iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by Christian Göbel

Alex Dukalskis @alexdukalskis.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

My department - @ucdpolitics.bsky.social - is hiring two PERMANENT posts in any area of politics, international relations, theory, or development studies. Please apply if you are on the academic job market, and if you're not, please do us a solid & spread the word! Deadline NOV 9.

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Society of American Archivists @saa-official.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Want to start a digital preservation program? Join SAA’s virtual “Preserving Digital Archives” course on Nov 5–6! Learn hands-on skills and practical steps to preserve digital collections. Register now: ow.ly/Nehg50ZHYmY

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Just published in @chinaquarterly.bsky.social: "Subversive Amplification: Online Dissent and the Limits of Information Control in China," on the two days of online contention that preceded the White Paper protests. The article is available open access: doi.org/10.1017/S030...

doi.org

Subversive Amplification: Online Dissent and the Limits of Information Control in China | The China Quarterly | Cambridge Core

Subversive Amplification: Online Dissent and the Limits of Information Control in China

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Marta Vukovic @martav.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Our Research Network Democracy and Human Rights is now on Bluesky! 🦋 Follow @dem-hum.bsky.social for exciting research updates related to democracy & human rights. 💬

bsky.app

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 08/07/2026

We need to discuss abolishing grades instead of ways to prevent cheating or forcing educators to integrate LLMs into a learning process.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 16/06/2026

Ich freue mich ebenfalls sehr. Die Tatsache, dass ein Autokratieforscher zu einer Veranstaltung eingeladen wird, die sich mit der Zukunft der Demokratie beschäftigt, zeigt, wie wichtig das Thema ist. Der Abend wird sicherlich spannend.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 21/05/2026

Österreichische Unis rufen zu einer Demonstration nächsten Mittwoch, 13:00 Uhr auf. Demonstriert wird gegen anvisierte hohe Budgetkürzungen, die die Qualität von Forschung und Lehre massiv beeinträchtigen würden. Bitte weitersagen und teilnehmen! www.univie.ac.at/aktuelles/pr...

univie.ac.at

Budget - Unis rufen zu Demos gegen Kürzungen auf

Rektor Schütze: "Schaden für die Reputation enorm"

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 31/03/2026

Golden advice from SAGE on how to prevail in the cutthroat competition for doing peer reviews.

Tips to become a top reviewer

Become more visible:
Increase your chances of being selected to review by providing an institutional email address, adding keywords to your account, or linking your account with your ORCID.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 02/02/2026

That said, the rest went flyingly. Program takes Multimarkdown script created with Scrivener, inserts citations form bibtex library, builds tex file and formats citations with the .csl file created by the LLM based on journal specifications, then produces pdf and docx files.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 02/02/2026

LaTeX is the final boss for LLMs. Changing a conversion script so that one table in a document is presented in landscape mode broke the machine. The output is eerily similar to how I feel when I need to do this by hand.

LLM output, model seemingly telling itself to "stop being silly" and to "focus", interspersed with gibberish.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 20/01/2026

Sounds like a good speech. Keeps options for cooperation open, but not at any price(“our response will be unflinching, united and proportional“); provides vision of world trade without the US, which fits the title, expresses that patience with US not honouring agreements is wearing thin.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 10/12/2025

Can‘t say the writing wasn‘t on the wall.

skeet from 9 months ago: I wouldn't be surprised if the
US position in the "peace talks" is that unless Ukraine gives it access to minerals, the US will actively support Russia against Ukraine - and work out a deal with Russia to split the loot. If Ukraine accepts the deal, Europe will be responsible for enforcing it.

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Fergus Ryan @fergus.bsky.social · 02/12/2025

Our new ASPI report 'The Party’s AI' is out now. It shows how China’s LLMs, vision models and “AI+” governance architecture are hard-coding censorship and control into the future of AI. www.aspi.org.au/repo...

Cover of ASPI’s “The Party’s AI”. A lone man stands on a road where tanks should be, but they’ve been erased, mirroring how Chinese LLMs censor sensitive images. For more, see Chapter 1.

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John Paul Helveston @jhelvy.bsky.social · 30/11/2025

Online survey research is screwed. LLM-enabled agents can take surveys just like humans. Here's a video I made where the Comet browser agent takes a simple survey and gets around nearly all my bot detection checks. The crisis is here already...more in this 🧵 www.youtube.com/watch?v=05Je...

youtube.com

Comet browser fills out a survey with bot detection questions

YouTube video by John Helveston

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Cherie Wong 王卓妍 @chercywong.bsky.social · 30/11/2025

While Hongkongers are mobilizing to get beds, student's textbooks, curtains, baby formulas, missing pets to survivors of the Tai Po Hung Fuk fire, western-centric discourse are quick to paint us as "backwards, unscientific, unsafe"... and I have zero patience for this racist bs.

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Wing Kuang @wingkuang.bsky.social · 30/11/2025

I’ve been monitoring online discussions from Hong Kong about why HKers consider blaming bamboo scaffolding is a gov spin, and I think many AUS media have got it WRONG. They think it’s a spin NOT because they see bamboo scaffolding as a tradition that distinguishes HK from China.

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Yuen Chan @yuenchan.bsky.social · 30/11/2025

State-backed Hong Kong newspaper Ta Kung Pao has taken down an investigative report published on 28 Nov which cited industry sources saying building maintenance works effectively controlled by cartel, rife with corrupt practices in tender process, widespread cost and corner-cutting in materials.

Screenshot of a page of the Ta Kung Pao newspaper with picture of fire-hose on Wang Fung Court tower, bamboo scaffolder at work alongside Chinese text. Headline reads: Revealing dark dealings behind maintenance work scaffolding.

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Kiwi Ting @kiwiting.bsky.social · 29/11/2025

Multiple local new sources in Hong Kong are reporting that the police have begun arresting activists calling for independent inquiries and accountability for the Tai Po fire 😡

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 26/11/2025

天朝物產豐盈，無所不有，原不藉外夷貨物以通有無

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Sense Hofstede @sensehofstede.nl · 23/11/2025

📊 In this blog post, I use my visits database to look at Xi Jinping’s changing dominance seen through diplomatic patterns in MFA data: the third term really is different. sensehofstede.nl/xi-jinpings-...

sensehofstede.nl

Xi Jinping’s changing dominance seen through diplomatic patterns

Since Xi Jinping has begun his third term, much has been written about him delegating more responsibilities to a new crop of trusted subordinates, both domestically and abroad. This is an important de...

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𝑪. 𝑫𝒂𝒂𝒆́ @christinedaae.bsky.social · 23/11/2025

I lied. Put your clothes back on. We’re going to talk about how there are actually female scholars within Confucianism who contributed significantly to Chinese literature, philosophy, and history, and their accomplishments are worthy of note and should be studied just as much as the men

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 22/11/2025

Stellar, important and painstaking work tracing China's external investments worldwide on a project-by-project level, more than 33k in total. The dataset and very good visualisations available on china.aiddata.org. Can't believe this isn't getting more attention here.

china.aiddata.org

China Global Development Dashboard

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Mike Tierney @miketierneyir.bsky.social · 22/11/2025

Interesting conversation on China's lending and investments in the US, UK, and EU. With AidData's Brad Parks, David Culver, and Sailor Miao (all @wm.edu alums). Foreign aid nerds, see Brad's comments on U.S. now emulating China: www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8ZL...

youtube.com

Tracking China's Global Influence: A Conversation with CNN and W&M's AidData

YouTube video by William & Mary

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Reposted by Christian Göbel

Sheena Chestnut Greitens @sheenagreitens.bsky.social · 13/11/2025

Delighted to share a new @carnegieendowment.org report on China’s Foreign Police Training: A Global Footprint. Over 50 entities in China have provided training to at least 138 countries, forming a major pillar of Beijing’s drive to reshape global security: carnegieendowment.org/research/202...

carnegieendowment.org

China’s Foreign Police Training: A Global Footprint

New data reveal how China’s foreign police training programs have become an integral part of Beijing’s strategy to remake global security.

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Ariel Edwards-Levy @aedwardslevy.bsky.social · 13/11/2025

Leib Littman at CloudResearch notes that acquiescence bias is often exacerbated on some opt-in online panels typically used for consumer research, where fraudulent respondents have an incentive to say "yes" and route themselves into more surveys.

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Sense Hofstede @sensehofstede.nl · 07/11/2025

Independent Chinese-language film festival in US canceled after pressure campaign – Nikkei Asia: ‘said that he did not feel he was in physical danger but that the relentless messages forced him to shut down the event.’

asia.nikkei.com

Indie Chinese film festival in US canceled after pressure campaign

Organizer's reports of harassment echo other allegations of transnational repression

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Reposted by Christian Göbel

Lev Nachman @lnachman32.bsky.social · 05/11/2025

In case you missed it, Kerry Brown wrote a book that plagiarized Shelley Rigger’s classic book title. I, along with others who were asked to review Kerry’s manuscript, said verbatim to change the title. In the most tacky and unprofessional fashion, he stole her title anyway.

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Chenchen Zhang 🤦🏻‍♀️ @chenchenzhang.net · 04/11/2025

"a decision by the university not to publish a final phase of the research... was communicated to the National Security Service..." "China is not believed to have an organisation named National Security Service, so it is not clear who the individuals were". www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

bbc.co.uk

China academic intimidation claim referred to counter-terrorism police

Sensitive research into alleged human rights abuses is alleged to have been shut down by Chinese agents.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 03/11/2025

Local LLM just translated 王文涛 as "Wang Textao" 😂

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Finbarr Bermingham @fbermingham.bsky.social · 03/11/2025

A British university complied with a demand from Beijing to halt research about human rights abuses in China, leading to a major project being dropped, the Guardian can reveal.

theguardian.com

UK university halted human rights research after pressure from China

Exclusive: Leading professor at Sheffield Hallam was told to cease research on supply chains and forced labour in China after demands from authorities

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con questi nuovi ritmi americani (she/her) 🏳️‍⚧️🇵🇸🏳 @racheledini.bsky.social · 31/10/2025

I'm excited to share my piece in Los Angeles Review of Books @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social, which examines OpenAI's claims about ChatGPT's creative writing skills, Big Tech's weaponisation of grief and nostalgia, and the collapse of the academic humanities. lareviewofbooks.org/article/lite...

lareviewofbooks.org

Literature Is Not a Vibe: On ChatGPT and the Humanities | Los Angeles Review of Books

Rachele Dini discusses OpenAI’s “A Machine-Shaped Hand” and an academic sector in crisis.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 02/10/2025

Very solid and entertaining introduction to Labubu mania. Wondered why my visitors from China went into the Vienna Labubu store and straight out again last summer. Now I have an explanation. The Labubu store probably had no Labubus.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 30/09/2025

Genuinely delighted to have received a postcard from @polbehavior.bsky.social today. This is a very nice gesture that truly made my day.

Back of the postcard. "Thank you so much for your recent review for Political Behavior! Your work as a reviewer is invaluable to us as we make decisions and try to provide constructive feedback for the authors. We are glad you are a part of the Political Behavior research community and hope to have more opportunities to work together in the future.
Chris Karpowitz and Jessica Preece
Co-Editors-in-Chief, Political Behavior"

Front of the postcard. A drawing with snowy mountains in the background, a bell tower in the foreground and a yellow sun in the top right corner. In the bottom right corner, it says "Political Behavior".

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ogi @ Cooking: The Game @oleh2ogi.bsky.social · 05/09/2025

Dear Indonesian on bsky, my name is ogi- I am an Indonesian zinester, and I am planning to make an informative/educational zine about what happened in Indonesia. I want to share it in one of my zinefest in Växjö Sweden and you can use the ready-print version to share awareness when its finished!

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Zeyi Yang 杨泽毅 @zeyiyang.bsky.social · 04/09/2025

Here's my epic failure against Trump's tariffs: I placed an order from a Ukrainian woodworking shop on Aug 17, but it's still stuck at the customs. It turns out, big platforms like Temu ends up getting an advantage over indie sellers because they can better handle the post-de minimis tariff regime.

wired.com

The Unexpected Winners of Trump’s Trade War

Americans are now hit with tariffs when they shop from overseas sellers on eBay and Etsy. Shein and Temu had months to get ahead of the curve.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 04/09/2025

A very moving and informative essay with insights on how and why individuals (in China) consult LLMs for medical advice, and how Chinese companies employ LLMs in healthcare already now.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 23/07/2025

This will be one of the few things I’m looking forward to having in my inbox. Wired’s (China) reporting has been stellar, so I’m looking forward to more of it. I just signed up.

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Christian Göbel @christiangoebel.bsky.social · 23/07/2025

Oh, wow. I just know this will be good.

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Sense Hofstede @sensehofstede.nl · 09/07/2025

‘Containing Xi’, or refining party rule? – Holly Snape for Observing China: ‘These planned regulations are part of Xi’s longstanding pet project to govern the CCP and the PRC by rules’ ‘Xi has used rules not only to maximise his concentration of power, but also to facilitate its use.’

observingchina.org.uk

‘Containing Xi’, or refining party rule?

What does the latest politburo meeting reveal about Chinese politics?

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China Law Translate / Jeremy Daum @chinalawtranslate.bsky.social · 08/07/2025

Hey, if you support CDT but can't give cash- give a retweet. Maybe someone with more funds will see it. They are almost at their modest goal of $10,000, but there's no reason 10,000 RTs shouldn't have been reached ages ago.

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