Making platforms share data could mean less data gets made

A new economic paper finds that forcing online platforms to share their data widely might actually reduce the total amount of data available. This means governments trying to boost competition could inadvertently make the market less rich in data.

Governments around the world are trying to figure out how to make big online platforms share their data with smaller competitors. This paper shows that if they force platforms to share data at the same price for everyone, the platforms might just stop creating as much data in the first place. This makes it harder for regulators to achieve their goal of both more competition and more innovation.