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Watchdogs, Platforms and Audience: An Economic Perspective on Media Markets

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Abstract

The present paper provides a basic model to describe the functioning of media markets. The authors use this general theoretical framework to illustrate the key economic contributions according to the two-sided literature and the media capture and media bias approaches. Particular attention is devoted to the issue of pluralism.

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Notes

  1. The present review is an expanded and formalized version of a previous Italian paper by Battaggion and Vaglio (2013).

  2. The price structure of the platform distinguishes between the membership (access) fee and transaction (usage) fee. However, for the sake of simplicity, we abstract from the usage fee.

  3. For an interesting survey on “media governance,” see Puppis (2014).

  4. Notice that in Motta and Polo (1997) quality is not related to the cultural content, but it is interpreted as popular appeal or perceived quality.

  5. Two unpublished papers’ (Sobbrio (2011), Battaggion and Vaglio (2012b)) attempt to formalize this notion within a Bayesian framework.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Management, Economics and Quantitative Methods Department, Bergamo University, via dei Caniana 2, Bergamo, 24127, Italy

    Maria Rosa Battaggion

  2. CRIOS Bocconi University, Milano, Italy

    Maria Rosa Battaggion

  3. Management, Economics and Quantitative Methods Department, Bergamo University, Bergamo, Italy

    Alessandro Vaglio

Authors
  1. Maria Rosa Battaggion
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  2. Alessandro Vaglio
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Correspondence to Maria Rosa Battaggion.

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Battaggion, M.R., Vaglio, A. Watchdogs, Platforms and Audience: An Economic Perspective on Media Markets. Atl Econ J 43, 209–228 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11293-015-9455-5

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