ISO/IEC TS 5928

1 ISO/IEC draft DTS 5928
2 ISO TC /IEC JTC 1/SC 38/WG 3
3 Secretariat: ANSI
4 Date: 2022-12-202023-03-28
5 Title: Information technology — Cloud computing and distributed
6 platforms — Taxonomy for digital platforms
7
8 DTSTechnologies de l'information — Informatique en nuage et plates-formes distribuées —
9 Taxonomie pour les plates-formes numériques
10
11
12 Warning for WDs and CDs
13 This document is not an ISO International Standard. It is distributed for review and comment. It is subject to
14 change without notice and may not be referred to as an International Standard.
15 Recipients of this draft are invited to submit, with their comments, notification of any relevant patent rights of
16 which they are aware and to provide supporting documentation.
17
18
19
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ISO/IEC draft DTS 5928
1 © ISO/IEC 2023
2 All rights reserved. Unless otherwise specified, or required in the context of its implementation, no part of this
3 publication may be reproduced or utilized otherwise in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
4 including photocopying, or posting on the internet or an intranet, without prior written permission. Permission can
5 be requested from either ISO at the address below or ISO’s member body in the country of the requester.
6 ISO copyright office
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11 Website: www.iso.orgwww.iso.org
12 Published in Switzerland
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ISO/IEC draft DTS 5928
13 Contents
14
15
16 2 Normative references . 1
17 3 Terms and definitions . 2
18 3.1 Basic terms . 2
19 3.2 Terms relating to platform participation . 2
20 3.3 Terms related to digital technology platforms . 3
21 3.4 Terms related to digital economic platforms . 3
22 4 Abbreviated terms . 4
23 5 Digital platform overview . 6
24 5.1 General . 6
25 5.1.1 Meanings of “platform” . 6
26 5.1.2 Meanings of “digital platform” . 7
27 5.2 The ambiguity of “platform” for digital services . 7
28 5.3 Characteristics of digital platforms . 9
29 5.3.1 Network effects . 9
30 5.3.2 “Private” vs “Open” platforms . 9
31 5.3.3 Cross-cutting considerations . 10
32 6 Digital technology platforms . 10
33 6.1 General . 10
34 6.2 Cloud service capabilities types indicative of digital technology platforms . 12
35 6.3 Cloud services offering infrastructure capabilities type . 13
36 6.4 Cloud services offering platform capabilities type . 13
37 6.4.1 Platform as a Service (PaaS) . 13
38 6.4.2 Data Storage as a Service (DSaaS) . 14
39 6.4.3 Communications as a Service (CaaS) . 14
40 6.4.4 Emerging cloud services with platform capabilities . 14
41 6.5 Software development platforms . 15
42 6.6 Example of digital technology platforms in context . 16
43 6.7 One-sided and multi-sided technology platforms . 17
44 6.7.1 One-sided technology platform . 18
45 6.7.2 Two-sided or Multi-sided digital technology platform . 18
46 7 Digital economic platforms . 18
47 7.1 General . 18
48 7.2 Common characteristics of digital economic platforms . 18
49 7.2.1 Digital economic platforms as matchmakers . 18
50 7.2.2 Payment for use of a digital economic platform . 19
51 7.3 Taxonomy of digital economic platforms . 20
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ISO/IEC draft DTS 5928
52 7.3.1 Exchange platform . 20
53 7.3.2 Application marketplace . 22
54 7.3.3 Payment platform . 22
55 7.3.4 Ad-funded platforms . 25
56 8 Impact of platform characteristics on participant behaviour . 27
57 8.1 General . 27
58 8.2 Network effects . 27
59 8.2.1 Positive network effects . 27
60 8.2.2 Negative network effects . 28
61 8.2.3 Impact of network effects . 28
62 8.3 Customer inertia . 28
63 8.4 Stickiness . 28
64 9 Observations and conclusion . 29
65 (informative) . 30
66 Annex A Illustrative taxonomic hierarchies . 31
67 (informative) . 40
68 Annex B Comparison of monetisation and network effects . 41
69 Bibliography . 43
70
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ISO/IEC draft DTS 5928
71 Foreword
72 ISO (the International Organization for Standardization) is a and IEC (the International Electrotechnical
73 Commission) form the specialized system for worldwide federation of national
74 standardsstandardization. National bodies (that are members of ISO member bodies). The workor IEC
75 participate in the development of preparing International Standards is normally carried out through ISO
76 technical committees. Each member body interested in a subject for which a technical committee has
77 been established has the right to be represented on that committee. Internationalby the respective
78 organization to deal with particular fields of technical activity. ISO and IEC technical committees
79 collaborate in fields of mutual interest. Other international organizations, governmental and non-
80 governmental, in liaison with ISO and IEC, also take part in the work. ISO collaborates closely with the
81 International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) on all matters of electrotechnical standardization.
82 The procedures used to develop this document and those intended for its further maintenance are
83 described in the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 1. In particular, the different approval criteria needed for the
84 different types of ISO documentsdocument should be noted. This document was drafted in accordance
85 with the editorial rules of the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2 (see www.iso.org/directives 2 (see
86 www.iso.org/directives or www.iec.ch/members_experts/refdocs).
87 Attention is drawnISO and IEC draw attention to the possibility that some of the elementsimplementation
88 of this document may beinvolve the subjectuse of (a) patent rights. ISO(s). ISO and IEC take no position
89 concerning the evidence, validity or applicability of any claimed patent rights in respect thereof. As of the
90 date of publication of this document, ISO and IEC had not received notice of (a) patent(s) which may be
91 required to implement this document. However, implementers are cautioned that this may not represent
92 the latest information, which may be obtained from the patent database available at www.iso.org/patents
93 and https://patents.iec.ch. ISO and IEC shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent
94 rights. Details of any patent rights identified during the development of the document will be in the
95 Introduction and/or on the ISO list of patent declarations received (see www.iso.org/patents).
96 Any trade name used in this document is information given for the convenience of users and does not
97 constitute an endorsement.
98 For an explanation of the voluntary nature of standards, the meaning of ISO specific terms and
99 expressions related to conformity assessment, as well as information about ISO's adherence to the World
100 Trade Organization (WTO) principles in the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT), see
101 www.iso.org/iso/foreword.html) see www.iso.org/iso/foreword.html. In the IEC, see
102 www.iec.ch/understanding-standards.
103 This document was prepared by Joint Technical Committee ISO/IEC JTC 1, Information technology,
104 Subcommittee SC 38, Cloud Computingcomputing and Distributed Platformsdistributed platforms.
105 Any feedback or questions on this document should be directed to the user’s national standards body. A
106 complete listing of these bodies can be found at www.iso.org/members.htmlwww.iso.org/members.html
107 and www.iec.ch/national-committees.
108
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ISO/IEC DTS 5928:(E)
Introduction
Technologies such as cloud computing are supporting the evolution of digital business and accelerating
the shift to living and working (in part) online, in ways that would have been impossible a few years ago.
Increased debate about socio-technical developments always runs the risk of multi-disciplinary
terminological confusion, due to the potential for the same word to be used for two or more distinct
concepts. Moreover, polysemy (the capacity for a word or phrase to have multiple related meanings) is
an attribute of many words. Any attempt to provide a single definition for a polysemic word needs to be
be sufficiently broad to account for all potential meanings.
Terms with alternative meanings in economic, societal, political, regulatory and technical contexts are
being labelled with the same or similar names.
Adding clarity on concepts and definitions can assist in the formulation of well-informed policies in
important areas such as security, privacy and governance. One of the terms that has been at the forefront
of these changes is “platform”.
Note that the economic, societal, political, regulatory and technical uses of the word “platform” predate
cloud computing by many years.
Taxonomic structures serve many purposes and their topological structure, incorporation (or not) of
orthogonal dimensions (as we see here),, levels of refinement, and the decision about the order and
approach in which to apply the structuring factors lead to very different outcomes. The terminology and
concepts presented in this document can be combined in different ways, depending on the problem being
considered, and the factors that potentially influence the decisions driving such structuring are presented
with the related concepts.
In a situation where two or more distinct interpretations of the word “platform” are relevant, but only
one is taken into account, or where collaborators used two distinct interpretations at cross-purposes,
confusion can arise.
Therefore, it is important to understand the difference between the technical, economic and general uses
of the word platform in the context of digital services.
The audience for this document is technologists, economists, policy makers, social scientists and others
who wish to precisely and unambiguously use these terms, (e.g. in multi-disciplinary conversations.).

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ISO/IEC DTS 5928:(E)
Information technology — Cloud computing and distributed
platforms — Taxonomy for digital platforms
1 Scope
This document provides definitions for termsspecifies a taxonomy related to digital platforms.
Specifically, this document provides, by providing definitions and supporting information that
disambiguates different uses of the term “platform” as it applies to digital services (such as cloud
computing and other distributed computing systems).
2 Normative References
32 There are no normative references in this document.

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ISO/IEC DTS 5928:(E)
The following documents are referred to in the text in such a way that some or all of their content
constitutes requirements of this document. For dated references, only the edition cited applies. For
undated references, the latest edition of the referenced document (including any amendments) applies.
ISO/IEC 22123-1, Information technology — Cloud computing — Part 1: Vocabulary
ISO/IEC TS 23167, Information technology — Cloud computing — Common technologies and techniques
43 Terms and Definitionsdefinitions
For the purposes of this document, the terms and definitions given in ISO/IEC 22123-1,
ISO/IEC TS 23167 and the following apply.
ISO and IEC maintain terminology databases for use in standardization at the following addresses:
— ISO Online browsing platform: available at https://www.iso.org/obp
Field Code Changed
— IEC Electropedia: available at https://www.electropedia.org
Field Code Changed

4.23.1 Basic terms

3.1.1
digital service
service offered by one party to another party by means of digital hardware or software technology, or
both, including communication over a network
Note 1 to entry: In the context of this document, a service comprises one or more digital capabilities such as a
cloud computing, edge computing, or some other distributed computing capability. Such a service will be subject to
contract and typically have defined qualities of service, terms, and conditions for use.
Note 2 to entry: Cloud service, edge service, network service, broadcast service, and mobile service are all types
of digital service. Not all types are discussed in this document.

3.1.2
digital platform

distributed platform
set of digital services (3.1.1(3.1.1) that collectively exhibits the characteristics of either (or both) a digital
economic platform (3.4.2(3.4.2) creating a multi-sided market, or a digital technology platform
(3.3.1(3.3.1) providing a means to create applications
Note 1 to entry: A digital platform enables and assists other participant digital services in conducting business
with their customers, either by creating and facilitating a multi-sided market for those services, or by enabling the
technological creation and operation of those services, or both.
Note 2 to entry: “Distributed platform” is often used as a synonym to emphasise those elements of a digital service,
such as edge computing and mobile computing that go beyond classical datacentres of cloud computing.
4.33.2 Terms relating to platform participation

3.2.1
platform participant
party that makes use of or otherwise engages with a digital platform (3.1.2(3.1.2)
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ISO/IEC DTS 5928:(E)
Note 1 to entry: A party can be an individual end user or organisation.
Note 2 to entry: A platform participant can be a member of one or more participant groups (3.2.2(3.2.2).

3.2.2
participant group
group of platform participants (3.2.1(3.2.1) that share a common set of business requirements that differ
significantly from the requirements of one or more other groups of platform participants (3.2.1(3.2.1)
Note 1 to entry: Participant groups are not specific to digital services.
Note 2 to entry: Examples of such participant groups include purchasers, vendors, and developers. Purchasers are
platform participants seeking to acquire something, vendors are platform participants seeking to offer something,
while developers are platform participants seeking to create and sell (or operate) software (or services). Thus, the
members of each group have a common objective which is not shared with members of the other participant groups.
4.43.3 Terms related to digital technology platforms

3.3.1
digital technology platform
digital platform (3.1.2(3.1.2) that provides engineering components required to support
applications and services
Note 1 to entry: Elements provided can include cloud computing resources (see ISO/IEC 22123 and ISO/IEC
17789), which can include execution environments, storage, networking, location and mapping services, graphics
rendering and specialist processing (such as machine learning or quantum computing).
Note 2 to entry: Popular examples of such digital technology platforms include varieties of the cloud service
categories “infrastructure capabilities type” and “platform capabilities type” (see ISO/IEC 22123-1).
Note 3 to entry: This definition is distinct from those in ISO/IEC TS 25025:2021 and ISO/IEC TS 25011:2017.

3.3.2
software development platform
digital technology platform (Error! Reference source not found.)(3.3.1) that enables or
assists the development of software code
4.53.4 Terms related to digital economic platforms

3.4.1
economic platform
set of services that provide market intermediation to reduce search and/or transactions
costs
Note 1 to entry: Platforms are environments, computing or otherwise, that connect different groups and derive
benefits from others participating in the platform (Azoulay & Tucker)
Note 2 to entry: A shopping mall provides a non-computing economic platform, connecting merchants (participant
group) with visiting customers (participant group) and providing distinct services to each participant group such
as a pleasant environment, electricity, storage, parking, network connectivity, and security.
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ISO/IEC DTS 5928:(E)

3.4.2
digital economic platform
one or more digital platforms (3.1.2(3.1.2) which provide goods, services or licensed rights
to two or more distinct participant groups (3.2.2(3.2.2) who need each other in some way
Note 1 to entry: Examples of licensed rights can include the right to view a movie, to use commercial business data,
or to use specific software, each delivered as a license.
Note 2 to entry: While a digital economic platform is constructed with digital technology, often on top of a digital
technology platform (Error! Reference source not found.),(3.3.1), this does not mean that the digital economic
platform is a subtype of digital technology platform (any more than a car is a subtype of a road); these two terms
are orthogonal.
Note 3 to entry: A digital economic platform can optionally comprise more than one digital platform. For instance,
an exchange platform can be combined with a payment platform and appear to the end-user as a single digital
economic platform.

3.4.3
ad-funded platform
digital economic platform (3.4.2(3.4.2) where a platform generates revenue by charging
advertisers to show advertisements to customers of the service
Note 1 to entry: Advertisers are one participant group, those who view the advertisements are a second, and those
who display the advertisements alongside their own content are a third.

3.4.4
exchange platform
digital economic platform (3.4.2(3.4.2) which brings together vendors and potential
purchasers and enables them to sell and buy goods and services, potentially generating value for the
platform provider by intermediating the transaction

3.4.5
payment platform
digital economic platform (3.4.2(3.4.2) which facilitates the secure completion of payments
between platform participants (3.2.1(3.2.1)

3.4.6
application marketplace
digital economic platform (3.4.2(3.4.2) where the platform provides means for software
developers and publishers to provide applications to customers via the platform
Note 1 to entry: This document describes this concept in the economic platform domain. See also ISO/IEC 19944-
1:2020, 3.2.2 for the definition in the device platform domain.
54 Abbreviated Termsterms
AIaaS artificial intelligence as a service
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ISO/IEC DTS 5928:(E)
1
CaaS communications as a service
CaaS containers as a service
CSC cloud service customer
CSP cloud service provider
DSaaS data storage as a service
FaaS function as a service
GPU graphics processing unit
IaaS infrastructure as a service
MLaaS machine learning as a service
PaaS platform as a service
QCaaS quantum computing as a service
SaaS software as a service
SME Small- or Medium-sized Enterprise


1
Note that the acronym CaaS is unfortunately used by industry for multiple purposes, two of which are listed here,
so it is usually best to use the correct expanded term to ensure the reader has the correct context.
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ISO/IEC DTS 5928:(E)
AIaaS artificial intelligence as a service
a
CaaS communications as a service
a
CaaS containers as a service
CSC cloud service customer
CSP cloud service provider
DSaaS data storage as a service
FaaS function as a service
GPU graphics processing unit
IaaS infrastructure as a service
MLaaS machine learning as a service
PaaS platform as a service
QCaaS quantum computing as a service
SaaS software as a service
SME Small- or medium-sized enterprise
a
The acronym CaaS is unfortunately used by industry for multiple purposes, two of which are listed
here, so it is best to use the expanded term to ensure the reader has the correct context.
65 Digital platform overview
6.15.1 General
The term “platform” is used in the English language with a very wide range of meanings, and some of
these uses are ambiguous in the context of online or digital services.
This document defines a taxonomy of terms for digital platforms of various kinds, and shows how these
terms can be structured into a hierarchy (see Annex A).Annex A).
6.1.15.1.1 Meanings of “platform”
These uses include but are not limited to the following. These groupings are potentially overlapping, they
are not mutually exclusive.
— The traditional non-ICT uses of the term, such as a wooden platform to stand on, a political platform
of policies, or a railway platform from which trains will depart, highlight the highly context-
dependent use of the word “platform”.
— There are online, broadcast and printed media and public discourse settings, that serve as platforms
for free expression, expression of political and social viewpoints, artistic and musical expression,
discussion and debate. This includes social media.
— There are what we definecan be defined as “economic platforms”, which is a way to describe certain
business approaches that create multi-sided markets, where two or more distinct groups of
participants can do some kind of business together via an intermediary platform. This means that the
platform brings together two or more different participant groups and provides a meeting place to
facilitate interactions between the participant groups through the platform. Platforms serving two
participant groups are called two-sided platforms, and more generally platforms serving two or more
such groups are called multi-sided platforms.
— There are many examples of two-sided markets supported by intermediary platforms, including but
not limited to: publishers, academic journals and conferences; airports and ports; stock markets,
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ISO/IEC DTS 5928:(E)
auction houses and real
...