Stefano Baccinella, of ISTI-CNR, Pisa, Italy, is the winner of the 2009 "Franco Denoth Award". The award, now at its first edition, is granted by the "Fondazione Franco ed Enrico Denoth" in memory of Franco Denoth, computer science pioneer and, among others, former member of the ERCIM Board of Directors (see ERCIM News 72 for a tribute to Franco on the occasion of his death). The 2009 "Franco Denoth Award" is granted to the best MSc thesis obtained in 2008 from the University of Pisa, dealing with issues related to the development of the Internet. Stefano obtained his MSc degree in Computer Science with a thesis entitled "Multi-Facet Rating of Online Hotel Reviews: Issues, Methods and Experiments", carried out under the supervision of Andrea Esuli and Fabrizio Sebastiani, both of ISTI-CNR (see ERCIM News 77, pp. 60-61 for a brief description of Baccianella's thesis work). Stefano's thesis is now a book, published by VDM Verlag, Saarbrücken, Germany. Stefano is currently pursuing a PhD in Information Engineering at the University of Pisa.
