Fast or Slow? Competing on Publication Frequency

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Chen, Lin; Roels, Guillaume
• 署名单位: INSEAD Business School
• 刊物名称: M&SOM-MANUFACTURING & SERVICE OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1523-4614
• DOI: 10.1287/msom.2023.0024
• 发表日期: 2024
• 关键词: publishing; batching; information goods; COMPETITION; Vertical differentiation; digitalization

摘要

Problem definition: For many information goods, longer publication cycles (or batches of information) are more economical, but often result in less timely-and, therefore, less valuable-information. Whereas the digitalization of publication processes has reduced fixed publication costs, making shorter publication cycles more economically viable, competing firms have adapted their publication cycles differently: some of them publish more frequently, whereas others publish less frequently. In the face of growing competition and digitalization, how should information providers change their publication frequency strategies? Methodology/results: In this paper, we build a game-theoretic model to determine how information providers should set their publication cycles and prices in a duopoly. We find that, compared with a monopolistic environment, competition gives rise to differentiation by cycles and expands product variety. Specifically, competing firms should seek to differentiate on their publication frequency when the fixed publication is high and their contents share a high degree of commonality, but not otherwise. Whereas a reduction in the fixed cost of publication tends to yield shorter publication cycles, it could also intensify the competitive dynamics, leading firms to further differentiate their publication cycles, hurting consumer surplus. However, this could be temporary, as firms may ultimately converge in their choices of publication cycles. Managerial implications: The digitalization of publication processes is disrupting many information provision industries (e.g., news, weather, financial). We show that competing firms should anticipate nonmonotone or abrupt changes in their publication strategy as their publication processes get digitalized and may actually be hurt-as well as consumers-in the process of digitalization.