Ownership vs access: consumers' digital ownership perceptions and preferences

Abstract

PurposeThis study investigated the interrelations of US consumers' perceptions of their ownership of digital media content, their perceived importance of various digital rights and ownership rights and their preferences for owning vs accessing media content.Design/methodology/approachThis study used an online questionnaire survey and analyzed data from 437 participants recruited via Amazon's Mechanical Turk mechanism.FindingsParticipants' perceived importance of digital rights correlates with consumers' ownership perceptions, and people who value certain digital rights tend to have narrower ownership perceptions. Users' ownership and access preferences vary with their perceived importance of ownership rights, especially concerning music and movies. Notably, people who prefer the access model were less concerned about ownership rights to possess, use and resell content.Social implicationsThe study provides empirical evidence of consumers' ownership perceptions in the digital age and warns consumers of the dangers of the erosion of their digital ownership rights.Originality/valueLegal ownership and psychological ownership are usually considered separate constructs and seldom examined together. By showing the correlation between consumers' ownership perceptions and their perceived importance of digital rights, this study demonstrates the connection between legal ownership and psychological ownership.