Celebrities’ Influence with Medical Information Cascades
https://www.bmj.com/content/347/bmj.f7151 This research explores the extent to which celebrities influence people’s decisions on personal health. These studies have shown how celebrities transfer their desirable attributes to products and use their success to boost both their perceived credibility, and credibility in the products of ideas. Psychologically, people are classically conditioned to react positively to the […]
Game Theory in Voter Polarization
https://pennpoliticalreview.org/2018/01/disastrous-elections-predicted-by-game-theory/ A first-past-the-post voting system the type of voting system present in the United States. It’s simplest definition is one person, one vote. This seems logically fair; however, it is fundamentally flawed in voter satisfaction. The effects of a first-past-the-post voting system is the consolidation of the political system to be two relatively-polarized parties. […]
How Information Cascades Caused the 2008 Housing Bubble
One topic we spent a lot of time covering in lecture was the idea of information cascades. As explained in the lecture, information cascades are when people start to act based upon the information they gained from the actions of others (in the same situation) rather than act based upon the information they gain. This […]
Pharma’s first-to-market advantage explained by network effects
Source: https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/pharmaceuticals-and-medical-products/our-insights/pharmas-first-to-market-advantage According to a McKinsey study, there is a weak first-to-market advantage on average in the pharmaceutical industry, but with significant nuances dependent on market context. The study showed that first-in-class players on average achieve a greater-than-fair market share. In addition, first-to-market players have a 6% market-share advantage over later entrants, yet the first-to-market advantage […]
PSA: Group FaceTime’s Video Chat Not Available on Older iOS Devices
Link: https://www.macrumors.com/2018/10/30/group-facetime-video-newer-devices-only/ I recently succumbed to the allure of Apple iOS 12 update. I had been holding out because the 2 GB of required space just to download the update was significant, especially on a 16 GB iPhone with barely enough room to keep all of my music and photos. As I pondered the pros […]
Diffusion and Movie Choices
Here at Cornell I am a part of several different friend groups that are relatively unconnected (I don’t think I am alone in this). I have my friends from freshman year, my friends from my project team, and my friends from my major/classes. These groups all overlap by one or two people, but by and […]
Prediction Markets for the 2018 Midterm Elections
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-05/prediction-markets-see-republicans-losing-house-keeping-senate https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/11/06/us/elections/results-dashboard-live.html After the 2016 elections, where the prediction markets were wrong about who would take control of the presidency. Bettors and pollsters were confident in who would take control of the house and senate during the 2018 midterm elections. On the PredictIt market, the scenario where the Republicans gain less than or equal too […]
How Diffusion in Networks Explains the Spread of the #MeToo Movement
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/world/metoo-shockwave/ In October 2017, the New York Times reported allegations of sexual assault against the famous Harvey Weinstein. Just a few days after the article was published, the hashtag #MeToo went viral. It was first used by activist Tarana Burke, and then adapted by actress Alyssa Milano to encourage survivors to come forward as a […]
Election Predictions in the Stock Market
https://www.wsj.com/articles/right-on-the-election-dead-wrong-on-the-market-reaction-1541691477 Before the 2018 midterm elections, there were many predictions about who would gain control of the house and senate. The Democrats had about a 60% chance of taking over the house, while republicans had an overbearing 90% chance of remaining the majority party in the senate. In fact, this scenario is exactly what […]
Explaining the E-Commerce Equilibrium
https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-warehouse-market-coming-closer-to-balance-1523394312 In U.S. Warehouse Market Getting Closer to Balance, Erica E. Phillips discusses the warehouse market’s potential approach to equilibrium. In the past couple of years, the supply of available warehouses was not able to sustain the exponentially increasing demand for warehouse space. This is evident in the slight decline in the availability of industrial […]
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