Curriculum Technology & the Digital Economy
Technology & the Digital Economy
How network effects, data, platforms and attention reshape the basic rules of buying, selling and building value online.
- Network Effects: Why Bigger Platforms Get More Valuable Why a messaging app or marketplace gets more useful to you as more other people join it. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Economics of "Free" - How Ad-Supported Platforms Make Money If you aren't paying for a product, someone else is - and understanding who reveals how free platforms actually earn money. 📄 Read-aloud
- Winner-Take-Most Markets in Tech Why a handful of tech companies capture most of the market in their category instead of splitting it evenly with competitors. 📄 Read-aloud
- Data as an Economic Asset Why the information companies collect about you functions like a genuine economic asset, similar in some ways to property or inventory. 📄 Read-aloud
- Technology & the Digital Economy: Checkpoint 1 Covers network effects, the economics of free platforms, winner-take-most markets, and data as an economic asset. 5 questions
- Platform Monopolies and Antitrust Why governments scrutinize dominant tech platforms differently than other big companies, and what antitrust law tries to protect against. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Subscription Economy Why so many products moved from a one-time purchase to a recurring monthly fee, and what that shift does to both companies and customers. 📄 Read-aloud
- Two-Sided Markets: Matching Buyers and Sellers How platforms that connect two different groups - like drivers and riders, or buyers and sellers - set prices and grow differently from ordinary businesses. 📄 Read-aloud
- Why Tech Startups Chase Growth Over Profit Why so many tech startups lose money for years on purpose, and why investors are often fine with that. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Economics of App Stores and Platform Fees Why app stores can charge developers a cut of every sale, and why that arrangement has become such a major economic and legal fight. 📄 Read-aloud
- Technology & the Digital Economy: Checkpoint 2 Covers platform monopolies and antitrust, the subscription economy, two-sided markets, startup growth strategy, and app store platform fees. 5 questions
- Digital Piracy and Intellectual Property Economics Why copying a digital file is economically different from stealing a physical object, and what that difference means for creators and pricing. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Attention Economy Why human attention itself has become a genuinely scarce economic resource that companies compete fiercely to capture. 📄 Read-aloud
- Cloud Computing and the Economics of Infrastructure Why renting computing power from a handful of giant providers replaced most companies owning their own servers, and what that shift changed. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Economics of Digital Advertising How online ads are actually bought and sold in real time, and why digital advertising became so much more valuable than older forms of advertising. 📄 Read-aloud
- Technology & the Digital Economy: Checkpoint 3 Covers digital piracy and intellectual property, the attention economy, cloud computing, and digital advertising. 5 questions
- The Economics of the Creator Economy How people who make videos, posts, and podcasts turn audience attention into an actual income. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Economics of Algorithmic Recommendations Why the systems that decide what you see next are built around a company's economic incentives. 📄 Read-aloud
- Trust and Reputation Systems in the Digital Economy How star ratings and review systems solve a fundamental economic problem for strangers doing business online. 📄 Read-aloud
- The Economics of Freemium Pricing Why so many digital products are free to start and how companies make money from the small share who eventually pay. 📄 Read-aloud
- Digital Labor: Content Moderation and the Human Cost of the Internet Behind every clean, safe-feeling platform is a hidden layer of human labor most users never see or think about. 📄 Read-aloud
- Digital Public Infrastructure: India Stack How India built public digital systems for identity, payments and data sharing, and why other countries are studying the model. 📄 Read-aloud
- Data Privacy Laws and the Economy How laws like Europe's GDPR and India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act regulate personal data, and their economic effects. 📄 Read-aloud
- Open Networks for Online Selling: ONDC How India's Open Network for Digital Commerce aims to let small sellers reach online buyers without depending on a few big platforms. 📄 Read-aloud
- Online Gaming and Its Regulation in India How India's online gaming industry boomed, why real-money games raised concerns about addiction and losses, and how a 2025 law banned them. 📄 Read-aloud