Paolo Mancini has been Professor at the Department of Political Sciences, University of Perugia. His research focuses mostly on political communication in comparative perspective. He is the author of many books both in English and Italian. The book he wrote with Dan Hallin, “Comparing Media Systems. Three Models of Media and Politics” won several prizes and was translated in many languages. Mancini is Fellow of International Communication Association and in 2019 was awarded the Murray Edelman Career Achievement Award from the Political Communication division of the American Political Science Association (APSA). In the same year Mancini received the title of “Honorary doctor” from Midsweden University, Sundsvall.

Nina Springer (Dr. phil, LMU Munich) is an associate professor in the Journalism Department at Södertörn University, Stockholm, Sweden. Her research evolves around online user comments: She has investigated commenters’ motives and contributions to viewpoint diversity, as well as comments’ use for and their effects on audiences and journalists alike. Her most recent work focuses on the dark side of comments: How harassment and hate speech affect specifically female journalists, or how conspiracy theories around Covid-19 are spread and countered by commenting communities. Nina preferably works comparatively and collectively. She guest lectured at the University of Helsinki, the National University of Singapore, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She co-chaired and chaired the Journalism Studies Division of the German Communication Association (2016-2018, 2018-2020) and served as the Secretary of the Journalism Studies Division of the International Communication Association (2017-2019). Before joining Södertörn University, professor Springer spent the winter term 2017/18 as a visiting researcher at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University.