互联网流量补贴模型研究与实例分析

Mobile Data Subsidy Model and Case Study

随着移动互联网的不断发展,许多网络用户都使用智能手机或是平板电脑取代了传统的台式机作为首选的上网设备.相应地,用户对移动流量的需求增长也非常迅速.然而,由于高昂的访问成本,人们还是难以完全享受移动互联网带来的便利,已经在一定程度上阻碍了移动互联网的发展.从全局角度看,如何为互联网参与者们设计优化的流量分配方案已经成为一个关键问题.针对此问题,提出了一个新的基于互联网内容提供商与运营商合作的流量补贴模型DA(data allowance),共同为用户提供补贴.通过对该模型的经济学分析,得到以下结论:1)该模式能够在内容商、运营商、用户之间形成更具弹性的关系,能有效延长用户的活跃在线时间;2)提出的内容商补贴策略能够实现用户与内容商的双赢结果;3)流量补贴策略不是可以任意实施的,它有约束条件限制以保证补贴的有效性,能够对互联网内容商和运营商制定补贴策略提供有益参考.

With the advances of mobile Internet market,many customers use smartphones and tablets to replace desktops as the default Internet accessing tools.The demand for mobile data also increases rapidly.Despite the increasing popularity of mobile computing,exploiting its full potential is still difficult due to the expensive Internet access from mobile clients.The conflict of demand-cost has impeded the development of mobile Internet in some extent.It has become a critical issue that how to design the optimal data allocation mechanism for all participants from the global perspective.In this paper,we investigate a novel data allowance（DA）model which enables seamless collaboration between Internet content providers（CPs）and Internet service providers（ISPs）.Taking Alibaba＇s real-world deployment as an example,we provide a detailed economic analysis of this business model and reveal the following findings：Firstly,this model enables a more flexible relationship between ISPs and their customers,which can efficiently increase the active online time of mobile users.Secondly,the proposed CP-provided subsidization policy leads to a win-win solution for both CPs and users.Thirdly,the subsidization policy is restrained by some constraints which ensure the validity of the subsidizing process.We believe that our findings provide important insights for CPs and ISPs to design the effective subsidization mechanism for mobile users in the mobile Internet market.