Digital intermediaries and cultural industries: the developing influence of distribution platforms

Abstract

The last few years have seen the generalization of a communicative device which is technical and organizational integration of a terminal, an operating system, a network connection, an online platform to access applications (contents and services). Indeed, smartphones, connected TVs, tablet computers and game consoles are structured by this model which develops itself thanks to the rise of computer performance and capacity telecommunication networks. Single technical interface for users, they show, for industrial actors involved, a mode of organization cannot be reduced to a commercial intermediation. So at the heart of this configuration are the "platforms" which are a new form of goods and services distribution and carry out the renewal of uses and related practices and a change in the value chain which are in the depths of effective change, hopes and fears aroused by the devices presented in our contribution.Our paper aims at exposing the evolution of these devices in several fields of cultural industries especially mobile and audiovisual sectors with a focus on smartphone and connected TV industry. It intends thereby to question the double dialectic in these sectors in reconfiguration (integration / disintegration activities on the one hand and disintermediation / re-intermediation on the other hand).

Critical Interpretations of Global-Local Co-Productions in Subscription Video-on-Demand Platforms: A Case Study of Netflix’s YG Future Strategy Office

“…At the forefront of these changes was the emergence of the platform as a new model to analyze, extract, and monopolize data, quickly becoming a new form of capital production (Srnicek 2017). Platforms can be understood as “the online services of content intermediaries, both in their self-characterizations and in the broader public discourse of users, the press and commentaries (Gillespie 2010, 349).” As intermediaries, platforms provide opportunities for both incumbent major and minor stakeholders in the industries; to consolidate their pre-existing market share and to penetrate in niche markets respectively (Guignard 2014; Plantin et al 2018). About this, Gawer (2009, 3–4) describes a platform as a “building block, which can be a product, a technology, or a service, that acts as the foundation upon which other firms can develop complementary products, technologies or services.” Hence, both OTT and SVOD are platforms since they allow “content developers to systematically track and profile the activities and preferences of billions of users (Nieborg and Poell 2018, 4276).” Based on sophisticated algorithms equipped within their user database, they provide à la carte selections to their subscribers.…”

“…Platforms can be understood as "the online services of content intermediaries, both in their self-characterizations and in the broader public discourse of users, the press and commentaries (Gillespie 2010, 349)." As intermediaries, platforms provide opportunities for both incumbent major and minor stakeholders in the industries; to consolidate their pre-existing market share and to penetrate in niche markets respectively (Guignard 2014;Plantin et al 2018). About this, Gawer (2009, 3-4) describes a platform as a "building block, which can be a product, a technology, or a service, that acts as the foundation upon which other firms can develop complementary products, technologies or services."…”