Jia, L. orcid.org/0000-0003-2982-6490, Nieborg, D.B. and Poell, T. (2022) On super apps and app stores: digital media logics in China’s app economy. Media, Culture & Society, 44 (8). pp. 1437-1453. ISSN 0163-4437
Abstract
Aiming to enrich the conceptual vocabulary of platform and app studies, this article provides a critical political economic perspective on the media industry to understand how platform power is operationalized in the app economy. Using the China-based tech conglomerate Tencent as a case study, four mechanisms are discussed: conglomeration, financialization, platformization, and infrastructuralization. These mechanisms show how Tencent leveraged both a conglomerated corporate structure and access to finance capital. This was combined with the infrastructuralization of the MyApp app store and the WeChat platform by providing vertically integrated app development and distribution services, which are nested in Tencent’s holdings and investments. Taking Tencent as the starting point for theory building, this article attempts to “provincialize” US-based platform companies by charting Tencent’s corporate evolution and its path to mobile dominance.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © The Author(s) 2022. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage). |
Keywords: | apps; platforms; Tencent; WeChat; political economy; app stores; Asia as method |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > Department of Sociological Studies (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 01 Nov 2022 15:04 |
Last Modified: | 01 Nov 2022 15:04 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | SAGE Publications |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1177/01634437221128937 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:192813 |