PILATI FEDERICO
Biography
Federico Pilati is a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Milano-Bicocca.
He obtained an European Doctorate from IULM University in Milan, defending a thesis titled "One Pandemic, Many Controversies. Mapping the COVID-19 'Infodemic' via Digital Methods". Throughout his doctoral studies, he has been involved in establishing the Infodemic Observatory, a project co-funded by the Bruno Kessler Foundation and the World Health Organization.
As a researcher, he took part in two Horizon projects, inDICEs and EUMEPLAT, the EMIF-funded project UnMiSSeD, and the Future Artificial Intelligence Research partnership within NRRP. He has also been a visiting scholar at the Center for Internet and Society at CNRS in Paris and at the Medialab of the University of Geneva.
Research
- Active participation in the creation of digital content, exemplified by collaborative editing on Wikipedia (OIR) and by the participation to so-called challenges in TikTok (HSSC);
- The creator economy and its associated monetization models, exemplified by live-streaming services such as Twitch (Scientific Reports) and online music distribution platforms like Bandcamp (IJCP);
- Digital subcultures, with particular reference to early Web 2.0 forums and more recent subReddits connected to the Flat Earth Society (New Media & Society), and to writing and reading communities in fanfiction forums such as the Archive of Our Own (Convergence);
- The formation of knowledge communities on Twitter during the Covid-19 (Social Science & Medicine), with particular attention both to misinformation risks and algorithmic censorship (Frontiers in Sociology);
- Mediatized controversies surrounding the Covid-19 at the nexus of rumors dissemination and the attention economy on Facebook (RIS) and Twitter (ComPol, TS, PaCo);
- Artificial Intelligence both as a tool for social research (Sociologica) and as an active agent in algorithmic public opinion (Frontiers in Political Science).
Publications
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Pilati, F., Venturini, T. (2025). The use of artificial intelligence in counter-disinformation: a world wide (web) mapping. FRONTIERS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE, 7 [10.3389/fpos.2025.1517726]. Detail
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Pilati, F., Sacco, P., Scianna, M., Artime, O. (2025). The broadcasting trap: TikTok and the “democratization” of digital content production. HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES COMMUNICATIONS, 12(1) [10.1057/s41599-025-04797-w]. Detail
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Pilati, F., Houssard, A., Sacco, P. (2025). Mirroring the inequalities of mainstream music platforms: popularity, revenue, and monetization strategies on Bandcamp. INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF CULTURAL POLICY, 31(3), 338-357 [10.1080/10286632.2024.2356169]. Detail
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Pilati, F., Venturini, T., Sacco, P., Gargiulo, F. (2024). Pseudo-scientific versus anti-scientific online conspiracism: A comparison of the Flat Earth Society’s Internet forum and Reddit. NEW MEDIA & SOCIETY [10.1177/14614448241252593]. Detail
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Pilati, F., Tartari, M., Houssard, A., Sacco, P. (2024). From fandoms to heritage. Understanding fanfiction forums as Digital Heritage Communities. CONVERGENCE [10.1177/13548565241302245]. Detail