The European Commission (EC) has recognised the exposure of citizens to online disinformation and micro-targeting of voters based on the unlawful processing of personal data as one of the major challenges for European democracies. In a response, the EC has put in place several measures creating a "European approach". This paper analyses the approach to identify which are the key principles upon which it is based; and the extent to which it takes into account the complexities of the challenges identified. The initial conclusions are that, while being a significant step in the creation of a common EU answer to disinformation and political manipulation, the "European approach" requires further elaboration, primarily to include additional layers of transparency and public oversight.

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Technological transformation has provided conditions for people to engage in different stages of news production, as never before. With this in mind, this paper explores whether the media and journalists across Europe in their attempt to innovate the news business model reconsider their relations to users. More specifically, we question whether this innovation seeks to address users primarily as citizens or as consumers. The analysis is based on the data collected by national research teams through the project Media Pluralism Monitor 2016, implemented in EU:28, Montenegro and Turkey. The results show that the most visible attempts of innovation are crowdfunding/crowdsourcing and paywalls, which can be seen as a turn to audiences to compensate for a loss in advertising revenues. At the same time, only a few initiatives re-invent their relationship with audiences by giving them more decision-making powers (be it related to content or to their business strategy). Audiences are to a great extent still treated simply as paying consumers, and the level of participation remains limited.

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