Lottery fantasies and the story of luck


Who does not dream of wealth and luck? An international research team, including Angela Fabris, a specialist in Romance languages, is investigating the emergence of national lotteries and of gambling fantasies in Europe from the 18th century to the present day.

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The fastest trackers in video searches

Every day, 80,000 hours of video material are uploaded to the video platform YouTube alone, corresponding to a period of nine years. Multimedia researchers around the world are working to improve searches in these video pools, common – amongst others – to many media organisations. One of these researchers is Klaus Schöffmann, who created the Video Browser Showdown for this purpose in 2012. Today, the world’s leading scholars take part in this competition and present their latest approaches to searching for videos.

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Saving the world with a “like”?

Adding rainbow flags and the dove of peace to profile pictures and lighting an online candle to oppose racism: social engagement is effortless on social media channels. We spoke to Christina Peter, a scholar in the field of communication, about the role networks play for movements like Fridays for Future or #metoo.

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Catching up with … Alice de Benetti

Alice de Benetti works as Global Search Marketing Manager at Swarovski. She talks to ad astra about how studying at two universities can work, how quickly markets change, and what happens when a university is open to everyone.

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