bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Introduction
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This introductory chapter briefly explores how Big Data and Big Analytics has affected both the US and EU economy. It highlights Big Data’s implications for competition policy by analysing competition law’s integral role in ensuring that people capture the benefits of a data-driven economy while mitigating its associated risks. As more companies undertake data-driven business strategies and mergers, competition officials and courts will likely confront the competitive implications of Big Data. The potential threat of Big Data is too significant to overlook or downplay data-driven mergers or the abuses of dominant companies built on data. The chapter examines the competition authorities’ approach to data-driven mergers and business strategies, and their current approach’s strengths and weaknesses.
Defining Big Data
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter looks at the definition of ‘Big Data’. It focuses on personal data, which is generally defined as ‘any information relating to an identified or identifiable individual (data subject)’. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) provides a list of types of personal data which the chapter discusses. These are: user-generated, including blogs and commentary, photos, and videos, etc; activity or behavioural data, including what people search for and look at on the Internet, what people buy online, how much and how they pay, etc; social data, including contacts and friends on social networking sites; locational data, including residential addresses, GPS, and geo-location, IP address, etc; demographic data, including age, gender, race, income, sexual preferences, political affiliation, etc; and identifying data of an official nature, including name, financial information and account numbers, health information, national health or social security numbers, police records, etc.
Smartphones as an Example of How Big Data and Privacy Intersect
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter analyses smartphones in discussing how Big Data is quantitatively and qualitatively different from the data collected before. In particular, it looks at the case of Riley v California and the unanimous decision here issued by the US Supreme Court. The case mainly stems from the issue of whether the government could search a suspect’s smartphone without a warrant. The Fourth Amendment of the US Constitution prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures, and requires the government to first obtain a warrant, supported by probable cause. There are several expanding exceptions for warrantless searches and seizures. In the end, the Supreme Court decided that searching a smartphone is not the same as searching someone’s wallet or purse. The case reveals that although Fourth Amendment Constitutional issues may seem far afield from competition policy, it raises interesting privacy issues.
Why Haven’t Market Forces Addressed Consumers’ Privacy Concerns?
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter explores the reasons why market forces are not promoting services that protect consumer privacy. One possible explanation is that consumers—especially younger ones—are not concerned about privacy. But survey data refutes this claim. A second possible explanation is that competition, at times, can worsen, rather than improve, the privacy protections. But that still leaves markets where competitive market forces should be responsive to consumers’ demand for better privacy protections, but are not. The fundamental problem in these markets is that consumers lack viable alternatives. It is in here where the core concern of competition policy—namely the accumulation of market power—intersects with privacy concerns. The main reason why market forces have not yielded the privacy protections that consumers want/demand is the absence of meaningful competition.
The US’s and EU’s Mixed Record in Assessing Data-Driven Mergers
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter examines the recent track record of EU and US competition authorities in assessing data-driven mergers to determine whether, and to what extent, competition agencies’ analysis has improved. The assessment of several recent investigations reveals how some agencies—notably the European Commission and US Department of Justice—are at least starting to engage with or address the issue of Big Data. However, there are still missing key issues. The chapter discusses these issues by describing and analysing six recent data-driven mergers and the response of competition authorities: TomTom/TeleAtlas, Facebook/WhatsApp, Alliance Data Systems Corp/Conversant, Google/Nest Labs and Google/Dropcam, Google/Waze, and the Bazaarvoice/PowerReviews merger. These data-driven mergers highlight the enforcers’ hits and misses in understanding the implications of Big Data.
Agencies Focus on What is Measurable (Price), Which is Not Always Important (Free Goods)
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter examines how price effects have predominated antitrust analysis in the US. Competition agencies have never disclaimed the importance of non-price competition. Indeed, the consensus is that the effects of mergers or restraints on dynamic efficiencies, including innovation, are often more important than the effect on short-term prices. Nonetheless, economic factors that were easier to measure, such as the merger’s likely short-term impact on price, output, or productive efficiency in narrowly defined markets, became disproportionately important. Factors that were harder to assess or measure like the merger’s impact on innovation, systemic risk, and the risks that the increasing concentration of power pose to democracy and individual autonomy were ignored or discounted. The competition authorities specifically recognize the importance of quality competition. In assessing whether a merger may substantially lessen quality or other parameters of non-price competition, competition agencies employ an approach analogous to that used to evaluate price competition.
Data-Driven Mergers Often Fall Outside Competition Policy’s Conventional Categories
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
One reason why competition agencies have not fully considered the implications of Big Data is that data-driven mergers can defy or challenge the agencies’ conventions that work well for other mergers. This chapter explores three conventions: the categorization of mergers, the belief that similar products/services compete more fiercely than dissimilar products/services, and the focus on the substitutability of services or products. It also examines how competition agencies categorize mergers as horizontal, vertical, and/or conglomerate. Regardless of the category, the ultimate assessment is the same, namely whether the merger may substantially reduce competition or create a monopoly (or monopsony). But the analytical framework differs depending on whether it is a horizontal, vertical, or conglomerate merger.
Importance of Entry Barriers in Antitrust Analysis
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter describes the importance of entry barriers in antitrust analysis. A key issue is whether entry barriers are sufficiently low to alleviate concerns about adverse competitive effects. Some argue that data does not lend itself to entry barriers. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), for example, noted three trends underlying data-driven innovation: the exponential growth in data generated and collected; the widespread use of data analytics including by start-ups and small and medium enterprises (SMEs); and the emergence of a paradigm shift in knowledge creation and decision-making. Others, however, claim that online markets are notable for their low entry barriers and typically do not require big data for entry. The merging parties or dominant firm may use the traditional factors that the agencies consider to argue that entry barriers are generally low in that online industry.
Entry Barriers Can Be Higher in Multi-Sided Markets, Where One Side Exhibits Traditional Network Effects
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter examines traditional network effects in the Facebook/WhatsApp merger to assess how entry barriers can be higher in multi-sided markets, where one side exhibits traditional network effects. Despite the absence of traditional entry barriers due to their online nature, the Facebook/WhatsApp merger raised the traditional direct network effects with which enforcers and courts are most comfortable. The merger involved classic direct network effects in two different product markets: texting apps and social networking. Recognizing how the texting apps could be susceptible to these direct network effects, the European Commission did not end its analysis on the ‘traditional’ entry barriers. The value of a texting app, the European Commission found, increases as more and more people use that particular app. Thus, Facebook and WhatsApp both enjoy traditional network effects, whereby one’s utility from the product increases as others use the product.
Scale of Data
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter explores a second network effect, which arises from the scale of data: the more people who actively or passively contribute data, the more the company can improve the quality of its product, the more attractive the product is to other users. The chapter considers this data-driven network effect in three contexts: Waze’s navigation app, search engines, and Facebook’s digital assistant ‘M’. It argues that one can benefit (and one’s utility can increase) when others use the same search engine, since the quality of the search results can increase. As more people use the search engine, the more trial-and-error experiments, the more likely the search engine’s algorithms can learn of consumer preferences, the more relevant the search results will likely be, which in turn will attract others to use the search engine, and the positive feedback continues.
Two More Network Effects
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter analyses two more network effects: the scope of data and spill-over effects. It shows how the feedback loop is accelerated when the company harnesses the variety of data across its platform to improve the quality of its product, which attracts more users who provide the company with more data to further improve. These effects are examined through Facebook’s digital assistant ‘M’ and search engines. Through the scope of data effect, the more users rely on the platform’s other services, the greater the variety of personal data on particular users, the better the digital assistant can segment results by user profiles, and the better the digital assistant can personalize results. On the other hand, under spill-over effects, the growth of users on one side of the multi-sided platform can attract more advertisers or suppliers on the other side of the platform, which in turn attracts more users, advertisers, and suppliers.
Reflections on Data-Driven Network Effects
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter addresses several competition issues raised by data-driven network effects as they tend to be difficult to enter and are easily susceptible by one or two firms. The data-driven network effects in online markets can amplify the stakes of gaining and losing users. Depending on the network effect, the loss of users can degrade the product’s quality and reduce the likelihood of attracting (and retaining) users, advertisers, or sellers. With each user the platform acquires relative to its competitors, a quality gap emerges. If the quality differences become apparent to users, the feedback loop can accelerate—attracting both new users and users of the competitors’ products. Another issue raised is the localization of data-driven network effect in some markets. Regarding search engines, companies may be unable to fully leverage the network effects across languages; users likely want the search results in their own language.
Risk of Inadequate Merger Enforcement
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter identifies four significant risks in the ways competition agencies have analysed data-driven mergers, and how they have not fully considered the implications of a data-driven economy. First, it is questionable whether competition agencies are accurately predicting the competitive effects of mergers in concentrated markets. The second risk is when competition agencies consider only the merger’s impact on the ‘paid’ side of multi-sided platforms and ignore the free side. To illustrate, the chapter uses the wave of US commercial radio station mergers from the 1990s to the 2000s, where the Department of Justice considered in its consent decrees only the mergers’ effect on advertising, and not on listenership. The third risk is that, even if the agency reviews the merger’s likely effect on each side of the multi-sided platform, its price-centric tools are ill suited for evaluating the free side. The network effects can magnify the likely consumer harm—the fourth risk.
The Price of Weak Antitrust Enforcement
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter explains why the societal harm is too great to ignore data-driven mergers and abuses by dominant firms. The costs are high when agencies and courts get it wrong, going to the heart of many democratic systems. Anticompetitive data-driven mergers and monopolistic abuses can affect not only consumers’ economic interests but also their privacy interests and the values that underlie these privacy interests, such as individual autonomy and freedom of expression and association. Many of these industries, given the data-driven network effects, are ripe for consolidation. Thus, the incentives for mergers and exclusionary behaviour increase to tip the market towards dominance. Additionally, the chapter explains why privacy and consumer protection agencies and laws will not necessarily prevent these harms through behavioural remedies and fines.
Data-opoly: Identifying Data-Driven Exclusionary and Predatory Conduct
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter explores the issue of path dependence and competitive portals—critical inflection points where antitrust can make a key difference by focusing on data-driven anticompetitive exclusionary and predatory behaviour. Competition law can deter exclusionary and predatory practices and keep competitive portals. Big Data enhances this as it can confer power and a durable competitive advantage. This works in hand with data-driven network effects which improve product or service quality. At times, consumers benefit from this competitive rivalry and drive to maintain a data advantage. Companies innovate to expand their platform of services to secure a greater following. But when the stakes are greater, so too are the incentives to engage in unfair practices to tip the market to the company’s favour and maintain a monopoly. Consequently, competition authorities must be alert to dominant companies’ unfair practices aimed at thwarting competitors and disrupting innovators. The chapter outlines several potentially anticompetitive data-driven tactics.
Need for Retrospectives of Data-Driven Mergers
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This chapter discusses the benefits of conducting merger retrospectives. It highlights the risk of false negatives under the current quantification paradigm. One benefit is that the competition authority can evaluate its or the courts’ assumptions and analytical tools. Although the anticompetitive effects could be caused by unforeseen intervening events, the agency and court typically assess mergers through their price-centric models, which rely on several assumptions, such as the likely reaction of rational, self-interested consumers with willpower to a small, but significant, non-transitory price increase. The behavioural economic scholarship has drawn into question these assumptions of rationality and willpower. Thus, the merger retrospectives will reveal what happened to price and non-price competition and the extent to which actual marketplace behaviour comports with the predicted behaviour of rational agents with willpower.
Conclusion
Authors: Stucke Maurice E , Grunes Allen P 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
This concluding chapter describes the integral role of competition law in ensuring that everyone can realize the benefits of a data-driven economy while mitigating its associated risks. Policymakers must not assume that privacy, consumer protection, and competition policy concerns are so distinct that they should be left to their respective agencies. Likewise, the fact that privacy is a fundamental right in some jurisdictions does not mean that it is always relevant in competition policy. The chapter argues that people cannot afford a widening gap between enforcement and policy among jurisdictions. Such a gap leaves enforcers ill-equipped to identify and address the anticompetitive risks and privacy harms from data-driven mergers and abuses by dominant firms, subjects companies to inconsistent enforcement, and leaves consumers and start-ups vulnerable.
Income and campus application disparities among European and non-European heritage Hispanic undergraduate applicants
Authors: Alvero AJ , Giebel Sonia , Pearman Francis A 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
Leveraging every undergraduate application submitted by self-identified Hispanic applicants to the University of California system in the 2016 and 2017 application cycles, we show that a significant number of applicants claim Hispanic identity by virtue of European heritage. We subsequently demonstrate that Hispanic-identifying students of European descent are significantly more affluent and more likely to apply to selective University of California campuses than their non-European Hispanic peers. We comment on the practical implications of these disparities, as well as their relevance for studies of inequality in the social sciences and education.
Bio-molecular analyses enable new insights into the taphonomy of feathers
Authors: Pan Yanhong , Qi Zeming , Hu Jianfang , Zheng Xiaoting , Wang Xiaoli 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
Exceptionally preserved feathers from the Mesozoic era have provided valuable insights into the early evolution of feathers and enabled color reconstruction of extinct dinosaurs, including early birds. Mounting chemical evidence for the two key components of feathers—keratins and melanins—in fossil feathers has demonstrated that exceptional preservation can be traced down to the molecular level. However, the chemical changes that keratin and eumelanin undergo during fossilization are still not fully understood, introducing uncertainty in the identification of these two molecules in fossil feathers. To address this issue, we need to examine their taphonomic process. In this study, we analyzed the structural and chemical composition of fossil feathers from the Jehol Biota and compared them with the structural and chemical changes observed in modern feathers during the process of biodegradation and thermal degradation, as well as the structural and chemical characteristics of a Cenozoic fossil feather. Our results suggest that the taphonomic process of feathers from the Cretaceous Jehol Biota is mainly controlled by the process of thermal degradation. The Cretaceous fossil feathers studied exhibited minimal keratin preservation but retained strong melanin signals, attributed to melanin's higher thermal stability. Low-maturity carbonaceous fossils can indeed preserve biosignals, especially signals from molecules with high resistance to thermal degradation. These findings provide clues about the preservation potential of keratin and melanin, and serve as a reference for searching for those two biomolecules in different geological periods and environments.
China's progress in synergetic governance of climate change and multiple environmental issues
Authors: Yang Jianxun , Zhao Zhan , Fang Wen , Ma Zongwei , Liu Miaomiao , Bi Jun 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
Advancing the synergetic control of climate change and environmental crisis is crucial for achieving global sustainable development goals. This study evaluates synergetic governance levels over climate change and four environmental issues at the provincial level in China from 2009 to 2020. Our findings reveal significant progress in China's coordinated efforts to mitigate carbon emissions, reduce air pollutants, and conserve water resources. However, there remains room for improvement in managing solid waste and protecting ecological systems and overall progress in synergetic governance has slowed since 2015. Employing a random forest model, we identify socio-economic factors with great influence on synergetic climate change and environmental governance, such as energy intensity, service sector development, electronic equipment manufacturing, and transportation. Additionally, we reveal nonlinear relationships between some factors and performance of environmental subsystems, including both plateau effects (e.g. output in the smelting of ferrous metals) and U-shaped patterns (e.g. output in the manufacturing of metal products), possibly attributed to constraints in end-of-pipe treatment capacities and complexities in supply chain networks. Furthermore, through hierarchical clustering analysis, we classify provinces into four groups and provide tailored recommendations for policymakers to enhance synergetic governance levels in their respective regions. The framework established in this study also serves as a valuable reference for countries seeking to develop practical and context-specific solutions to mitigate climate and environmental risks.
Maximized response by structural optimization of soft elastic composite systems
Authors: Fischer Lukas , Menzel Andreas M 
Published: August 2024

Abstract
Soft actuators triggered in a wire—and contactless way advance soft robotics, for instance, concerning microsurgical perspectives. For optimal performance in this and other contexts, maximized stimuli-responsiveness is frequently desirable. We demonstrate on the example of soft magnetoelastic systems how analytical theoretical measures in combination with computer simulations provide tools to develop optimized components. To enhance the overall macroscopic response, we adjust microstructural properties. Our strategy guides us towards ideally structured soft materials that can be fabricated using modern technologies.