Bias in Hate Speech Detection: Challenges and Solutions
2024-12-12 11:15 - 12:00 (Europe/Oslo) | SFI MediaFutures, MCB
SFI MediaFutures invites to a seminar on bias in hate speech detection hold by Debora Nozza, on 12 of December in our office in Bergen.
Abstract:
Online hate speech is on the rise, often leading to offline harm. While NLP methods, including LLMs, offer tools for detection, fine-tuning these models can introduce severe unintended bias—performing inconsistently across comments involving specific identity terms (e.g., gay, Muslim, woman). This talk explores the risks of deploying off-the-shelf classifiers, methods for measuring and mitigating bias, and the ongoing challenge of balancing effective hate speech detection with fairness in online spaces.
Bio:
Debora Nozza is an Assistant Professor in Computing Sciences at Bocconi University. Her research interests mainly focus on Natural Language Processing, specifically on the detection and counter-acting of hate speech and algorithmic bias on Social Media data in multilingual context. She was recently awarded a €1.5m ERC Starting Grant project 2023 for research on personalized and subjective approaches to Natural Language Processing.
The event is free of charge.
If you want to join online, please open the following link: https://uib.zoom.us/j/64083511296?pwd=[REDACTED]

Rethinking Trust: Unveiling the Dynamics of Trust and Distrust
2024-12-16 16:00 - 17:00 | U.Phil Auditorium
Title: Rethinking Trust: Unveiling the Dynamics of Trust and Distrust
Research on trust is highly interdisciplinary and has produced an impressive body of knowledge about its forms, causes and consequences. However, existing research agendas have notable biases, two of which are the focus of this presentation: first, research privileges trust while marginalising distrust, resulting in an incomplete and flawed understanding; second, it engages in sweeping generalisations, overlooking distinctions between trust in people, institutions and machines. This presentation proposes ways to conceptualise trust and distrust as complementary phenomena and explores the specific dynamics that govern trust relationships with humans, institutions and machines.
Bio:
Christian Lahusen is Professor of Sociology at the University of Siegen, Germany. In his work Lahusen has paid special attention to the relation between state authorities and citizens, focusing on both the attitudinal and the behavioural levels. He has been studying political and civic engagement, in later years with a strong focus on solidarity and trust. His work documents the importance of citizens’ empowerment, but also the situational and contextual conditions that hamper it. His recurrent involvement in large-scale interdisciplinary research projects has led to a number of co-authored publications. He has published extensively in the fields of political sociology, contentious politics and societal integration and has led several national and international research projects in these areas. Lahusen was the coordinator of the Horizon 2020 project Enlightened trust: An examination of trust and distrust in governance – conditions, effects and remedies.

Northern Lights Deep Learning Conference
2025-01-07 08:00 - 17:00 | Tromsø
Deep learning is an emerging subfield in machine learning that has in recent years achieved state-of-the-art performance in image classification, object detection, segmentation, time series prediction and speech recognition to name a few. This conference will gather researchers both on a national and international level to exchange ideas, encourage collaborations and present cutting-edge research.
Keynote topic: A technical talk on recommender systems, focusing on how this technology is often used to enhance misinformation and create echo chambers, and what can be done to combat this.

Lerchendalkonferansen 2025
2025-02-04 08:00 - 2025-02-05 17:00 | Scandic Nidelven, TRONDHEIM
The Lerchendal conference serves as an important meeting place for approximately 200 leaders and talents from politics, business, and academia. It is a platform where Norway’s key decision-makers and innovators come together to discuss, share, and shape the future.
The conference is the perfect arena for those who want to shape the future, broaden their perspective, and gain new knowledge.
MediaFutures centre leader Christoph Trattner will hold a presentation on Day 1 of the conference. He will focus on our research on misinformation, addressing its broader meaning on democracy, the economy, and other societal areas.
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Desinformasjon og falske nyheter – hvordan det kan true sikkerhet og demokrati

Innlegget holdes på engelsk

Christoph Trattner, Professor, Director MediaFutures: Research Centre for Responsible Media Technology and Innovation, Universitetet i Bergen
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This Year’s Theme: Geopolitics and the Technological Race
How does the global power struggle impact technology, business, and value creation?
The conference is a collaboration between the Research Council of Norway, Tekna, NTNU, and SINTEF.

AI & Media: The Transformative Impact of AI in the Media Industry
2025-02-27 17:00 - 20:00 | Google, Bryggegata 6, Oslo, 0254
Our Innovation Coordinator, Christopher Senf, and PhD candidate, Peter Andrews, have been invited to speak at Oslo AI’s next event at Google’s office on Misinformation and Disinformation in the Age of AI. They will introduce the Center and present a live demo of the AI Moderator.
Topic: AI & Media: The Transformative Impact of AI in the Media Industry
Speakers:
Christian Schüssler Oslo Kreativ AI
Igor Pipkin, PhD DN Media Group
Christopher Senf, PhD (SFI MediaFutures,UiB) and Peter Andrews, PhD candidate (SFI MediaFutures, UiB)
Christian Schüssler, Founder of Reimagine AS and organizer of Oslo Kreativ AI (kreativai.no)

“The Future of Visual Storytelling”
Join film director and founder of Reimagine and Oslo Kreativ AI, Christian Schüssler, on an inspiring journey into the next era of media, creativity and storytelling. We explore how artificial intelligence is revolutionizing the creative process, empowering artists, and unlocking a new realms of visual expression and narrative possibilities.

Igor Pipkin, PhD, Head of Data & Insights at DN Media Group (dngroup.com)
(more to come)
Join us for an insightful event featuring three expert talks on the revolutionary impact of AI in the media industry, from streamlining content creation to transforming audience engagement. Discover how cutting-edge AI technologies are reshaping the future of media and entertainment.
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Agenda (preliminary):
17:00-17:30 – Arrive at Google office for food, soft drinks and networking
17:30-17:40 – Welcome and introduction by the Oslo.AI team
17:40-19:40 – Presentations with Q&A
19:40-20:00 – Wrap-up and short mingling
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This event is organized by Oslo.AI, the largest community for AI enthusiasts and professionals in Norway with 3500 members. Oslo AI was founded with the goal of spreading knowledge on how artificial intelligence can be applied to contribute to creating a better society. Oslo AI strives to create an active and engaged AI community, the main focus being quarterly AI events with a specific theme. Their mission is to be the meeting place for people interested in how applied AI shapes business, technology, and society.
This in-person event is made possible by the Oslo AI team and their sponsors: Google, Inmeta & Microsoft.
Register for a free ticket here: https://lnkd.in/d_kZQieK

Opphavsrett for journalister – Hva du må vite om bruk og deling av innhold?
2025-03-06 12:00 - 17:00 | Media City Bergen, Medielaben i 9. etasje, tårn 3
Hva kan du bruke fritt, og hva krever tillatelse? Hva gjelder for lenking, embedding og bruk av innhold fra sosiale medier? Hvordan påvirker kunstig intelligens opphavsretten?
Bli med på en hands-on workshop med advokat Jon Wessel-Aas, en av Norges fremste eksperter på medierett. Her får du konkrete svar på de viktigste spørsmålene om opphavsrett – skreddersydd for journalister.

AI anno 2030: In the Public Interest?
2025-03-07 09:30 - 15:00 | Universitetsaulaen, Muséplassen 3
UiB AI is collaborating with NORA on a CuttingEdgeAI seminar in the University Aula in Bergen. The idea behind the seminar is to bring together some of the foremost AI researchers in Norway to discuss where we stand in terms of research, which areas Norway has the opportunity to make its mark on and what might happen on the AI front in the future. Where will the research front be in different branches of artificial intelligence in five years’ time? And does AI represent the public interest, for example when it comes to democracy, labour, welfare, the environment and culture? The seminar is mostly in Norwegian.

The seminar will be streamed, and the recording will be available through a link.
Program:
09:00 Arrival and light refreshments09:30 Welcome by Pro-Rector Pinar Heggernes, Pro-Rector at UiB and Chair of the UiB AI Steering Group
Part 1: Where is the research front in various branches of artificial intelligence headed?
09:40 AI research in Norway in 2025: Anne Kjersti Fahlvik, Director of Innovation in Business and the Public Sector, Research Council of Norway
10:00 Arnoldo Frigessi, Professor and Director of the Center of Excellence (SFF) Integreat, UiO10:15 Jill Walker Rettberg, Professor and Deputy Director of the Center of Excellence for Digital Narratives, UiB
10:30 Coffee break
11:00 Robert Jenssen, Professor and Director of the Center for Research-based Innovation (SFI) Visual Intelligence, UiT – The Arctic University of Norway11:15 Panel discussion with Anne Kjersti, Arnoldo, Jill, and Robert, moderated by Pinar Heggernes, Pro-Rector, UiB
11:45 Lunch
Part 2: Where does Norway have particular strengths in AI research?
12:30 AI at NAV – What are we doing, and what are we wondering about?Jon Vegard Sparre, AI Lead at NAV
12:45 Heri Ramampiaro, Professor and Head of the Department of Computer Science, NTNU13:00 Marija Slavkovik, Professor and Head of the Department of Information Science and Media Studies, UiB
13:15 Coffee break
13:45 AI and regulation: From Norwegian marketing to research qualityMalcolm Langford, Professor at the Department of Public and International Law, UiO
14:00 Panel discussion with Jon Vegard, Heri, Marija, and Malcolm, moderated by Klas Pettersen, CEO of NORA
14:30 Food and networking15:00 Farewell
Moderator for the day: Dag Stenvoll, Coordinator for UiB AI

Announcement of the 2025 Holberg Prize and Nils Klim Prize
2025-03-13 09:00 - 10:00 | University Aula, UiB
On Thursday, 13 March, the 2025 Holberg Prize and Nils Klim Prize will be announced at the University Aula in Bergen.
At the event, the Rector of the University of Bergen, Margareth Hagen, will present welcoming remarks. The Chair of the Holberg Prize Board, Professor Jørgen Sejersted, will announce the recipients of the Holberg Prize and the Nils Klim Prize. We will also hear the citations from the Academic Committees, before the Holberg Prize Academic Director, Professor Bjørn Enge Bertelsen, will lead a conversation between experts on the Laureates and their scholarly work.
There will be a musical performance, and a light breakfast will be served.
We ask that those who wish to attend the event in person to register.
The livestream requires no registration.
Doors open 8:40
About the Prizes
The Holberg Prize is awarded annually to a scholar who has made outstanding contributions to research in the humanities, social sciences, law or theology. The recipient must have had a decisive influence on international research. The Prize is worth NOK 6,000,000.
The Nils Klim Prize is awarded annually in the above fields, to a young researcher. The candidate must be a citizen of a Nordic country or be formally affiliated with a Nordic research institution. Also, the candidate must be under 35 years of age at the nomination deadline. The Prize is worth NOK 500,000.

The Language of Coordination: From Humans to AI Agents
2025-03-21 12:00 - 13:30 | SFI MediaFutures, MCB
We are thrilled to welcome Luca Maria Aiello, Associate Professor at the IT University of Copenhagen, to the MediaFutures seminar series.
As global challenges like climate change, pandemics, and mass migration become increasingly urgent, the need for mass coordination has never been greater. In his presentation, “The Language of Coordination: From Humans to AI Agents,” Professor Aiello will delve into the fascinating intersection of social science, language, and technology, exploring how natural language can drive large-scale coordination in the public sphere. Drawing on his cutting-edge research, he will demonstrate how insights from psychology and linguistics can be harnessed to understand and predict collective behavior, and how these insights can be applied to artificial intelligence to create persuasive social agents capable of influencing public discourse on social media platforms.
Abstract:
A defining task for humankind is to achieve mass coordination to tackle global challenges such as climate change, pandemics, and mass migrations. Social science research has identified psycho-linguistic aspects of social interactions that can trigger spontaneous coordination when used strategically in the public debate. We created Natural Language Processing tools that can capture these social dimensions from conversations, and found that they can explain and predict outcome of consensus and coordination. Furthermore, we show that these dimensions can be used to prompt AI agents powered by Large Language Models to make them behave as persuasive social agents that could be seamlessly integrated in the public discourse of social media platforms.
Professor Aiello’s work is at the forefront of an emerging field that combines computational social science, network science, and artificial intelligence. By analyzing vast amounts of digital data, he seeks to quantify human well-being and build systems that can improve it—whether in the context of health, urban living, or digital interactions. In his talk, he will explore the psycho-linguistic aspects of human interaction and how they can be translated into actionable insights for both human and AI-driven coordination.
Professor Aiello will be visiting Bergen and the MediaFutures research center from March 19th to 22nd, with his presentation scheduled for Friday, March 21st. We encourage you to join us for this insightful seminar, either in person or via the Zoom livestream.

About Luca Maria Aiello
Luca Maria Aiello is an Associate Professor at the IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark, where he conducts interdisciplinary research at the intersection of computational social science, digital health, network science, and urban informatics. His work leverages large-scale digital data to explore and quantify key aspects of human life, with a particular focus on how language and communication shape our collective behaviors and well-being.
His research interests span multiple fields, including the role of language in coordinating social actions, the application of Natural Language Processing (NLP) to study social dynamics, and the development of AI systems that can influence and improve social interactions. Through his research, Professor Aiello aims to better understand how people interact, how these interactions can be optimized to address pressing global issues, and how AI can be used to augment, rather than replace, human communication.
A recognized leader in his field, Professor Aiello has contributed to numerous influential studies on the role of language in social media and digital interactions. One of his notable contributions includes a study published in Nature on the language of persuasion in social media, which explores how certain linguistic features can be used to influence public opinion and behavior.
Currently, his research focuses on using NLP techniques to quantify social and psychological experiences, with applications ranging from improving public health to enhancing urban living environments. Through his work, Professor Aiello continues to push the boundaries of what is possible at the intersection of social science and technology.

Mid-term evaluation of PhD candidate Bilal Mahmood
2025-04-03 15:30 - 16:30 | SFI MediaFutures, MCB
On Thursday, April 3rd, PhD candidate Bilal Mahmood will have his mid-term evaluation.
Main supervisor: Mehdi Elahi
Co-Supervisor: Samia Touileb
External Evaluator: Sole Pera

Mid-term evaluation of PhD candidate Jia-Hua Jeng
2025-04-04 09:15 - 10:15 | SFI MediaFutures, MCB
On Friday, April 4, PhD candidate Jia-Hua Jeng will have his mid-term evaluation.
Main supervisor: Christoph Trattner
Co-Supervisors: Erik Knudsen, Alain Starke
External Evaluator: Sole Pera

Talks on Responsible Recommender Systems
2025-04-04 10:45 - 13:00 | SFI MediaFutures, MCB
April 4, MediaFutures sets the stage for a joined event featuring a series of talks, including contributions from Sole Pera (TU Delft) and the PhD candidates Lukas Wegmeth and Tobias Vente (University of Siegen).

10:45 – 11:45 | Sole Pera on “Into the AI-Known: How Search and Recommender Systems Shape Children’s Online Experiences & the Path to Safer Information Access”
12:00 – 13:00 | Lukas Wegmeth & Tobias Vente, “Green Recommender Systems – Minimizing Carbon Footprint for Sustainable Personalization”

Sole Pera, Associate Professor @ Delft University of Technology
Time: 10:45 – 11:45
Title: “Into the AI-Known: How Search and Recommender Systems Shape Children’s Online Experiences & the Path to Safer Information Access”
Abstract: In the AI era, search and recommendation systems increasingly shape how children perceive the world and interact with digital media. However, these systems are seldom designed with young users in mind, leading to exposure to content that is misleading, inappropriate, or simply not aligned with their needs. While AI has the potential to improve online information access, ensuring safe, effective, and age-appropriate digital experiences remains a challenge. In this talk, we will explore how mainstream search and recommendation algorithms influence what children encounter online. Along the way, we review current research, discuss the challenges and opportunities in building safer digital environments, and consider the ethical implications of designing AI-driven information access systems that prioritize children’s rights and well-being.
Dr. Maria Soledad Pera is an Associate Professor at the Web Information Systems group of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Science (EWI), Delft University of Technology. Sole’s main area of expertise is in Information Retrieval with emphasis on non-traditional population.
Lukas Wegmeth & Tobias Vente, PhD candidates at University of Siegen
Time: 12:00 – 13:00
Title: “Green Recommender Systems – Minimizing Carbon Footprint for Sustainable Personalization”
Abstract: Did you know one recommender systems research paper emits ~3,300 kgCO₂e — the same as one person flying from New York to Melbourne? This talk unveils the urgent need for Green Recommender Systems and delivers actionable guidelines to achieve them. We quantify the carbon footprint of training and inference, comparing deep learning and traditional algorithms. The goal? High-performance recommender systems that don’t cost the Earth. Discover how to minimize the carbon footprint while maintaining performance through energy-aware design, efficient hardware, and transparent reporting. This is a call to action: by rethinking how we design and measure recommenders, we can pioneer sustainable AI that benefits both users and the planet.
Lukas Wegmeth is a Ph.D. Student of the Intelligent Systems Group at the University of Siegen. Before joining the ISG he completed his bachelor’s and master’s degree in Medical Computer Science at the University of Siegen. During his time as a graduate student, Lukas set his focus on the topic of Machine Learning and collaborated with different chairs of the University of Siegen to work on and release scientific research papers in the field. Lukas is currently analysing recommender systems from an energy efficiency context, measuring amongst other power consumptions.
Tobias is a joint Ph.D. candidate at the ISG – Intelligent Systems Group (University of Siegen) in Siegen, Germany and the ADReM – Adrem Data Lab (University of Antwerp) in Antwerp, Belgium, working on model selection and automation in recommender systems. Generally, his research interests revolve around Recommender Systems, specifically applying ideas from AutoML (Automated Machine Learning) to information retrieval and recommender systems.
To follow the talks online, follow us on zoom:
https://uib.zoom.us/j/65989683261?pwd=[REDACTED]

Mid-term evaluation of PhD candidate Khadiga Seddik
2025-04-04 14:00 - 15:00 | SFI MediaFutures, MCB
On Friday, April 4th, PhD candidate Khadiga Seddik will have her mid-term evaluation.
Main supervisor: Erik Knudsen
Co-Supervisor: Damian Trilling, Alain Starke (Step-in)
External Evaluator: Sole Pera

Title: The Influence of News Recommender technology on Shaping Selective Exposure and Sharing.
Abstract:
Despite the benefits the news recommenders provide, overly personalized news recommendations and too much exposure to like-minded news can pose a threat to democracy by leading to filter bubble, echo-chambers, and political polarization. These negative consequences are not given, but they could depend on conditions and factors under which news recommenders amplify or reduce selective exposure. Many studies argue that news recommenders can be programmed to promote factors that reduce selective exposure because they are programmed by human beings, and they are dependent on the decisions surrounding the implementation and design of the technology. However, programming recommender systems to shape selective exposure is not a straightforward task, as we don’t know which factors the recommenders should be designed to promote, as well as how the recommenders should promote them. In this research project I investigate the heavily debated consequences of news recommender technologies, selective exposure and selective of like-minded news. The aim is to shift the scholarly attention from uncovering whether the current recommenders amplify or reduce selective exposure to understanding the conditions under which recommender systems do so, given that they are designed for that purpose. By doing so, we shift the responsibility for the democratic implications of recommenders from the technology itself to the decisions surrounding the implementation and design.
The project is a part of a larger project, the NEWSREC project (https://www.newsrec.ai). The main objective of NEWSREC project is to study, understand, and assess the precise conditions under which algorithmic news recommenders have positive or negative effects on the democratic role of the news media by focusing on both the input side and the output side of news recommenders.

MIX Innovation Day 2025
2025-05-09 11:00 - 14:00 | Media City Bergen, Atrium
Teklab from the Infomedia department in UiB invites to its yearly MIX Innovation Days. Happening in Media City Bergen on Friday May 9th at 11 o’clock, the final year students in media and interaction design (MIX) will pitch their design prototypes and value propositions at a lively event with co-students, university colleagues and industry partners.
The MIX Innovation Day has been held for several years, and is a vibrant arena where bachelor and master students in MIX present their design solutions and prototypes. A jury evaluates the prototypes and hands out the MVP Award – the Minimum Viable Proptotype Award.
At the MIX Innovation Day 2025 you can learn more about seventeen different designs created to tackle real-world challenges across a range of industries, including computer games, apps and web sites for partners as diverse as the Media Cluster Norway, Bergen Bysykkel and Parkinsonforbundet.
SIGN UP HERE
Program
The event takes place in the Atrium at Media City Bergen, Lars Hilles gate 30, next to the Bergen Light Rail station Nygård.
11:00 – 11.05. Welcome.
Our master of ceremony Joao Ribeiro will introduce the event.
11.05 – 12:00: Bachelor webdesign projects.
The five bachelor projects will be presented in a series of pitches with comments from the jury. Read all about the projects below.
12:00 – 13:30: Master safari and lunch.
The twelve master projects will be presented simultaneously at a “safari” where the audience walk from stand to stand and talk with the students and discuss the projects’ merits. Read all about the projects below.
You will also be able to enjoy your free lunch during this session.
13:30 – 13.40. Launch of “Håndbok i innovasjon for studenter”.
TekLab recently published the free online book “Håndbok i innovasjon for studenter” and today it will be officially launched. The TekLab project has spent several years writing it, and a large numer of students and teachers have been involved in the project.
13.40 – 14:00: Awards ceremony.
The jury will announce the winners of the MVP Award for the bachelor and master projects.
The MVP Award
A jury of professional designers will evaluate the projects and give the students valuable feedback. The jury will hand out the MVP award to the project that has the best chance of becoming a real product in the media industry, hence the name “minimum viable product” (MVP). There are separate prizes for the bachelor and master programs. The prize has been awarded for several years in a row, and you can read about the winners from 2024 and the winner from 2023.
The jury is:

Precilia Isaksen is a UX consultant at Bouvet. She was named Designer of the Week by UX Norway in 2024. Precilia is a former MIX student and has previously worked at TV 2.
Sofija Ivanova is a service designer at Youwell, a patient and health technology company. She is a board member of IxDA Bergen and has worked at several design agencies.
Iselin Kornli holds an MSc in innovation and entrepreneurship and has spent the past nine years leading innovation projects, coaching cross-functional teams, and helping to establish innovation environments in several major companies.

We are really grateful that Precilia, Sofija and Iselin will join us as jury members.
Organization
The event is organized by The department of information science and media studies at UiB in collaboration with Agenda Vestlandet. Agenda Vestlandet was established by Sparebanken Vest to drive the green transition in Vestlandet, and it supports research, innovation, and dialogue around regional challenges and opportunities.
The event is prepared and managed by MIX master students Anine Glenne Arnesen and Julie Teilstad Østby in collaboration with Joao Ribeiro, lead open innovation manager at GALP and a teacher at UiB, and professor Lars Nyre.

Trust and trustworthiness: The Rhetorical History of Trust in the Nordics
2025-05-19 11:00 - 16:00 | University of Bergen, Lauritz Meltzers hus (SV-bygget), Room: Vesletinget (Floor 2)
With talks by some of the best national and international researchers in trust and trustworthiness, this seminar explores trust as a historical, societal, and rhetorical phenomenon.
What is trust and trustworthiness in a rhetorical perspective? Can we talk about cultures of trust? What is a culture of trust? How does trust develop historically, and how do digital cultures influence trust and trustworthiness? Furthermore, how may we theoretically account for rhetorical trust and methodologically explore it?
This open and free seminar explores such questions. The seminar is organized by the research project “Trustworthiness: The Rhetorical History of Trust in the Nordics”.
The project examines why the Nordics are consistently among the world’s most trusting countries and explores how this trust is used to explain the stability, prosperity, and even happiness of the citizens in the Nordic countries.
Today, however, a wide range of factors threaten to overturn Nordic people’s propensity to trust each other, including an increasingly fragmented media landscape, as well as a more conflictual political atmosphere.
The renowned speakers in this open and free seminar addressees such issues of trust and trustworthiness.
Program
11.00-11.05: Welcome
11.05-11.25: The working group on Trustworthiness in the Nordic Countries: “Rhetorical trust”
11:25-12.25: Ute Frevert (Max Planck Institute): “Rhetorics and Politics of Trust in Modern Societies – A Historian’s Perspective”
The talk asks why modern societies care about trusting relations? What do they need trust for? What kind of work does trust do? Is trust synonymous with calculativeness, or does it go beyond an instrumental attitude? How do political systems – democratic and non-democratic handle trust?
12.25-13.00: Lunch
13.00-14.00: Helge Skirbekk (Oslo Met): “The historical development of Trust in Norway”
Norway is still characterised by high levels of trust, both in general and in public institutions. Why is this so, and why did it become so? In what is referred to as the Nordic model, there are several things that distinguish Norway from other Western countries. Among these are the high degree of labour organisation, the relatively small income differences, and the large extent of the public sector and the high level of taxes. But the high levels of trust cannot be understood without examining the relatively peaceful historical interactions between elites and population. Belonging to networks built on civic engagement can strengthen norms of mutual trust. I will investigate the emergence of unions and lay organisations, and their interplay with political elites in order to find an answer to this question.
14.00-14.45: Dag Wollebæk (Institute of Social Research): “Trust as sacred rhetoric”
In Norway, trust has become a foundational element of the national self-image. In public discourse, trust is often framed not merely as a strength, but as a sacred value: a non-negotiable, inviolable resource that must be protected at all costs. Drawing on the concept of sacred rhetoric (Marietta, 2008), I argue that the way we talk about trust affects political debate and institutional accountability in profound ways. Sacred rhetoric shifts public argumentation from the weighing of evidence and compromise to the invocation of moral absolutes, the discouragement of criticism, and the protection of power. While this rhetoric may encourage compliance and cooperation, it undermines deliberation and weakens critical vigilance. In this keynote, I examine how the rhetorical sacralization of trust affects democratic discourse in Norway. I argue that desacralizing the rhetoric of trust and shifting the focus from preserving trust to deserving trust would be desirable — to cultivate a political culture where institutions are not shielded by sacred narratives, but held accountable through reasoned scrutiny.
14.45-15.00 Break
15.00-15.30: Esther Oluffa Pedersen (Roskilde University): The Digital Society and Trust
Increasing digitalization raises the question how digital technologies influence relations of trust. This calls for an empirical and conceptual approach. Conceptually I argue that trust evolves between humans but is anchored within the individuals encountering each other with either trust or distrust. Affective and epistemic attitudes of trust or distrust are influenced by the individual’s prior experiences (e.g. betrayals of trust) and future goals (e.g. goals’ dependency on collaboration). Besides interpersonal relations trust also unfolds in institutional trust, trust in oneself and trust in technology. Thriving interpersonal and institutional trust are characterized by mutual assessments of trustworthiness and thus by reciprocity. Trust in technology is different as the non-agential technology does not reciprocate. Many argue that we do not trust but simply rely on technology. It is, however, an empirical fact that the other trust relations are influenced by digital technologies. I will exemplify this with the case of the Danish tax authorities’ fully automated property assessments. The property assessments were digitalized with the explicit ambition to recreate trust in the system of property taxation. Besides exceeding the budget, and as until now not completely implemented, the system has also been sending erroneous assessments out to the citizens.
15.30-16.00: Panel with presenters: How to study trust rhetorically and historically.
Would you to attend the seminar? Please send an email to: Olivia.Akerholm@student.uib.no

Phd Defense of Sohail Ahmed Khan
2025-06-03 09:15 - 15:00 | Ulrike Pihls Hus, Ulrikes aula, Professor Keysers gate 1, Bergen, Norway
On Tuesday, June 3rd, PhD candidate Sohail Ahmed Khan will defend his PhD thesis “Computational Visual Content Verification”. The trial lecture starts at 09.15, and the defense starts at 10.30.
In his dissertation, Sohail Khan explores how newsrooms verify visual user-generated content (UGC) and examines growing challenges related to manipulated media content such as deepfakes and cheapfakes. The dissertation analyses current verification practices in journalism, maps existing tools and workflows, and uncovers a clear gap between technological advances and newsroom practices.
Through the thesis, Sohail contributes both a critical review of the current verification landscape and new AI-based methods for detecting deepfakes and cheapfakes. The research also emphasises the need for closer collaboration between researchers and journalists, and highlights initiatives to build a research community around these challenges, including through international media verification competitions.
Opponents:

Professor Giulia Boato, Department of Information Engineering and Computer Science, University of Trento
Associate Professor Nhien-An Le-Khac, School of Computer Science, University College Dublin

Chair of the committee: Professor Bjørnar Tessem
Chair of the defense: Professor Knut Helland

Japan-Norway Encounters 日本とノルウェーの出会い x Bergen HCI summer seminar
2025-06-04 10:00 - 17:00 | Morning: Auditorium Egget, Studentsenteret Finding your way, afternoon: Nordre Allmenning 3, Nygårdsgaten 5
On the 4th of June, MediaFutures professor Morten Fjeld as part of the HCI research group presents the HCI summer seminar with a special program for the attendees and three test-defenses of PhDs in HCI. Amongst them will be MediaFutures PhD candidate Peter Andrews (see program below).
We are proud to announce that we also got visiting researchers from the Tohoku University in Japan holding a presentation, as well as members of the UiB HCI research group presenting their work.
Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) is a subject with implications for research and development (R&D) in areas such as education, health, engineering, architecture, and media. While innovation is key in advancing HCI itself, innovation is also needed to advance research and industry in these areas.
During this event you will be able to see selected results of the UiB HCI infrastructure project. Presentations will show cutting-edge research demonstrations including conversational agents (Peter), motion capture (Miroslav), gaze tracking (Yuki), AR/VR technology (Paulina, Floris), and digital biomarkers (Vegard). Some of these projects are partially supported by the UiB digital accessibility initiative.

The Program
Check out the Program below by clicking on the date.

Wednesday June 4th
Locations:
9.45-13.00 – Auditorium Egget Studentsenteret, Finding your way, Room layout
13.00- 17.00 – Nordre Allmenning 3 Nygårdsgaten 5, Conference center

Time
Wednesday June 4th

9:00
Picking up at Terminus entrance

9:15
Quick guidance at the Museum Garden

9:45
Welcome and opening remarks of HCI summer seminar / Announcements

10:00

PhD defense rehearsal talk:Human-AI Interaction for Video Content: Designing and Engineering Multimodal Conversational Agents
Peter Andrews, PhD candidate, UiB, Bergen
Abstract: This thesis unifies the second screening experience with Computer Vision (CV) and Deep Learning (DL), thereby building an interactive video framework following the From Video to Data → From Data to Narrative → From Narrative to Interaction paradigm. The result is a Multimodal Conversational Agent (MCA) that can hyper-contextualize video content. This video framework encompasses three research questions:1) How can recent advances in computer vision and artificial intelligence facilitate interaction with video content?2) How can interactive video increase subjective understanding of the content?3) How do young adults perceive the user experience of interactive video for news broadcasts?
Answering these questions gives a better grasp of what is needed to build an end-to-end interactive video framework with AI. At the same time, empirical research can show how the capabilities of the framework can improve user experience and comprehension.
To address these questions, I develop prototypes for interactive video in sports (football) and politics. I approached the video framework in a modular manner with four in-house design prototypes – FootyVision, the Automated Commentary System (ACS), AiCommentator, and AiModerator. Collectively, these four prototypes demonstrate how CV- and NLP-based event detection and LLM-powered MCAs can synchronize and facilitate real-time interaction with video content. I tested prototypes in lab-based mixed method studies and found that interactive video with MCA can enhance engagement, immersion, and subjective understanding. However, a Human-AI Interaction (HAI) trade-off between automation and user control occurs. While a high degree of automation can tightly synchronize the experience, it comes at the cost of user control. The affordances of MCA include multimodal feedback and remediation. Multimodal feedback supports subjective understanding, which aligns with the Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning (CTML). Remediation involves repurposing traditional roles in innovative ways. MCAs achieve this by transforming sports commentators and political moderators into remediated personas, thus leading to increased engagement. Moreover, MCAs can also push the user into a more objective viewing state, highlighting a trade-off between objectivity and emotional involvement. Finally, trust is paramount for high-stakes environments where transparency is crucial.
Test opponent: Shlomo Berkovksy, Macquarie U., Australia

11:00

Keynote: Synthetic versus Real Media: From the age of signal processing to the battle between AI models
Prof. Giulia Boato, University of Trento, Italy
Abstract: Over the last few decades, the realism of synthetic media has increased dramatically. The multimedia research community has developed techniques to distinguish real and fake media, initially focusing on images and, more recently, videos. Early methods relied heavily on signal processing and artefact detection. However, in recent years, AI-generated media has become so hyper-realistic that it is perceived as “more real than real.” This has sparked the AI-versus-AI battle towards new defensive models.
Bio: Giulia Boato is a Full Professor at the Department of Information Engineering and Computer Science, University of Trento, Italy. Since 2012, she has pioneered research at the intersection of signal processing, physiological signal analysis, and, more recently, advanced deep learning methods to distinguish between virtual and real humans. Her work also addresses various forms of digital media manipulation, with a recent focus on deepfake detection and forensic analysis in open-world scenarios such as social media. She has authored over 140 publications in international journals. Her research spans image and signal processing, multimedia data protection, and digital forensics. She is an elected member of both the IEEE Multimedia Signal Processing Technical Committee (MMSP TC) and the IEEE Information Forensics and Security Technical Committee (IFS TC).

12:00
Lunch, Cafe Smauet

13:00
(40 mins)

Short presentation: Tohoku University ICD lab
Prof. Yoshifumi Kitamura (10 min): on the ICD Lab
Assist. Prof. Miao Cheng (5 min): Understanding emotion from bodily movements: database and cultural influence
Manato Abe, PhD student (5 min): Force Sensor Data Feedback Method for Industrial Robot-Arm Operation
Ryo Ooka, PhD student (5 min): Robotics-Enabled Spatial Information Experiences: Novel Presentation with Interactive Displays and Comfortable Furniture
Hongyue Xu, Master student (5 min): From Vision to Emotion: The Future of Human Health in the Age of AI
Yuhui Wang, Master student (5 min): Toward Practical VR: Designing Human-Centered Systems for Training and Well-being
Akira Murakami, Master student (5 min): Robotic Partitioning System for Adaptive Workspaces

13:50
(50 mins)

Short presentation: UiB HCI group
Prof. Morten Fjeld (5 min): From interactive tabletops to in-motion UIs
Prof. Frode Guribye (5 min): Research topic tbd
Assoc. Prof. Miroslav Bachinski (5 min): Simulating Users for Human-Computer Interaction
Yong Ma, Postdoc (5 min): Emotion-aware voice UIs
Pavel Okopnyi, Postdoc (5 min): Design Automation
Yuki Onishi, Postdoc (5 min): Production control room optimization with eye tracking technology
Paulina Becerril Palma, PhD student (5 min): Accessible Mixed Reality
Mahya Jahanshahikhabisi, PhD student (5 min): A Digital Approach to Dementia Research: Integrating Digital Tools, AI, and Personalized Interventions in Dementia Management
Vegard Bolstad, Master student (5 min): Drawn to Mind: Instrumenting fine motor hand movement for cognitive assessment and identification of digital biomarkers for dementia
Andreas Tjeldflaat, Bachelor student (5 min): Tangible Privacy and Privacy Perception

14:40
Coffee break

15:00

PhD defense rehearsal talk: AR for Maritime Collaboration: Using Augmented Reality to Facilitate Team Decision-Making, Team Situation Awareness, and Communication in Maritime Operations
Floris Hendrikus Johannes van den Oever, PhD candidate, UiB, Bergen
Abstract: High-quality collaboration is crucial for safe and efficient maritime operations. Collaboration is a factor in maritime operations, such as ship navigation, port construction, and maintenance of offshore units. A challenge for collaboration is that crewmembers have to share their different perspectives and information. Augmented reality (AR) has the potential to improve maritime collaboration through facilitating team decision-making, team situation awareness (TSA), and communication. This PhD project investigated the potential of AR in facilitating collaboration within maritime operations. It comprised three core studies: a systematic literature review, a laboratory study using virtual reality (VR), and a field study employing AR. The literature review examined current AR applications across various maritime operations, including ship navigation, construction, and maintenance. The laboratory and field studies focused on the use of AR for collaborative ship navigation, emphasizing three key constructs of collaboration: team decision-making, TSA, and communication, along with user experience, and the advantages and disadvantages of AR. Findings indicate that AR can aid communication by simplifying information gathering, displaying the same information to multiple crewmembers, displaying complementary information to different crewmembers, and providing visual tools like point of interest highlighting and crosshairs.
Test opponent: Prof. Yoshifumi Kitamura, Tohoku, Japan

15:40

PhD defense rehearsal talk:Nature–Machine Entanglement: Interacting with Biologically-Informed Flying Robots
Ziming Wang, PhD candidate, Chalmers/Luxembourg/Stanford
Abstract: Nature and humanity have engaged in continuous, evolving interactions throughout history and across technological epochs. I hypothesize that integrating natural characteristics into robot design can enrich HCI by leveraging our deep-rooted familiarity and affinity with the natural world. To explore this, I conducted investigations focusing on close-range interactions with flying robots across various proxemic conditions, employing a mixed-methods approach.
Test opponent: Prof. Yoshifumi Kitamura, Tohoku, Japan

17:00
Closing remarks

19:00
Informal discussion and food/drinks, Amundsen Bar, Terminus

Thursday June 5th

ThursdayJune 5th

Venue

10:00
Picking up at Terminus entrance

10:15
Guided tour or MediaFutures office/research facility

MediaFutures, Media City Bergen

Friday June 6th

12.25
Pick up 12:25 in the atrium of Media City Bergen

MediaFutures, Media City Bergen

12:30-13:30
Guest lecture: Boosting User Trust to Increase the Uptake of Recommendations, Shlomo Berkovksy, Macquarie U., Australia
MediaFutures, Media City Bergen

Boosting User Trust to Increase the Uptake of Recommendations
2025-06-06 12:30 - 13:30 | SFI MediaFutures, MCB
We’re excited to welcome Professor Shlomo Berkovsky to MediaFutures for a special guest talk on June 6! Professor Berkovsky leads the Clinical AI and Sensing Technologies research stream at the Centre for Health Informatics, Macquarie University. His work explores the intersection of AI, health, and media technologies, including research on food recommender systems and user trust in recommendation interfaces.
Abstract of the talk:
The level of trust a user places in a recommender is crucial to the success of recommendations. Although prior work established factors that build and sustain user trust, their comparative power and impact on the uptake of recommendations received less attention. We conducted a user study examining the impact of various recommendation interfaces and content selection strategies on user trust. Following this, we conducted another study that evaluated the impact of including proponents (people or avatars) in the recommendation interface. We will discuss these results and implications on use and misuse in future recommendation interfaces.
About the Speaker:
Shlomo Berkovsky is the leader of the Interactive Medical AI research stream at Macquarie University. The stream focuses on the use of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning methods to develop usable patient models and personalised predictions of diagnosis and care. The stream also studies how clinicians and patients interact with health technologies and how Large Language Models can improve patient care. His other areas of expertise include user modelling, online personalisation, and behaviour change technologies.
We’ll meet you at 12:25 in the atrium of Media City Bergen and take you up to the MediaFutures office on the 3rd floor together.
Food will be served!
If you cannot join in person, you can follow the presentation on zoom by clicking here: https://uib.zoom.us/j/65067583768?pwd=[REDACTED]

fAIrgov-sluttkonferanse
2025-06-12 09:00 - 12:00 | Lillesalen, Kulturhuset i Bergen Vaskerelven 8, 5014 Bergen
Artificial intelligence is often described as the electricity of our time, and its development is accelerating. But what does this mean for the public sector, and what is needed to maintain public trust?

Public Fairness Perceptions of Algorithmic Governance (fAIrgov) is a research project at NORCE that, since 2018, has been exploring Norwegian attitudes toward the use of AI in the public sector. They now invite you to their final conference: a morning of reflections, insights, and discussion, featuring contributions from both researchers and public sector representatives.
Both academic and administrative staff at the Department of Information Science and Media Studies are welcome to attend the conference!
Registration form(Limited number of seats!)
Details of the fAIrgov Final Conference:

Date: June 12
Time: 09:00–12:00
Venue: Lillesalen, Kulturhuset i Bergen, Vaskerelven 8, 5014 Bergen
Afterwards: Lunch and informal research meetups from 12:00–14:00

Preliminary Program:

09:00–09:30 – Doors open, coffee and mingling
09:30–09:45 – Opening remarks by Camilla Stoltenberg
09:45–10:05 – Case: AI in the Norwegian Tax Administration, by Nina Serdarevic
10:05–10:25 – Case: AI in NAV (Labour and Welfare Administration), by Robindra Prabhu
10:25–10:45 – Break
10:45–11:05 – Public support for AI, by Mikael Poul Johannesson, NORCE
11:05–11:50 – Panel debate: What does it take for the Norwegian public sector to be ready for the AI revolution?– with Camilla Stoltenberg, Annette Fagerhaug Stephansen, Sveinung Arnesen, Nina Serdarevic, Robindra Prabhu
11:50–12:00 – Closing remarks by Sveinung Arnesen, fAIrgov project leader
12:00–14:00 – Lunch and informal networking with researchers

The conference is free and open to everyone. It is particularly relevant for public sector employees, researchers, policymakers – and anyone curious about how AI might transform the public sector and affect us as citizens.
Follow the event Is the Norwegian Public Sector Ready for the AI Revolution? on Facebook for updates and a link to the livestream if you’d like to attend digitally.

AI, rights and development of Norwegian language models
2025-06-23 16:00 - 20:00 | Union Scene, Drammen
Artificial intelligence (AI) and language technology have developed rapidly in recent years. The language models used in AI services are trained on vast amounts of text, often without permission from or compensation to the rights holders.
In Norway, there is broad political agreement that we need Norwegian language models. Public and private AI services should reflect the Norwegian and Sámi languages, history, and culture, and there is a need for Norwegian alternatives to international services.
Much is at stake. AI services are already weakening the economic foundation for, among others, translators, illustrators, and those who write and publish educational materials. At the same time, the National Library has documented that language models improve when trained on protected content, such as books and newspapers.
Do Norwegian authors and publishers have a social responsibility to contribute content to Norwegian models if they are compensated?Would such agreements drain an already vulnerable cultural sector by accelerating a shift where human creativity loses ground?Perhaps this is a unique opportunity to set a precedent: that training on protected material must be paid for. New income streams for the cultural field could enable the creation and publication of new works of great value to society.
Panel discussion featuring experts in the field:

Trine Skei Grande, CEO of the Norwegian Publishers Association

Espen Ytreberg, author and professor of media studies

Lilja Øvrelid, professor and head of the Language Technology Group at the Department of Informatics, University of Oslo, MediaFutures Work Package 5 member

Hege Munch Gundersen, CEO of Kopinor

The event is free and open to all. Welcome!

Pint of Science x MediaFutures
2025-06-26 19:00 - 21:00 | Staatsraaden bar, Bergen, Bradbenken 2, Bergen, 5003, Norway
Had Enough of Office Talk and Formal Seminars?
Yeah, us too.
That’s why we’re shaking things up and teaming up with Pint of Science to bring research out of the lecture halls and into your local bar! Join us for our very first Pint of Science night, right in the cosy atmosphere of Staatsraaden bar in Bergen.
Pint of Science is a global, non-profit movement where thousands of researchers in 500+ cities share their work in pubs, cafés, and public spaces. No slides packed with jargon. No academic gatekeeping. Just real science, served with a drink.
This evening’s theme: The Future of Media Technology
Expect three short and super accessible talks from our MediaFutures researchers, each just 10–15 minutes long. They’ve boiled down their work to the juicy bits so you can sip your beer and still get smarter.
The vibe? Casual, fun, and all about conversation. You’ll get to meet the scientists, ask questions, and even take part in a quick quiz to wrap up the night.
So whether you’re a media geek, techie, curious mind, or just someone looking for a different kind of night out, grab a friend or come solo and join us for a pint of science (or soda).
We can’t wait to meet you and hear what you think the future of media should look like.

Samia Touileb
Associate Professor
Talk Title: Bias in Large Language Models

Yuki Onishi
Researcher
Talk title: Can eye gaze show us what future TV production galleries looks like?

Peter Andrews
PhD Candidate
Talk Title: Enhancing Debates with a AI Powered Political Co-Pilot

Arendalsuka: "AI in the media: Empowering editors and safeguarding democracy"
2025-08-12 15:00 - 15:45 | Arendalsuka, Kunstig Intelligens-teltet Kirkebakken 19, Tyholmen, Arendal, Norway
MediaFutures Centre Leader Christoph Trattner, Innovation Coordinator Christopher Senf and MediaFutures Industry Partners will talk about AI in the Media: Empowering Editors and Safeguarding Democracy.
Program
Session 1: Introducing SFI MediaFutures (10 min.):
15:00—15:02:
“A Research Centre for Responsible MediaTechnology and Innovation”
Anne Nielsen (Head of Administration @ SFI MediaFutures)
15:02—15:10:
“MediaFutures in Action: Combating Visual Misinformation with C2PA”
Christoph Trattner (Director @ SFI MediaFutures)
Session 2: AI as a Tool to Empower Editors (20 min.):
15:10—15:20:
“Real Journalist, Virtual Avatar: What We Learned at TV2 from Peeking into Pandora’s Box with KI-Kjetil” (10 min.)
Lubos Steskal and Chris Ronald Hermansen (AI Team @ TV2)
15:20—15:30:
“Leveraging AI for Fac- Checking and Investigative Journalism” (10 min.)
Morten Langfeldt Dahlback (Head of Innovation @ Faktisk.no)
Session 3: AI as a Tool to Preserve Democracy (15 min.):
15:30—15:35
“Reimagining Debate with AI: Fighting Disinformation with a Political Co-Moderator” (5 min.)
Chris Senf (Innovation Coordinator @ SFI MediaFutures)
15:35—15:45:
“Truth Tech: How AI Verifies Political Claims” (10min.)
Gaute Kokkvoll (Head of Product @ Factiverse)

Book Launch: Schibsted – The Digital Transformation of a Nordic Media Giant
2025-08-22 10:00 - 11:00 | Medielab, tower 3, 9. floor, Media City Bergen.
How do you steer one of the Nordics’ largest media companies through the digital revolution while aiming to grow stronger on the other side?
We invite you to a conversation with Ole J. Mjøs, author and Professor of Media Studies at the University of Bergen, who has closely studied Schibsted’s strategic choices, digital transformation, and international journey.
Joining the discussion are Kjersti Løken Stavrum, CEO of the Tinius Trust (Schibsted’s owner) and Chair of the Schibsted Board, and Didrik Munch, former CEO of Schibsted Norway and a key figure in building the company’s strong position. The conversation will be moderated by Sølve Rydland, Political Editor at Bergensavisen (BA).
Together, they will explore some of the big questions:

What have been Schibsted’s greatest successes—and crises?

Which turning points shaped its digital expansion?

Why was the company split?

What is at stake in the battle against global platform giants?

And what lies ahead for a company determined to become the Nordic region’s leading media destination?

This is a rare opportunity to gain firsthand insights into the past, present, and future of one of the most influential media companies of our time.
Organizers: The Centre for Investigative Journalism (SUJO), the Media Industry and Journalism Research Group (Department of Information Science and Media Studies, University of Bergen), and Media Cluster.

Towards Responsible AI for Local Journalism
2025-08-27 14:15 - 16:00 | SFI MediaFutures, MCB
We hereby invite you to a talk by Dr. Reshmi Pillai, Vrije University, Amsterdam, on responsible AI for local journalism where she presents an ongoing research project. The studies include a graph-based retrieval augmented generation for news background information, text simplification of news reports, usage of LLM personas for news feedback for journalists.

About Reshmi Pillai:

Dr Reshmi Pillai is a Post-doctoral Research Associate in the Department of Communication Science at the Vrije University Amsterdam, the Netherlands, in the project “Towards Responsible AI for Local Journalism”. Earlier, she was a Lecturer (Docent 4) in the Masters’ Information Studies program in the Informatics Institute at the University of Amsterdam (2019-2023). In 2021, she was awarded Ph.D. for her thesis titled “Expressions of psychological stress on twitter: detection and characterisation”, from the University of Wolverhampton, UK.

In her research, Reshmi explores human-centred AI applications to support societally embedded workflows and challenges—particularly in journalism. Collaborating with a Dutch news media organization, she led design thinking sessions to identify practical challenges in newsroom settings. This led to several applied projects grounded in Natural Language Processing including: a graph-based Retrieval-Augmented Generation system that provides contextual background to journalists from sources like Wikipedia and news archives, experimental prompting strategies for rewriting news headlines on social media in varied linguistic styles, the development of LLM-based news reader personas to explore cultural inclusivity and evaluations of text simplification models to assess their treatment of stylistic and rhetorical devices.

CANCELLED: MediaFutures Lunch seminar with Assistant Professor Jeremy Barnes
2025-09-01 12:00 - 13:00 | SFI MediaFutures, MCB
Dear all,
The upcoming seminar with Jeremy Barnes is cancelled. Unfortunately, our invited guest has fallen ill and is unable to travel to Bergen to join us. We were very much looking forward to the discussions and insights he was planning to share, and we hope to reschedule his visit at a later date. Thank you all for your interest in the seminars, and I hope to see you at other future events. Have a great week!

WP5 invites to a MediaFutures lunch seminar with Assistant Professor Jeremy Barnes, IXA Taldea / HiTZ Zentroa, University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU).

Tittel: Challenges for automatic summarization evaluation in low-resource languages

Abstract:
In this talk, I will describe a transferable methodology for determining how effective available metrics are at identifying quality differences in automatic news summary quality in Basque and Spanish. After collecting a metevaluation dataset (BASSE) to evaluate five criteria (coherence, consistency, fluency, relevance, and 5W1H), we benchmark how well automatic evaluation metrics and LLM judges are able to capture differences in these criteria. Our results suggest that proprietary LLM judge models currently give the most consistent results across criteria, while a careful combination of automatic metrics can give similar results.

The event will also be streamed. Click here to join digitally: https://uib.zoom.us/j/65787045468?pwd=[REDACTED]

UiB AI #16 Trustworthy AI
2025-09-02 09:00 - 12:00 | Storsalen, Nygårdsgaten 5 (første etasje)
Over the past decade, artificial intelligence has achieved major technological breakthroughs and has become part of research, education and working life. However, for AI to gain widespread acceptance in society, it is crucial that the systems that use artificial intelligence are reliable. Today’s AI systems lack scientific definitions and clear criteria for values such as fairness, responsibility, security, privacy and other important ethical aspects. There are also serious weaknesses in the legal frameworks within which AI systems operate, as well as problems with the accuracy and robustness of the systems.
To address these challenges and strengthen high-quality AI research at UiB, the Trond Mohn Research Foundation (TMF) and the University of Bergen have developed and co-financed the Trustworthy AI research programme. This seminar will present insights from this research programme.
The seminar is held in English.
PROGRAMME
09:00 Coffee/tea and mingling
09:15 Welcome and today’s programme. TBC
09:20 “The Trustworthy AI research programme”. NN, Trond Mohn Research Foundation & Barbara Wasson, TAIS
09:35 “Algorithmic Foundations of Trustworthy AI”. Fedor Fomin from the Department of Informatics, UiB & Thomas Ågotnes, Department of Information Science & Media Studies
09:55 “”TRUSTworthy AI models to predict progression to complications in patients with Diabetes”. Valeriya Lyssenko from the Mohn Research Center for Diabetes Precision Medicine, UiB & Iain Johnston, Department of Mathematics
10:15 Break and coffee
10:30 “Artificial Intelligence in Education: Layers of Trust”, Barbara Wasson & Fride Klykken, Centre for the Science of Learning & Technology (SLATE) & Alessia Di Muro, Faculty of Law
10:50 “PANEL “Conceptions of Trust & Trustworthy AI”, Participants TBD, Barbara Wasson (moderator)
11:15 Discussion
11:30ish Light lunch and mingling
Moderator: Dag Stenvoll, coordinator of UiB AI

Book launch: Teen Boys and their Smartphones as Worldmaking Devices
2025-09-05 12:15 - 14:00 | SFI MediaFutures, MCB
Welcome to the launch of Dr. John Magnus R. Dahl’s book : Teen Boys and their Smartphones as Worldmaking Devices. 5th of September we invite to an event in which our previous Postdoctoral researcher Dahl presents how he spent two years on ethnographic fieldwork, following six teenage boys on- and offline to find out how they use their smartphones to create a world for themselves and their peers.
He asked himself: What is it like to be a young man in the age of the smartphone?
He concludes, among other things, that the smartphone is a crucial tool for creating the kinds of social relationships the boys consider important, and thus a way to increase freedom and agency in their own lives. Furthermore, he shows that this is especially significant for minority boys: queer boys and boys with immigrant backgrounds use their phones differently than straight, white boys.
John Magnus R. Dahl
The launch will take the form of a book conversation between Dahl and Professor Kristine Jørgensen, project leader of Understanding Masculinity in Gaming, followed by an opportunity for questions. The conversation will be held in English. and light refreshments will be served.
The book is published by Palgrave Macmillan and is based on the research Dahl conducted as a postdoctoral fellow at MediaFutures (UiB) from 2021 to 2024. He is now employed as Assistant Professor at the University of Copenhagen.
The e-book is available here, and a longer article about the book’s findings can be read here (in Norwegian).

Innovasjonsuken OPP - 2025
2025-09-15 08:00 - 2025-09-21 17:00 | Bergen
This is Vestlands innovation festival and platform for networking and sharing knowledge. OPP celebrates each year entrepreneurship together with several local partners to highlight their work on innovation. In short, OPP is gathering events from local innovative companies during these two weeks to focus on how innovation can look like in the region of Vestlandet.
We want to feature some of these events which are relevant for MediaFutures followers and supports:
Demo Day Vestlandet
Wednesday 17.09 kl. 12:00 – 18:00
Thormøhlensgate 51
Demo Day Vestlandet annually connects good ideas with capital. Here, selected startup companies from Vestlandet get the opportunity to pitch their ideas in front of a packed audience of investors. A whole day is filled with presentations and exciting meetings. Demo Day Vestlandet is a unique meeting place for you who are an early-stage investor. Every year, 150 investors and funds gather for a party day in Bergen in connection with the OPP Innovation Week. We invite the most exciting, and investor-ready, companies in the west (Rogaland, Vestland and Møre og Romsdal) to a day filled with exciting meetings, presentations and entertainment. Here you get insight into what is happening in the early-stage investor environment and which ideas and companies are worth investing in. You also get the opportunity to meet other investors to expand your network and connections.
UiB Innovation Day: 200 years of research and innovation
Friday 19.09 kl. 09:00 – 15:00
Læringsarena, UiB, Nygårdsgaten 5
On September 19, the University of Bergen is pleased to invite you to UiB Innovation Day, a meeting place for researchers, students and partners from the business and public sectors in the region. The day will focus on research and innovation at all UiB faculties, where we will showcase some of the most exciting projects being developed at UiB with the goal of strengthening collaboration between research and the society around us. The Innovation Day will also mark 200 years of research and innovation in Bergen, including an anniversary exhibition on the occasion of the University Museum of Bergen’s 200th anniversary.
PopOPP
Friday 19.09 kl. 16:30 – Saturday 20.09 kl. 00:00
Marineholmen
On Friday, September 19, students and young adults with drive and ideas will gather for a festival experience a little out of the ordinary. It’s about progress. About creating. About connecting to something bigger. What can you expect? Scenes. Flavors. Atmospheres. People you haven’t met before. Questions you haven’t asked yet. And hopefully a lot of answers.

The future of mobile human-machine interaction
2025-09-16 16:30 - 18:00 | Realfagbygget, Auditorium 2 (basement), Allegaten 41
The use of portable devices is now ubiquitous in our society. Our daily lives are shaped by ever-evolving interactive devices and applications from touch-based smartwatches and tablets to large digital screens.
Although smart devices like laptops, tablets, and smartphones are mobile, users are usually either stationary or risk their physical safety by using such devices while moving. The health consequences of today’s mobile devices are well documented. These include, among other things, how a predominantly sedentary lifestyle affects health and well-being.
This lecture will present innovative thinking, design, and engineering in the field of mobile human-computer interaction (HCI). At the end, there will be time for questions from the audience.

Date: Tuesday, September 16, 2025
Location: Realfagbygget, Auditorium 2 (basement), Allegaten 41
Time: The lecture starts at 16:30 Light refreshments will be served outside the auditorium from 16:00

The meeting is open to everyone and will be in Norwegian.
About the Speaker
Morten Fjeld is a professor in human-computer interaction (HCI) at the University of Bergen and Chalmers University of Technology. He researches interactive systems with a focus on tangible and mobile interaction. Fjeld holds a double master’s degree in applied mathematics from NTNU and ENSIMAG Grenoble, as well as a PhD from ETH Zurich, where he also received the ETH medal in 2002. He has been a visiting professor in Singapore, Japan, and Switzerland, and has extensive industry experience in fluid mechanics, simulators, and user interfaces.

Human-AI Interaction for video Content: Designing and Engineering Multimodal Conversational Agents
2025-09-29 09:15 - 14:00 | Jusbygget, Auditorium 3
Our PhD Candidate Peter Andrews will defend his thesis on September 29th at the University of Bergen.
Trial lecture starts at 09:15 and the defense at 10.30.
We want to encourage you to attend his trial lecture and defense, and learn more about HCI.
Title:
Human-AI Interaction for video Content: Designing and Engineering Multimodal Conversational Agents
Abstract:

As young adults increasingly shift away from conventional news sources, interactive and AI-driven media present a new frontier for their engagement in news consumption. Young adults often prefer more interactive video content on streaming platforms, challenging the traditional model of passive video consumption. Second screening, interacting with a second device while watching a primary display, has emerged to satisfy the need for interaction and support with additional content and context. However, second screening can hinder comprehension, revealing the need to synchronize the experience.

This thesis unifies the second screening experience with Computer Vision (CV) and Deep Learning (DL), thereby building an interactive video framework following the textit{From Video to Data} $to$ textit{From Data to Narrative} $to$ textit{From Narrative to Interaction} paradigm. The result is a Multimodal Conversational Agent (MCA) that can hyper-contextualize video content. This video framework encompasses three research questions: 1) How can recent advances in computer vision and artificial intelligence facilitate interaction with video content? 2) How can interactive video increase subjective understanding of the content? 3) How do young adults perceive the user experience of interactive video for news broadcasts? Answering these questions gives a better grasp of what is needed to build an end-to-end interactive video framework with AI. At the same time, empirical research can show how the capabilities of the framework can improve user experience and comprehension.

To address these questions, I develop prototypes for interactive video in sports (football) and politics. I approached the video framework in a modular manner with four in-house design prototypes – FootyVision, the Automated Commentary System (ACS), AiCommentator, and AiModerator. Collectively, these four prototypes demonstrate how CV- and NLP-based event detection and LLM-powered MCAs can synchronize and facilitate real-time interaction with video content. I tested prototypes in lab-based mixed method studies and found that interactive video with MCA can enhance engagement, immersion, and subjective understanding. However, a Human-AI Interaction (HAI) trade-off between automation and user control occurs. While a high degree of automation can tightly synchronize the experience, it comes at the cost of user control. The affordances of MCA include multimodal feedback and remediation. Multimodal feedback supports subjective understanding, which aligns with the Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning (CTML). Remediation involves repurposing traditional roles in innovative ways. MCAs achieve this by transforming sports commentators and political moderators into remediated personas, thus leading to increased engagement. Moreover, MCAs can also push the user into a more objective viewing state, highlighting a trade-off between objectivity and emotional involvement. Finally, trust is paramount for high-stakes environments where transparency is crucial.

Overall, my research challenges traditional linear media by integrating CV, DL, and NLP into an interactive framework that facilitates on-demand information augmented by the information space. However, future systems must address key concerns regarding the aforementioned trade-offs and the management of cognitive load. I recommend variable autonomy and transparency to give the user control over the experience, reinforcing both trust and understanding through Human-Centered AI (HCAI). By synthesizing these findings in human-AI interaction (HAI) and multimedia learning frameworks, my work provides valuable insights for researchers, developers, and broadcasters looking to engage the next generation of news consumers through interactive video.

Opponents:

Dr. (Research Director, DR2) Petra Isenberg , Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire des Sciences du Numérique, Université Paris-Saclay
Prof Huamin Qu, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

Head of committee
Prof Miroslav Bachinski
Moderator of the defense
Prof Bjørnar Tessem
