Handbook home
Regulating Digital Platforms (BLAW20002)
Undergraduate level 2Points: 12.5On Campus (Parkville)
To learn more, visit 2023 Course and subject delivery.
About this subject
- Overview
- Eligibility and requirements
- Assessment
- Dates and times
- Further information
- Timetable(opens in new window)
Contact information
Summer Term
Overview
Availability | Summer Term |
---|---|
Fees | Look up fees |
This subject offers an overview on how law interacts with online digital platforms. It introduces students to different types of digital platforms and their business practices, as well as a selection of fundamental regulatory domains in the information economy.
In recent years online digital platforms have become a site of critical study. Early Utopian visions of the internet included open speech environments, anonymous interactions, and non-hierarchical networks. Today’s cyberspace, however, is deeply hierarchical, embedded in a surveillance and data-processing based economy, with work, social life, and commerce all channeled through increasingly powerful digital platforms. Online digital platforms now dominate activities like search, shopping, and social media, as well as coordinate offline activities like ride-sourcing and labour-hire. Some have suggested the massive power of digital platforms emerged under conditions of 'lawlessness'. Close analysis makes clear however, that law – its existence, interpretation, and enforcement – are all critical to how the digital economy is structured and how platforms monetize their position.
This subject explores different types of online digital platforms, the ways they monetize data, and how they exert power in the digital economy. Examples include controlling the visibility of websites, products, content, and people with ranking algorithms; renting access to repositories of intellectual property; facilitating double-sided marketplaces; and selling advertising. Understanding the platform economy means coming to grips with the development of large AI models, industrial scale data mining and refining, the monetization of user attention, and the ways platforms coordinate actors in multi-sided markets.
Through a selection of case studies highlighting ongoing regulatory controversies in different legal domains, this subject demonstrates how law both contributes to and limits the power and practices of platforms. Examples include how data protection and privacy laws shape consumer profiling and behavioural advertising; how accountability and transparency requirements regulate the visibility of ranking systems and other forms of algorithmic decision-making; how competition law manages monopolies and anti-competitive behaviour; and how labour law enables platforms to limit their obligations to workers.
Intended learning outcomes
On completion of this subject students should:
- Have an understanding of the different ways that online digital platforms operate in the information economy
- Appreciate how different legal ideas interact with of digital platforms, and how the interpretation and enforcement of law influences platforms' business practices
- Understand how regulation has developed over the years to assist platforms to monetize their dominant positions
Generic skills
- Capacity for self-directed learning, specifically the ability to plan work and use time effectively;
- Cognitive and analytical skills;
- Ability to speak about complex ideas in a clear and cogent manner;
- Awareness of diversity and plurality;
- Ability to write essays which develop structured argumentation;
- Capacity to judge the worth of their own arguments.
Last updated: 11 April 2024
Eligibility and requirements
Prerequisites
None
Corequisites
None
Non-allowed subjects
None
Recommended background knowledge
It is strongly recommended that students have completed at least 100 points of undergraduate study before enrolling in this subject. Students are responsible for checking any course progression rules with their home faculty.
Inherent requirements (core participation requirements)
The University of Melbourne is committed to providing students with reasonable adjustments to assessment and participation under the Disability Standards for Education (2005), and the Assessment and Results Policy (MPF1326). Students are expected to meet the core participation requirements for their course. These can be viewed under Entry and Participation Requirements for the course outlines in the Handbook.
Further details on how to seek academic adjustments can be found on the Student Equity and Disability Support website: http://services.unimelb.edu.au/student-equity/home
Last updated: 11 April 2024
Assessment
Description | Timing | Percentage |
---|---|---|
Two short writing exercises of 500 words each
| During the teaching period | 25% |
Reflective essay
| 2 Weeks after the end of teaching | 75% |
Additional details
Assessment due dates will be available on the LMS.
Last updated: 11 April 2024
Dates & times
- Summer Term
Principal coordinator Jake Goldenfein Mode of delivery On Campus (Parkville) Contact hours Total time commitment 136 hours Pre teaching start date 2 January 2023 Pre teaching requirements Students are expected to access and review the subject materials that will be available from the LMS subject page. Teaching period 30 January 2023 to 10 February 2023 Last self-enrol date 6 January 2023 Census date 3 February 2023 Last date to withdraw without fail 10 February 2023 Assessment period ends 10 March 2023 Summer Term contact information
Time commitment details
136 hours
What do these dates mean
Visit this webpage to find out about these key dates, including how they impact on:
- Your tuition fees, academic transcript and statements.
- And for Commonwealth Supported students, your:
- Student Learning Entitlement. This applies to all students enrolled in a Commonwealth Supported Place (CSP).
Subjects withdrawn after the census date (including up to the ‘last day to withdraw without fail’) count toward the Student Learning Entitlement.
Last updated: 11 April 2024
Further information
- Texts
Prescribed texts
- Specialist materials may be made available via the LMS.
- Related Handbook entries
This subject contributes to the following:
Type Name Breadth Track Law - Media and Intellectual Property Law - Breadth options
This subject is available as breadth in the following courses:
- Bachelor of Arts
- Bachelor of Biomedicine
- Bachelor of Commerce
- Bachelor of Design
- Bachelor of Environments
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Acting)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Animation)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Dance)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Film and Television)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Music Theatre)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Production)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Screenwriting)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Theatre)
- Bachelor of Fine Arts (Visual Art)
- Bachelor of Science
- Available through the Community Access Program
About the Community Access Program (CAP)
This subject is available through the Community Access Program (also called Single Subject Studies) which allows you to enrol in single subjects offered by the University of Melbourne, without the commitment required to complete a whole degree.
Entry requirements including prerequisites may apply. Please refer to the CAP applications page for further information.
Additional information for this subject
If required, please email the Subject Coordinator for approval.
- Available to Study Abroad and/or Study Exchange Students
This subject is available to students studying at the University from eligible overseas institutions on exchange and study abroad. Students are required to satisfy any listed requirements, such as pre- and co-requisites, for enrolment in the subject.
Last updated: 11 April 2024