In our applications, achieving near-perfect transcription accuracy in one API call without significant ex-post cleaning still requires frontier models (3.1 pro) and precise prompts refined through extensive testing, which drives up costs. But overall, the improvement over previous software is huge
Over the last months, my coauthors and I have been rebuilding our pipelines for several digitization projects from scratch, using Gemini. Our experience so far is that the results are absolutely impressive.
@sergisme.bsky.social
1/n
Poli sci did a good job on this one. Among others, shoutout to Grimmer for demonstrating in court (twice, I believe) that Eastman’s empirical claims about the 2020 election being manipulated were false
How has Senegal avoided major democratic backsliding? Social norms stemming from early nation-building, such as interethnic marriages. Easy read of my @AfrAfJournal article w Alioune Ngom in @democracyinafrica.bsky.social 👇
It's hard to overstate the importance of this election for Hungary and Europe, but also for the comparative study of democracy. Hungary was the epitome of democratic backsliding.
Saving local news means saving our shared memory. When archives disappear, communities lose their history. Learn about the librarians & archivists helping safeguard local history, & the collaboration between @archive.org, @poynterinstitute.bsky.social, & @ire.org that’s providing tools & training ⬇️
The takes like "Democracy is not great because Hitler, Mussolini etc etc" mostly reveal ignorance about the history of fascism.
Follow-up work by the authors:
Persuasion in RDD: arxiv.org/pdf/2509.26517
Persuasion in DiD: arxiv.org/pdf/2410.14871
Hard to overstate how much I endorse these applied econometrics agendas. We need tighter connections between the estimands of popular designs and theoretical concepts.
Today, April 7, is Kwibuka32, the commemoration of the 32d anniversary of the first full day of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsis in Rwanda.
Past US presidents marked the date with stock statements of “never again.” Today the president instead echoed the language & threats of the perpetrators.
In this new era, should I keep talking like a psyched music/podcast bro (new paper dropped) or switch to psyched tech bro instead (new paper shipped)
Can we have an Italian polisky to bash the shitshow that this referendum campaign is
So happy to see this great paper in print. @rmajumdar.bsky.social
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
This is also a Sanremo hater account
Sorry to my Barcelona friends, on the other hand tonight is a good moment to reveal this is also a Toko Shengelia stan account
🏆 🇮🇹🏀 ⚫️⚪️
Four years ago, the lives of millions of people like me, including friends of mine, were devastated.
On a much more minor note, my political identity changed maybe for good.
Can feed algorithms shape what people think about politics? Our paper "The Political Effects of X's Feed Algorithm" is out today in Nature and answers "Yes."
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Russia, Venezuela, Iran, China, the Sahel region, the United States ...
Want to know why state agents carry out brutal repression — or participate in illegal coups?
Our new book "Making a Career in Dictatorship" provides answers — it just got published by @academic.oup.com:
tinyurl.com/ystwm3tf
I'm increasingly convinced that the correct way to interpret these takes is competition for leadership recognition
www.cambridge.org/core/journal...
So happy to work on this with @haasvioleta.bsky.social!
I am also curious about your "ideal" electoral rule.
Great paper.
As I have been spending much of my time digitizing municipal electoral lists from provincial BOs over the last year, I know what you went through.
Seeing several non-US online commentators justify (if not praise) threats of invasion, abductions, and now plain murders, just because they like Trump and dislike the left of their countries, I feel bad for when in grad school I thought Svolik was overstating the role of polarization.
Imagine your last act in life being to try to pick someone up off the icy ground and the consequence is you get repeatedly pistol whipped in the face and then shot to death.
Donald Trump and his goons robbed a human being of their life during a moment of compassion.
It is hard to even imagine.
In just over eight months, Berlin will hold its 20th state election since 1946. While its well known East West divide in voting behaviour is often attributed to the city’s former split into capitalist and socialist halves, these differences existed even before the city’s division. A thread. 🧵
Counterpoint: I want to see reactions in Spain
🤢
1/10 🧵 The U.S. just captured a sitting head of state in a military operation—and Trump says the U.S. will "run" Venezuela “for now.” Whatever you think of Maduro, this is the most consequential unilateral move in the hemisphere since Panama (1989).
Secretaries Rubio and Hegseth looked every Senator in the eye a few weeks ago and said this wasn’t about regime change. I didn’t trust them then and we see now that they blatantly lied to Congress.
Look, libs, he is a man of peace, not like that Hillary Clinton warmongerer, ok?
