Who would be the winner?

Let’s remember the network theory. In a competitive environment, any nodes can enter the network, and all of them get the profits. A few node get a high number of incoming links and other nodes tend to link to a few node. In a blogosphere, such A-list blogs, the best-known (most read, most linked to) blogs, play a key role in connecting with other blogs sharing similar political stances. However, the principle that the rich get richer is not always accurate. Instead, only nodes that have a certain attractiveness—that is, being differentiated from others—can be richer in a short hub. That is, the so-called “fitness” explains succinctly the nodes with higher fitness (nodes’ attractiveness) and more links. For example, those who have the characteristics of extroversion might have more Facebook friends—even though they may be beginners on the site—than those who started the site earlier. In a sense, this explains why Google could become a hub in the Web industry, even though it was a relative newcomer.

What about the media industry? As technology developed, social media, such as blogs and Twitter, have played influential roles in agenda building and diffusion. Having such user-centered interfaces, the media includes an advantageous structure and finally brings about profitable behavior and performance. Chrome, Bing, and You and Me have the same story. As opposed to Twitter, they seem to have some relation in close substitutes rather distinct product differentiation. No matter which market structure is evident, the price of a product remains an influential factor that affects consumers’ purchase decisions. By the same token, however, while the objective of companies is to maximize profit, the objective for consumers is to maximize satisfaction. Thus, as competition becomes increasingly intense in the media industry, product differentiation could become an effective strategy for maximizing profits.