Blogs on 👋 hi, I’m basile

I had the privilege of chairing the closing keynote of the 2026 IIPC Web Archiving Conference in Brussels, hosted at the grand KBR (Royal Library of Belgium).

I was back in Perugia this April for the International Journalism Festival, this time as part of a small group co-hosting a closed-door side event called Bridging Journalism and Justice.

Last month, Wikipedia banned Archive.today and began removing close to 700,000 citation links.

I’m looking forward to returning to Perugia for the International Journalism Festival and the stimulating discussions and encounters it brings about every year.

The UN Special Rapporteur on Counter-Terrorism Professor Ben Saul has published a new position paper: Protecting Human Rights while Using Artificial Intelligence to Counter Terrorism – a realy interesting read on how to ensure AI systems protect rather th…

I am excited to share a new article published on Opinio Juris, co-authored with Sabrina Rewald, Emma Irving, and Kate Keator.

Originally published at Nieman Lab.

I recently had the incredible opportunity to participate in a mock trial at the Inner Temple in London (see previous blog about the training).

The content authenticity ecosystem is experiencing unprecedented growth and evolution.

I am pleased to have been selected to present at the International Internet Preservation Consortium (IIPC) annual conference, which took place in April 2025 in Oslo.

Last year, I worked with the TRUE Project and the Institute for International Legal and Advocacy Training (IILAT) to develop training materials and legal arguments – an experience that shifted how I think about the intersection of technology and justice.

I recently opened a presentation by a short explanation of what it is I do ™️ and how I got here.

Originally published at Nieman Lab.

Originally published at Nieman Lab.

I am so proud to announce that our team at Starling Lab, alongside partners Hala Systems and DFRLab, has submitted groundbreaking digital evidence to the International Criminal Court (ICC) documenting alleged attacks on schools in Kharkiv, Ukraine.

Originally published at Nieman Lab.

The updated version of The Data Journalism Handbook was published this week – a huge relief for Liliana Bounegru and Jonathan Gray, its editors, who have been working on this for years.

🎉 I’m very exited to announce that the Digital Evidence Preservation Toolkit is being funded by the Prototype Fund, a joint venture of the Open Knowledge Foundation and of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research!

Earlier this week, as I was looking into idiomatic ways of updating a chart, I came across Kaho Cheung’s d3-render – and boy did I get excited. d3-render packages up a bunch of d3 commands in a declarative shell, inspired by a eather functional and reacti…

Originally published at Nieman Lab.

An original data-driven experiment looking at how Brexit splits the Tories.

December 2025 Update: I’ve refreshed the data for this analysis.

A node backend and a modular, reactive front page visualising the UK general election results, as they happened.

An interactive map of natural gas infrastructure in the EU, built with Svelte and d3, for Global Witness.

I recently had to complete a technical test for a role I’m interested in.

So, I’m in France right now, and with this lockdown going on we’re quite restricted on the physical exercise front.

Let’s say things are a little confused over here in Brexit Land.

Earlier this year, I released a simple R package (available at basilesimon/noaastorms) that downloads, cleans and parses NOAA IBtrack data for you.

Over the Christmas holidays, I read “Maths Meets Myths: Quantitative Approaches to Ancient Narratives,” from the Springer Understanding Complex Systems collection.

Mapping historical storms data is now a little bit easier.

This is a Christmas present to myself to celebrate 10,000km of commuting on my bicycle: a lovely frame print of all my GPS traces on a home-made map of London.

I made a sweet Christmas present for my friend Clément, who cycles far too much.

Japan is currently counting the cost of the strongest typhoon to hit its coasts in 25 years.

This year, the OpenVis conference took place in Paris.

Joy of joys, I am in Italy again.

End of term.

Today, we are happy to share the first version of our data visualisation catalogue: a collection of data visualisations created for the Times and Sunday Times, collected together in one place in the hope that what we have learned can be useful to others.

Originally published at Nieman Lab.

There was quite a bit of excitement in the newsroom when news came in that prime minister Theresa May, contrary to her promises, was calling for a snap election on May 8, 2017.

I was apparently bullied into opening an account on Medium (for the second time).

I was apparently bullied into opening an account on Medium (for the second time).

This year, I have the privilege to be teaching at City university, as part of the MA in Interactive Journalism.

I never thought I’d talk about football this much, but here you go.

Originally published at Nieman Lab.