About
Dr D. Bondy Valdovinos Kaye is a digital media and platform governance researcher. Their research explores power, policy, and inequality in the tech industry and cultural industries through lenses of political economy and socio-legal theory. Kaye completed a PhD in Creative Industries in 2021 at Queensland University of Technology. Their PhD research investigated the enduring colonial legacy of copyright law in the Myanmar music industry.
Kaye is author of TikTok: Creativity and Culture in Short Video (2022, Polity Press), the first scholarly book analysing the popular short video platform, TikTok. They have authored or co-authored over twenty peer-reviewed journal articles on a range of topics including content moderation on digital platforms, consumer finance regulation on digital platforms, the financialization of intellectual property rights, and generative AI in the music industry.
Prior to joining the LSE, Kaye served as a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Leeds on an ERC-funded Horizon 2020 grant project entitled MUSICSTREAM led by Prof David Hesmondhalgh that studied the impact of digital streaming platforms on music culture around the world. Kaye served as Lecturer of Digital Media at Queensland University of Technology, Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Sorbonne University Paris Nord, and Senior Research Fellow at Curtin University. They were a founding member of the TikTok Cultures Research Network. Outside of academia, Kaye is a multi-instrumentalist, recording artist, and stand-up comic.
Awards:
Dec 2021 SAGE Student Publication Prize
Queensland University of Technology ($400 AUD)
Sept 2019 Three Minute Thesis All-University Winner
Queensland University of Technology ($1000 AUD)
Aug 2019 Q1 Journal Publishing Award
Queensland University of Technology ($500 AUD)
Jul 2019 John Hartley Oxford Internet Institute Scholarship Award
Queensland University of Technology (£1875)
Research
Selected publications:
Burgess, J. Bartolo, L., Gray, J.E., Hutchinson, J., Kaye, D.B.V., Matamoros-Fernandez, A., Pappalardo, K., & Wikström, P. (2024). ‘Diversity’ as epistemic trading zone for understanding and improving media and entertainment recommender systems. International Journal of Cultural Studies. https://doi.org/10.1177/13678779241239342
Hesmondhalgh, D., Valverde, R. C., Kaye, D.B.V., & Li, Z. (2023). Digital Platforms and Infrastructure in the Realm of Culture. Media and Communication, 11(2). https://doi.org/10.17645/mac.v11i2.6422
Kaye D.B.V. (2025) Renting royalties: How the assetization of music copyrights contributes to inequality for musicians. Media, Culture and Society. https://doi.org/10.1177/01634437251341715
Kaye, D.B.V., Zeng, J., & Wikström, P. (2022). TikTok: Creativity and Culture in Short Video. Polity Press.
Kaye, D.B.V. & Gray, J. (2021). Copyright Gossip: Exploring copyright opinions, theories and strategies on YouTube. Social Media + Society https://doi.org/10.1177%2F20563051211036940