Platform power of News Aggregators: Media Plurality Webinar Series: Session 10

• Andrey Simonov
• 19 May 2025

Session 10 : Tuesday, 13 May 2025, 5 PM (CEST) / 4 PM (BST) / 11 AM (EDT)

Session 10 featuring Professor Andrey Simonov (Columbia Business School and CEPR), who presented his new working paper, co-authored with Ruben Durante, Ruben Enikolopov and Daniil Mikhailov on the influence of news aggregators on both news consumption and news production.


Using data from Russia’s largest aggregator, Yandex News, the paper explores how algorithmic changes—especially following regulatory interventions—impacted traffic to independent versus government-controlled media, and how news outlets responded by adapting their production strategies.


This paper provides a powerful lens into how platform design can shape media markets, even in highly sensitive political environments, and serves as a continuation of our deep dive into the world of algorithms launched in Session 8.