Nima Thing
Early-career Computational Social Science Researcher · Political Communication & Alternative Media · Berlin
Berlin, Germany
I am an early-career computational social science researcher based in Berlin, originally from Kathmandu, Nepal. I study how alternative and independent media actors shape political attention, discourse, and mobilization — with a focus on understudied political contexts, especially Nepal.
I was trained in electronics engineering in Kathmandu, worked for several years as a quality assurance/automation software engineer, and then moved into social science through a postgraduate diploma in research writing (The Open Institute for Social Science, Nepal) and a Master of Data Science for Public Policy at the Hertie School (Data for Good scholarship, 2023–2025).
At logiq.media (part-time since April 2026; volunteer researcher Jan–Mar 2026), I work on audience segmentation, narrative mapping, and creator-led political messaging — including the European Narratives Observatory SHIFT project. My prior research includes a submitted MSc thesis on political TikTok virality in Nepal’s 2022 elections (supervised by Prof. Simon Munzert) and observational work on mobilization across Reddit, Facebook, and Bluesky.
I am preparing to apply for PhD programmes in computational social science and political communication. I do not yet have peer-reviewed journal publications; my outputs so far are a submitted master’s thesis, working papers, posters, and talks — on Research outputs. The fuller agenda is on Research.
news
| Jun 11, 2026 | Abstract accepted for a poster at “Youth in a Digital Society”, organized by the University Research Focus “Education for the Future,” University of Potsdam (poster session 8 October 2026). |
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| Jun 10, 2026 | Presented poster at “How Are You, Democracy?” conference in Karlsruhe (25 June 2026) — Beyond the ban: co-engagement network signals on Nepali Reddit in the run-up to the Sep 8 Gen Z protest. |
| May 12, 2026 | Presented a session called “AI, Democracy and Elections module” under “AI for Governance and Public Good” to participants from Project Abhaya from Kathmandu, Nepal. |
| Apr 24, 2026 | Presented my Master Thesis “TikTok Virality and Political Engagement in Nepal’s 2022 Elections” at Turkey Computational Social Science Conference (TCSS) 2026 |
| Apr 01, 2026 | Started with European Narrative Observatory project called SHIFT, a multi-country project studying harmful online narratives and testing creator-led counter-messaging by linking audience segmentation, platform use, and channel-level engagement. (Logiq Media) |
selected research
- Fact-Checking in the Feed: The Gap Between Output Metrics and Public Reception2026Mixed-methods commentary, co-authored at logiq.media. Submitted to the HKS Misinformation Review (under review).
- Beyond the Ballot: TikTok Virality and Political Engagement in Nepal’s 2022 Election2025MSc thesis (Hertie School, 2025). Submitted and completed; revised after committee feedback. Supervised by Prof. Simon Munzert. Multimodal machine-learning pipeline (CLIP, Whisper, XGBoost) for political-virality prediction in a low-resource, multilingual electoral context. Not yet published as a journal article.