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The Production of Information in an Online World

Author

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  • Julia Cagé
  • Nicolas Hervé
  • Marie-Luce Viaud

Abstract

News production requires investment, and competitors’ ability to appropriate a story may reduce a media’s incentives to provide original content. Yet, there is little legal protection of intellectual property rights in online news production, which raises the issue of the extent of copying online and the incentives to provide original content. In this article, we build a unique dataset combining all the online content produced by French news media during the year 2013 with new micro audience data. We develop a topic detection algorithm that identifies each news event, trace the timeline of each story, and study news propagation. We provide new evidence on online news production. First, we document high reactivity of online media: one quarter of the news stories are reproduced online in under 4 min. We show that this is accompanied by substantial copying, both at the extensive and at the intensive margins, which may constitute a severe threat to the commercial viability of the news media. Next, we estimate the returns to originality in online news production. Using article-level variations and media-level daily audience combined with article-level social media statistics, we find that original content producers tend to receive more viewers, thereby mitigating the newsgathering incentive problem raised by copying.

Suggested Citation

  • Julia Cagé & Nicolas Hervé & Marie-Luce Viaud, 2020. "The Production of Information in an Online World," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 87(5), pages 2126-2164.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:restud:v:87:y:2020:i:5:p:2126-2164.
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/restud/rdz061
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    Cited by:

    1. Bertin Martens & Luis Aguiar & Estrella Gomez Herrera & Frank Muller, 2018. "The digital transformation of news media and the rise of disinformation and fake news," JRC Working Papers on Digital Economy 2018-02, Joint Research Centre.
    2. Han, Xintong & Li, Yushen & Wang, Tong, 2023. "Peer recognition, badge policies, and content contribution: An empirical study," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 214(C), pages 691-707.
    3. Alabrese, Eleonora & Capozza, Francesco & Garg, Prashant, 2024. "Politicized Scientists: Credibility Cost of Political Expression on Twitter," CAGE Online Working Paper Series 735, Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE).
    4. Margot Belguise, 2023. "Red herrings: A theory of bad politicians hijacking media attention," Discussion Papers 2023-12, Nottingham Interdisciplinary Centre for Economic and Political Research (NICEP).
    5. Sreevidya Ayyar & Uta Bolt & Eric French & Cormac O'Dea, 2024. "Imagine your life at 25: Gender conformity and later-life outcomes," IFS Working Papers W24/32, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    6. García-Uribe, Sandra, 2022. "Multidimensional media slant: Complementarities in news reporting by US newspapers," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).
    7. Julia Cagé & Moritz Hengel & Nicolas Hervé & Camille Urvoy, 2022. "Hosting Media Bias: Evidence from the Universe of French Broadcasts, 2002-2020," Sciences Po Economics Publications (main) hal-03878119, HAL.
    8. Louis-Sidois, Charles & Mougin, Elisa, 2023. "Silence the media or the story? Theory and evidence of media capture," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    9. Boxell, Levi & Steinert-Threlkeld, Zachary, 2022. "Taxing dissent: The impact of a social media tax in Uganda," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    10. Stephanie L. Chan, 2021. "The Social Value of Public Information When Not Everyone is Privately Informed," Working Papers 2021-09-18, Wang Yanan Institute for Studies in Economics (WISE), Xiamen University.
    11. Charles Angelucci & Julia Cagé & Michael Sinkinson, 2024. "Media Competition and News Diets," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 16(2), pages 62-102, May.
    12. Béatrice Mazoyer & Julia Cagé & Nicolas Hervé & Céline Hudelot, 2020. "A French Corpus for Event Detection on Twitter," Post-Print hal-03947820, HAL.
    13. Joan Calzada & Ricard Gil, 2020. "What Do News Aggregators Do? Evidence from Google News in Spain and Germany," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 39(1), pages 134-167, January.
    14. Choi, Jay Pil & Yang, Sangwoo, 2021. "Investigative journalism and media capture in the digital age," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 57(C).
    15. Kristian D. Allee & Ryan Cating & Caleb Rawson, 2025. "No news is bad news: local news intensity and firms’ information environments," Review of Accounting Studies, Springer, vol. 30(1), pages 1-32, March.
    16. Joan Calzada & Nestor Duch-Brown & Ricard Gil, 2021. "Do search engines increase concentration in media markets?," UB School of Economics Working Papers 2021/415, University of Barcelona School of Economics.
    17. Michele Bisceglia, 2023. "The unbundling of journalism," Post-Print hal-04941017, HAL.
    18. Christian Peukert & Margaritha Windisch, 2023. "The Economics of Copyright in the Digital Age," CESifo Working Paper Series 10687, CESifo.
    19. Bisceglia, Michele, 2023. "The unbundling of journalism," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

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    JEL classification:

    • L11 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Production, Pricing, and Market Structure; Size Distribution of Firms
    • L15 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Information and Product Quality
    • L82 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Entertainment; Media
    • L86 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Information and Internet Services; Computer Software

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