IIC UK Chapter – Media plurality in an ad funded world?

Date: Tuesday 17 September
Time: 17:00-19:00 BST, followed by a networking reception

Kindly hosted by Oxera

Discussion topics were:

• Plurality: Impacts on news and media of shift to online advertising
• Competition: What issues are emerging and what is CMAs view – see Privacy Sandbox , AdTech cases, DMCCA. And international cases.
• Privacy: How can rights to privacy be protected and growth generated?

Registration Fees for delegates

Tuesday 17 September 2024
IIC UK Chapter Event

IIC Members – Free
Non-Members – £25 GBP (excluding VAT *) 
*VAT will be applicable for UK registrations only

If you feel the delegate fee may be a barrier to attending this event, please contact us at enquiries@iicom.org

We had a great host and scene setter from Oxera followed by a review of the market context from IIC UK Chair Tim Cowen. Tim referred to the issues identified in the Res Publica report, the Furman Report, Stigler Centre report that preceded the EU Digital Markets Act and the CMA’s 2020 Market Report on Online Markets and Digital Advertising. They identified the following issues:

1. All digital markets exhibit high fixed cost low variable costs and high network externalities, meaning that increased returns to scale and scope and increased efficiency tends to generate monopolies. Like telecoms there is then a need to regulate to achieve public interest outcomes.
2. Digital Advertising markets are largely now dominated by Facebook and Google each holding about a 40% share. The remainder is competed for by smaller publishers including newspapers. Incomes are reducing and threatening journalism. This has been called out in the Cairncross Review and the House of Lords report Breaking News? The EU has enacted the DMA and the UK has enacted the DMCC to intervene and secure public interest outcomes. So we have a problem of lack of funding for journalism and there isn’t a mechanism to ensure plurality of the media.
3. We have moved from a world that is content supported by advertising to one where we have advertising supported by content. This means a world where people used to pay attention to content. They read content and were encouraged to apply their critical faculties and spend time understanding content and engaging with it.
4. Advertising was in the past additional income for the distributor: newspapers and magazines were often sold in newsagents who generated income from the sale of sweets and tobacco as well as news and magazines.
5. The shift in business model has affected the way news is consumed – lack of engagement is promoted by platforms that are promoting adverts being seen by consumers and paid for on a per impression or cost per click basis; this leads to and fuels doom scrolling.
6. News and the public interest in plurality of the media is undermined. Essential elements of democracy are threatened.
7. Platforms combining AI into their systems are accelerating the pace of consumption of copyrighted material that is used for their training data.
8. The DMCC is designed to address market failure and provide a basis on which the DMU can take action to prevent loss of public goods such as plurality of the media.
9. Ofcom has just launched a public service media review in which this will be discussed and the grounds for action consulted on.
10. See further from one of our IIC members: Review of public service media: Ofcom publishes terms of reference – Wiggin LLP : Wiggin LLP