or China.” www.nbcnews.com/business/eco...
They surely appreciate where their communication power truly lies
Interesting thing about the Donald vs Elon bar fight is that they are throwing food at each from within the boundaries of their own personal social media platforms while never crossing these boundaries. Elon keeps pinging Trump’s X accounts but has to screenshot his Truth posts to reply to them.
Bukele, with 1% of his population behind bars likely the world most successful mass-incarcerator under 40, now also arresting journalists under charges of fostering “public anxiety” when they report on his political ascension.
Also acknowledging scholarship that informed our approach to AI governance: @jeah.bsky.social, @ckatzenbach.bsky.social & Kirsten Gollatz as well as @fabianlferrari.bsky.social, José van Dijck & Antal van den Bosch on observability, inspectability, and modifiability in GenAI systems
This work builds on the foundational thinking of Axel Bruns @snurb.info, Zizi Papacharissi @zizip.bsky.social, danah boyd @zephoria.bsky.social, and Crystal Abidin.
Their work on produsage, networked and refracted publics, and digital culture shaped how we conceptualised the Undersphere.
Their work on produsage, networked and refracted publics, and digital culture shaped how we conceptualised the Undersphere.
We argue AI governance should learn from climate policy:
– Embrace complexity & uncertainty
– Prepare for unintended uses
– Enable fast, flexible responses
Because waiting for harms to go mainstream — like we did with deepfakes — is a mistake we can't afford to repeat.
– Embrace complexity & uncertainty
– Prepare for unintended uses
– Enable fast, flexible responses
Because waiting for harms to go mainstream — like we did with deepfakes — is a mistake we can't afford to repeat.
What are Underspheres?
They’re creative, decentralised spaces (think r/StableDiffusion) where AI tools get remixed, repurposed — and sometimes misused.
They’re not driven by ideology, but their outputs (like deepfake porn) pose real threats to privacy, safety & democratic trust.
They’re creative, decentralised spaces (think r/StableDiffusion) where AI tools get remixed, repurposed — and sometimes misused.
They’re not driven by ideology, but their outputs (like deepfake porn) pose real threats to privacy, safety & democratic trust.
Reposted by Francesco Bailo
Creative Underspheres and democratic challenges: Exploring the implications of generative AI misuse - Milica Stilinovic, Francesco Bailo, Jonathon Hutchinson, 2025
This article introduces the concept of the Undersphere – a networked community brought together via creative exchange – to highlight how the increased prolifera...
journals.sagepub.com
🚨Proud Supervisor Alert🚨 Pleased to share this open source article in New Media & Society, first-authored by Milly Stilinovic. With contributions from @francescobailo.bsky.social Francesco Bailo, we explore the dark sides of #GenAI within the creative worlds: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
@lukemansillo.com how does it look like?
We always get this picture. And it is usually always from the Bondi Beach polling station (www.npr.org/2025/05/02/g...).
Breaking out of legacy mobilization networks: how the internet reaches and activates the politically disengaged
This paper examines how digital media can activate political participation in areas traditionally excluded from social capital networks, focusing on Italy’s Five Star Movement (M5S). Using a granul...
doi.org
🖇️ Open access paper here: doi.org/10.1080/1933...
🖇️ A short blog post summarising the paper is here:
francescobailo.net/C9MGY8YR/
🖇️ A short blog post summarising the paper is here:
francescobailo.net/C9MGY8YR/
✅ Meetup groups first grew in civic hubs.
✅ After media spotlight, meetups exploded into low-social capital areas.
✅ Result: more political talk + M5S votes among previously disengaged.
✅ After media spotlight, meetups exploded into low-social capital areas.
✅ Result: more political talk + M5S votes among previously disengaged.
🚨Just out in Journal of Info Tech & Politics🚨
How the Internet helped Italy's Five Star Movement break out of legacy networks and activate politically disengaged voters.
I introduce Internet capital — digital resources enabling mobilization beyond traditional networks and reshaping geography.
How the Internet helped Italy's Five Star Movement break out of legacy networks and activate politically disengaged voters.
I introduce Internet capital — digital resources enabling mobilization beyond traditional networks and reshaping geography.