ABSTRACT
Online platforms have become pervasive, unavoidable actors, in particular on audiovisual markets. Often accused of being detrimental to competition and of restricting users’ actual choices, their impact on diversity, however, remains understudied. This chapter offers a general reflection about the role played by online platforms in providing diversity. To do so, it first provides a conceptual framework that allows to address the interactions between various dimensions of diversity. Most of all, it reconciles two approaches that are often left apart: the analysis in terms of competition (what is the competitive impact of online platforms? To what extent does competition foster or prohibit diversity?) and the study of how online platforms can influence consumer choices, in particular via their recommendation systems. The chapter is therefore one of the first to combine a macro and a micro approaches of online platforms, crucial to start assessing their impact on diversity.
