23 May 2023
Pay to Play
The rise of subscription-based business models in social media is part of a broader trend that can be observed in many industries. Against this background, it is necessary to adapt European consumer law to the new risks of the subscription economy.However, it is not enough to give consumers rights on paper. Nor is it sufficient to inform consumers about their rights in the small print. Effective consumer protection in digital markets requires a user interface design that enables consumers to exercise their rights with a simple click. Continue reading >>
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22 May 2023
The Shape of Personalisation to Come
While targeted advertising is still a money-making machine for social media platforms, its motor has begun to sputter. However, with artificial intelligence, the potential is even greater for companies to discover and exploit biases and vulnerabilities in consumers that they themselves may not be aware of. The point of this dive into economic engineering of personalised environments on digital platforms is to highlight the intentional creation of algorithmically curated choice sets for consumers. How can the law ensure their fairness? Continue reading >>22 May 2023
A Non-Binary Approach to Platform-to-Business Transactions
Social media is a disruptive technology that has challenged fundamental distinctions in contract law, as social media contracts don't adequately reflect complex relationships between platforms, businesses, and consumers, among others. Contract law has the potential for greater sensitivity to contract classifications because different types of contractual relations invoke different values and trade-offs. Courts can better posit them in the spectrum between business and consumer contracts, while securing business users‘ unique interests Continue reading >>
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19 May 2023
Digesting the (Not So) Free Lunches of Social Media
It has become common wisdom that “there is no such thing as free lunch.” Social media shows us daily how true this observation remains until today. The ‘conventional’ business model of these platforms focuses on data exploitation, and, increasingly, ‘freemium’ models. While it is obviously worthwhile to explore objectionable business practices in e-commerce and on social media, as 'freemium' models gain traction, this contribution suggests that the discourse on ‘dark patterns’ is somewhat sketchy and incomplete – and in need of more specificity. Continue reading >>
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17 May 2023
Social Media Contracts – The Quest for Fairness and the Need for Reform
The social media landscape is changing. The ‚public forum‘ is now filled with citizens selling products, promoting services, charging for subscriptions, and sometimes seeking attention in ways which may not be socially desirable. We ask: How can a space that is becoming increasingly commercialised, monetised, and is a source of income for many nevertheless be fair? Continue reading >>
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10 May 2023
Taiwan’s Participatory Plans for Platform Governance
Platform regulation is not limited to Europe or the United States. Although much debate currently focuses on the latest news from Brussels, California, or Washington, other important regulatory ideas emerge elsewhere. One particularly consequential idea can be found in Taiwan. Simply put, Taiwan wants to, tacitly, democratize platform governance. Concretely, Taiwan wanted to establish a dedicated body that would potentially facilitate far-reaching civil society participation and enable ongoing citizen involvement in platform governance. This article explains what discourses about platform governance can learn from Taiwan and how vivid democratic discourse shapes platform governance beyond traditional regulatory models. Continue reading >>
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27 February 2023
Action Recommended
The DSA will have a say in what measures social media platforms will have to implement with regard to the recommendation engines they deploy to curate people’s feeds and timelines. It is a departure from the previous narrow view of content moderation, and pays closer attention to risks stemming from the amplification of harmful content and the underlying design choices. But it is too early to celebrate. Continue reading >>
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15 December 2022
Articulating Legitimacy through Policy Recommendations
On 6 December, Meta's Oversight Board issued a policy advisory opinion on 'cross-check', a content moderation system used by the company to avoid the erroneous removal of content shared by highly influential users on its platforms. Despite the opinion’s directness in calling Meta out for the disproportionate attention paid to corporate interests to the detriment of its human rights commitments, the OB’s decision presents an underlying duplicity, as it criticises policy and design choices replicated in the OB’s own architecture. This curtails the institution's capacity to enhance accountability and legitimacy. Continue reading >>
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25 November 2022
Protecting Media Content on Social Media Platforms
On 16 September 2022 the European Commission released a proposal for a Regulation establishing a common framework for media services in the internal market, also known as the European Media Freedom Act. The proposal includes safeguards against political interference in editorial decisions, and includes a series of provisions targeting online services and establishing additional obligations and regulatory powers in this field. Continue reading >>
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10 November 2022