Data marketplaces can increase the willingness to share social media data at low prices

TL;DR

This study investigates how data marketplaces influence individuals' willingness to sell social media data, finding they significantly increase participation and lower acceptable prices, with minimal impact from privacy safeguards or buyer type.

Contribution

It provides empirical evidence that data marketplaces can boost willingness to sell social media data and offers insights into pricing and privacy considerations.

Findings

Data marketplaces increase willingness to sell by 12-25 percentage points.

Most participants set prices within the suggested lower range.

Privacy safeguards and buyer type do not significantly affect willingness to sell.

Abstract

Living in the Post API age, researchers face unprecedented challenges in obtaining social media data, while users are concerned about how big tech companies use their data. Data donation offers a promising alternative, however, its scalability is limited by low participation and high dropout rates. Research suggests that data marketplaces could be a solution, but its realization remains challenging due to theoretical gaps in treating data as an asset. This paper examines whether data marketplaces can increase individuals willingness to sell their X (Twitter) data package and the minimum price they would accept. It also explores how privacy protections and the type of data buyer may affect these decisions. Results from two preregistered online survey experiments show that a data marketplace increases participants' willingness to sell their X data by 12 to 25 percentage points compared to data donation (depending on treatments), and by 6.8 points compared to onetime purchase offers. Although difference in minimum acceptable prices are not statistically significant, over 64 percentage of participants set their price within the marketplace's suggested range (0.25 to 2), substantially lower than the amounts offered in prior onetime purchase studies. Finally, in the marketplace setting, neither the type of buyer nor the inclusion of a privacy safeguard significantly influenced participants willingness to sell.