ABSTRACT
Platforms in multi-sided market existed before the internet was created, in the form of newspaper and advertisement funded media, payment cards, and videogame consoles. This new model of industrial organization relies on network effects, as traditional network industries, but in particular on indirect network effects, as different groups of users interact with each other. The interaction can be of different forms, leading to transactional and non-transactional markets. The interactions are enabled by a platform, an intermediary that connects the different groups in such a form that value is created from direct and indirect network effects, capturing a share of such value.
