David S. Evans

If You’re Happy and You Know It, You Must Be Small
If You’re Happy and You Know It, You Must Be Small
May 02, 2024  |  David S. Evans

Finland did it again.  The World Happiness Report (WHR) came out in March. For the seventh straight year, it was No. 1. Keeping the top spot...

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Why Europe Must End Its 30-Year Digital Winter to Ensure Its Long-Run Future
Why Europe Must End Its 30-Year Digital Winter to Ensure Its Long-Run Future
April 18, 2024  |  Opinion

In the last 30 years, Europe — defined here as the EU plus the U.K., Norway and Switzerland — has created few leading digital businesses...

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How to Think About AI Regulation
How to Think About AI Regulation
January 24, 2024  |  David S. Evans

Every year, for the last 16 years, economists have come to Toulouse for the Digital Economics Conference to present cutting-edge research on just about everything digital. For...

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Platform Ignition Not Going Well? Call in the Volcanos
Platform Ignition Not Going Well? Call in the Volcanos
January 03, 2024  |  Opinion

 In early 2010, as winter turned to spring in Iceland, one of the many volcanos, Eyjafjallajökull, erupted. Beginning in mid-April, the volcano ejected about 250...

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Can the EU Get Its Digital Act Together?
Can the EU Get Its Digital Act Together?
December 06, 2023  |  David S. Evans

Where’s the European Union when it comes to AI? It has the world’s second-largest GDP — $18.4 trillion in 2023. Its 448 million population is more than 100...

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Humanity to OpenAI Board: You’re Fired!
Humanity to OpenAI Board: You’re Fired!
November 22, 2023  |  David S. Evans

Governance is back in the news with the OpenAI debacle.   The Governance Lessons of Brexit and Bitcoin   The last time I wrote about governance was...

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Platform Economics: How Instacart Leverages Time Into Profits
Platform Economics: How Instacart Leverages Time Into Profits
November 16, 2023  |  David S. Evans

Time is our most precious asset. Each day, we get just so much. Twenty-four hours, 1440 minutes, 86,400 seconds. If we don’t use it, we...

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What Lighting a Fire Tells Us About Igniting Threads and the Billionaires’ New City
What Lighting a Fire Tells Us About Igniting Threads and the Billionaires’ New City
October 31, 2023  |  David S. Evans

It never hurts to brush up on basic skills, like how to make a roaring campfire in the woods before taking that next backpacking trip. How...

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How Airbnb and 18th-Century Newspapers Found Profits from Frictions 
How Airbnb and 18th-Century Newspapers Found Profits from Frictions 
October 11, 2023  |  David S. Evans

Brian Chesky says that Airbnb is broken and he’s going to fix it.   New York City recently passed regulations that all but gave them the boot....

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