Alex Gates

Kevin Bacon is not the center of Hollywood. “In fact, he never has been, and almost certainly never will be.”

🚨Job alert: be my colleague!🚨 Barnard College is hiring someone at the intersection of Cognitive Science and Computer Science. Please share and reach out if you have questions! barnard.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/Facult...

I'm hiring a postdoc to start in summer/fall 2027! My lab uses computational social & cognitive science methods to explore how tech shapes knowledge & power: www.crockettlab.org You can submit an application here: apply.interfolio.com/195297. Review of apps starts Nov 20. Please share!

The NetSci 2027 Call for Abstracts & Satellites is here! netsci2027.github.io/calls/abstra... Submit your boundary-breaking research and join us in Dresden 🤩🚀 Abstract deadline: 1 Dec 2026 Satellite proposals: 15 Nov 2026 Conference: 18–21 May 2027

UVA School of Data Science has two open rank faculty positions open this year. Join us! - NLP: apply.interfolio.com/191213 - Data and Society: apply.interfolio.com/191214

In my latest for @undark.org, I compare AI adoption in science to the Ship of Theseus: "If you swap out every wooden plank on a ship over time, is it still the same vessel?" I argue that science derives authority from something more than data generation + publication. undark.org/2026/09/25/o...

Okay so I've built a new Atlas, this time it lets you explore the conversations on Bluesky over the past 7 days graphically. It should update every ~6 hours and help you navigate the information environment that exists on here. I've learned a LOT about what people do here today... atlas.jazco.dev

I’m excited to share our new preprint about network fairness and its ethical challenges. We spent many years thinking about this topic and shaping our arguments. /w @lespin.bsky.social @eliassi.bsky.social Ricardo Baeza-Yates , Pak Wong , Erich Prem , Meike Zehlike ,Suresh Venkatasubramanian

New preprint! A review article on Generative AI and Society, with the fantastic @thomasdavidson.bsky.social & Danny Karell (smartly not online!) osf.io/preprints/so... The lit on genAI is sprawling and mostly not in sociology. Our goal is to synthesize core themes relevant to sociologists. +

The mental model for Fable and Astra class models is that you are delegating to a good outside team, not an intern. Can you say what you want & how much leeway the AI has? Can you specify what you want tested & when to come to you for help? Can you describe what good looks like? Its all management.

The UVA School of Data Science has announced the eight finalists for the 2026 Data Is ART Competition, whose works will be exhibited in our public gallery throughout the 2026–27 academic year. Vote for your favorite work of art before submissions close on September 4: https://bit.ly/4xc9Dzd

The Allen Institute for AI wrote up a nice little blog post about how my research team is using their fully-open Olmo models and tools to probe how LLMs learn social reasoning allenai.org/blog/olmo-ca...

Check out our latest open model data -- which models are mentioned in every arXiv ML paper since ChatGPT. A very fun weekend project with Codex! From idea is full dataset in <72hours. ~500K papers processed 😎 Plot: dashboard.interconnects.ai?axrange=all#...

“Perhaps the best analogy is that a neuron itself is already a neural network" www.scientificamerican.com/article/neur...

Interested in complex systems research in beautiful Vermont? Teams @vcsi.bsky.social hope to fill postdoctoral positions on very short notice. One position is at the intersection of cognitive and epidemiological modeling. DM for details or keep an eye out for postings on here.

How is generative AI shaping the public funding landscape? Check out our latest paper in @pnas.org: The Rise of Large Language Models and the Direction and Impact of US Federal Research Funding: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... 1/n

1/ In 2024, I filed a false claims act lawsuit against Elsevier, Springer, Wiley & Informa alleging they systematically overcharged US federal grants for article processing. The gov declined to intervene and now it's public. Some thoughts on what this is, and what it isn't:

Who's up for a good old fashioned (but short, bc I'm tired) paper thread? Thrilled to be in this special issue of Gender & Society (an absolute dream!), where we propose a feminist-inspired extension of how to theorize and model the spread of ideas in science + journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

🙏 Come work with me 🙏 We're hiring a postdoc. to work on a v cool project using AI to better understand local-level social cohesion...

Interested in accessibility, visualization, or data ethics? I'm looking for Ph.D. students to join @data-and-design.org in Fall 2027. I've updated this post with additional information about this year's focus area. data-and-design.org/recruiting/phd

Young researchers, apply for our post-docs! The Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Rochester invites applications positions in theoretical and computational approaches to complex systems, information theory, and the emergence of autonomous agency. apply.interfolio.com/189157

Good news everyone! 🎉 The new version 3.0 of graph-tool is just out with major improvements! See below. graph-tool.skewed.de graph-tool is a comprehensive and efficient Python library to work with networks, including structural, dynamical, and statistical algorithms, as well as visualization. 1/N

Job Opportunity @cwts for a postdoc on Citizen Science and Public Trust in Science While earlier research about trust and citizen science has addressed the people actively participating in citizen science (CS) projects, we will investigate the perceptions and perspectives of citizens […]

Excited to share that first podcast interview with New Books Network is now live. @newbooksnetwork.bsky.social I spoke with host Ailin Zhou about my new book Film Diplomacy ( @columbiaup.bsky.social) Listen here: newbooksnetwork.com/film-diplomacy #FilmDiplomacy #newbook #history

I spent the past semester building interactive teaching apps with AI-assisted coding. I used my personal website to share them with my students, but that makes them hard to find for other educators. So I built Galvoro — galvoro.app

A stunning visualization born from a collaboration with @manlius.bsky.social : 55,486 galaxies and 29,555 streamlines tracing how matter flows across our local universe, built on data from the CosmicFlows-4 project. Article in the first reply 👇

People, I am hiring for a very cool project. Spread the word or apply! 👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇 www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/44...

Had a small part of this that I am pretty proud of: Full push-button reproducible manuscripts from data to manuscript. Nearly every stat, figure, number, table, etc is pulled directly from analysis code and data and "knit" with manuscript text written in Google Docs. Blog post coming soon ...

Enormously looking forward to this event on April 21 at 6:30pm ET (online!) with the amazing @emilymbender.bsky.social and @alexhanna.bsky.social talking about their new book, The AI Con. Register here: virginia.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

🚨 80% of Nobel Prizes go to folx in 5 countries. Why? We analyzed 75 years of prize committees, nominators, nominees, and laureates... a network of 500k edges. Turns out nominators choose compatriots at 5x the expected rate — amplifying geographic bias. Read: osf.io/preprints/so... #AcademicSky

Hurray!!!

Grant Witness is hiring! We're seeking a full-time data scientist to join our team building data resources to support journalism, litigation, and activism protecting science, public health, and the rule of law. grant-witness.us/apply.html #rstats

Thursday, March 5th! I’m giving a @lecturesontap.bsky.social about our work on drug-free zone laws & data justice — with incredible collaborators at @campaignzero.bsky.social @nunetsi.bsky.social @hutchinscenter.bsky.social Currently sold out, but there’s sometimes day-of tickets, so check back!

Now available! FILM DIPLOMACY: A MEDIA HISTORY OF US-TURKEY RELATIONS, by Ayşehan Jülide Etem. Use the coupon code CUP20 and save 20% bit.ly/3PaRGj2 @julideetem.bsky.social @columbiaup.bsky.social

🚨🚨🚨 NetSci Hackathon PSA!!! Are you at NetSci this year? Wanna come a day early and hack on a cool new dataset? Join our hackathon which will take place on May 31. We have limited space, so please indicate your interest through our application form by Mar 13: www.philchodrow.prof/higher-order...

New on the arxiv: “Graphs are maximally expressive for higher-order interactions” arxiv.org/abs/2602.16937 We clarify central misconceptions in the recent literature on "higher-order networks". w/ @piratepeel.bsky.social , @manlius.bsky.social, and @thilogross.bsky.social Explainer 🧵: 1/N

The Network Data Research Seminar returns with guest speaker Richard Betzel from the University of Minnesota. Join us for a talk on multi scale network neuroscience at the UVA School of Data Science on Feb. 20 from 1-2 PM. Read more: https://bit.ly/4qaYdHB

The bicycle is an underrated invention Bikes allow us terrestrial folk to be more like fish in terms of efficiency when travelling, and beat pretty much every organism, as well as all powered vehicles. buff.ly/vcH5TLu

Very excited to announce my first book 🪄 Film Diplomacy 📽️ is forthcoming with @columbiaup.bsky.social.

Postdoc openings at Kellogg/Northwestern! Review begins Feb 15 (rolling until filled). Apply / details: www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/academics-re...

Hello all! I’m recruiting a postdoc to work with my lab and I on methods for analyzing intensive longitudinal timeseries of psychological phenomena, with particular focus on measurement and optimization of interventions! Start would be August 2026

🚀 We're pleased to open the call for Champions and Mentors for the rOpenSci Champions Program 2026-2027, a 12-month journey in open science, research software, and community building. 🌎 This year's cohort will be run in Spanish and focused on Latin America More info at ropensci.org/blog/2026/01...

Another joint keynote at NetSci 2026 is official! 𝗔𝗹𝗯𝗲𝗿𝘁-𝗟𝗮́𝘀𝘇𝗹𝗼́ 𝗕𝗮𝗿𝗮𝗯𝗮́𝘀𝗶 and 𝗥𝗲́𝗸𝗮 𝗔𝗹𝗯𝗲𝗿𝘁 reunite on stage for a one-of-a-kind talk. Their discovery of scale-free networks and the Barabási–Albert model reshaped network science. We can’t wait to welcome you! @barabasi.bsky.social tinyurl.com/4t5p46yr

We're hiring a Business Development Contractor to expand SDS’s executive and non-degree education footprint in Northern Virginia. Cool job. Great organization (biased as I am). Unlimited bonus comp 🤑 datascience.virginia.edu/pages/busine...