Platforms and Cultural Production

In the past few years, platform studies have examined how platform companies reshape the mechanisms of the public sphere. In Platforms and Cultural Production, the authors explore platformization as a critical concept to theorize the transformation of cultural production. Previous studies define platformization as the penetration of platform companies into the public infrastructure, economic processes, and governmental frameworks of daily life. However, this book expands on this idea: the authors argue that the platformization of cultural industries implies power circulation between platform companies and cultural producers, empowering the platforms with authority to restructure cultural marketing.

In the book's introduction, the authors first delve into a systematic overview of platformization theory and cultural industry studies, then trace the theoretical linkage of the two research contexts. They claim that the departure point of this book is the comparison between cultural production routines led by platform companies and Internet websites: In contrast to websites that merely provide access for cultural producers to online cultural markets, platforms are empowered to control the flow of data, and thus determine the exposure of certain cultural products. Hence, platformization represents a dynamic process of power consolidation in favour of the platform, wherein the platform assumes an increasingly dominant role.

The remaining part of this book is divided into two sections, the institutional and the practical dimensions of cultural production. The focus is on three cultural industries: social media, games and news. The first half emphasizes the structural relationship between the cultural market, digital infrastructure, and governance institutions, while the second half details the relationship between the platform and cultural producers through the framework of labour, creativity, and democracy.

Chapter two focuses on the topic of the cultural market. Through the case of the game studio Zynga, this chapter unfolds how cultural producers increasingly rely on platform companies to disseminate and commercialize their products. By providing a multi-sided market, platform companies change the market relationship by holding power for matchmaking audience, users and cultural producers (p.49). Moreover, the platform facilitates the connection among them and stimulates the engagement of select cultural producers in the business and technical innovation of platform enterprises. On Facebook, game developers can leverage the existing data and technology on the platform to develop games, which can also be distributed and promoted on Facebook. At the end of this chapter, the authors contend that platformization involves two stages of economic power circulation: Platforms undermine the authority of professional cultural producers by promoting audience co-creation into cultural production, while consolidating their own autonomy to change pricing schemes or impose platform regulations.

Chapter three advances the discussion on platform infrastructure by delving into how cultural platforms incorporate producer relationships by leveraging their openness, ownership, and technical availability. The authors claim that platform infrastructures provide ‘economic and material affordances to develop, disseminate, market, and/or monetize cultural content,’ (p. 52). Drawing on instances such as the Guardian's outsourcing of its content hosting and data analytics functions to the AWS Cloud platform, they unveil how platforms’ control over interfaces and data has endowed them with a dominant position that cultural producers now rely on. This differs from physical public infrastructure, as platform infrastructure is no longer a free public asset. Cultural producers must conform to the platform's technical requirements to access their support and tailor their products to their programming requirements. Additionally, platform infrastructure also increases tension between regions. The case of India's prohibition of Tiktok illustrates that infrastructure building is regarded as data aggression and technological colonialism due to the need to collect users’ geolocation and data; sometimes it leads to geopolitical implications between nations.

Chapter Four investigates the functioning of platform governance within the cultural industry. By characterizing governance as a mechanism of institutional steering (p. 81), the authors classify platform governance into three modes: Regulation, Curation, and Moderation. Regulation refers to the ‘standards, guidelines, and policies set by the platforms.’ (p.85). Through instances such as the Apple App Store and Facebook Developer Account mechanisms, platforms are empowered to scrutinize the content of cultural products and set technical benchmarks for accessing them. If regulation determines the eligibility of cultural products for the platform, then curation ascertains their visibility on the platform. The authors demonstrate that platforms possess a subjective power of content selection by highlighting the transition from editorial to algorithmic curation. Especially for platforms like Spotify, YouTube, and Instagram, which rely on content recommendation schemes, algorithmic support like ‘Today’s Top Hits’ surpasses conventional artist and record company recommendations and endorsements in content promotion. The centralization of platform power is also manifested in their moderation of content, algorithms, and business strategies since platform companies have to cater to commercial interests and political regulations. Therefore, the discussion of market, infrastructure, and governance gradually reconciles a theoretical tension: platforms are both facilitators of cultural production for a broad spectrum of producers and prospective monopolists of cultural capital.

In chapter 5-7, the authors take labour, creativity and democracy as three case studies for illustrating the influence of platfomization in cultural industries: From chapter 5, the platformization of cultural production increase precarity, individualization and unevenness of cultural labour, since the cultural producers’ patterns of organization, economic distribution and their work visibility managed by the platform. Turning to creativity, chapter 6 argues that platforms’ engagement seeks to transform creativity production through their algorithmic preferences. Unfortunately, this has resulted in the nichification of cultural audiences and a decline in the authenticity of cultural products. Chapter 7 examines the potential impact of platformization on civil rights. The monopolistic control exercised by platform companies has resulted in imbalances and inequalities, ultimately eroding democratic values. Although platforms allow cultural producers to promote their work through open access to their platforms, the authors do not presume that these companies will act as impartial gatekeepers while pursuing commercial objectives. Therefore, there is a risk of undermining cultural democracy if platforms collude with the state or monopolies based on vast data reserves.

In terms of methodologies, this book combines the methods of business studies, communication studies, and software studies. Additionally, the authors introduce three perspectives to investigate the variations between different platformization patterns： industry segments, stages of cultural production and geographic regions. This is also an exploration of the comparative-platform study perspective. Although the authors establish a significant case diversity of platform behaviour in specific cultural sectors, they did not engage in detailed empirical research or fieldwork in this book. Therefore, it is worth anticipating studies to build upon the authors’ framework by integrating it into regions with different media systems and culture fields.

To conclude, the most significant contribution of this book is its promotion of platformization theory through illustrating the dynamics of power relations between platforms and cultural producers. Secondly, they elaborately describe how platformization drives the transformation of a specific industry in terms of the cultural production routine and cultural platform governance, rendering the abstract and macroscopic theory of platformization more concrete and vivid. Additionally, the authors provide a valuable perspective for future platform studies by emphasizing that platforms should not be viewed solely as economic or technological entities. In contrast, platforms combine the characters of producers, distributors and rule-makers through platformization. This complexity of platform’s functions provides greater theoretical imagination for exploring the platform society. Thus, this book will undoubtedly interest scholars in both platform studies and cultural studies or readers keen on exploring the effects of platform transformation.