A Thorough Study of European Union’s Online Media Platforms: What Is EU’s State of Things?
摘要
The media industry is undergoing a deep transformation. The universal access to the Internet, with not only a laptop but more practical devices, such as smartphones, has altered the way people consume content. Society has been migrating from traditional media (e.g., radio and TV) to Internet-distributed media, due to the easier consumption accessibility, content sharing simplicity, and higher level of freedom. Given the dominance of American and Chinese companies in this transformed media market (with social media platforms, such as YouTube and TikTok) and European Union’s significant innovation efforts, it is relevant to understand the types of business models implied by EU’s online media platforms. A dataset of fifty online media platforms from the EU is used, and their underlying business model attributes are defined through a morphological analysis. Results from a cluster analysis identify two types of online media platform business models (a regional magazine and a tiered social media) currently being employed by EU companies.