“You May Like…” Exploring Content Recommendation Platforms
We have recently discussed the basic mechanics of the Google and Facebook pay-per-click marketing platforms and the auction methods they use to determine ad prices and placement. Each platform enables advertisers to target viewers in a similar way and to provide relevant content to users at the true price of the ad-buyer. When the right […]
Analysis of the U.S. Wireless Service market
In our daily lives, we are familiar with the four biggest wireless service carriers: AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint and Verizon. After learning the techniques of analyzing a matching market, I realize that the Wireless Service Market can be modeled by a preferred-seller graph, in which the carriers are the sellers of the services and millions of […]
Non-naive bidding
eBay, by trial and error and thorough research, has perfected the art of running auctions on the internet. To simulate second price sealed bid auction, eBay lets you use its autobid tool, which knows what our desired price is, and will keep bidding until that point. It raises value by a little bit if someone […]
Instability in network in the Middle East
Today, when asked about one of the biggest threats to world stability, people will usually respond with “terrorism” or more generally, “the Middle East”. One of the main issues of today has been what is going on in Syria. From the Russian Airstrikes to bombing against rebel groups involved with the Islamic State we can […]
Chunyun and the problem of ticket scalpers
Chunyun, or literally “spring traffic”, refers to the huge traffic flow during Chinese lunar new year (spring festival). Due to the gap of development levels between major cities like Beijing and Shanghai and the rural parts of China, millions of young people chose to come to the cities in search of better opportunities. During Chinese […]
A Number Puzzle in Game Theory and Behavioral Economics
The Upshot newsletter of New York Times published an online number puzzle, open to everyone to participate in. This puzzle asked the participant to guess a number between 1 and 100. The correct number would be two-thirds of the average number chosen by all participants of the game. Therefore, in order to win, the participant […]
Braes Paradox Online
The article below explains how too many options can lead to poor response when it comes to computer generated suggestions. Braes paradox is the concept that adding extra roads to a network can lead to congestion. This is due to the fact that new, more efficient roads will disrupt the equilibrium which can have a negative impact […]
From Social Networks To Market Networks
In today’s world, networking with others seems to be a main component in one’s business life that can make their life a lot easier. It’s all about who you know! There is a lot of talk about market networks and how they could be the social network of the future. These new market networks that […]
Reddit’s Flawed Ranking Algorithm
The social forum news giant, Reddit, has come under fire recently due to a flaw in its story ranking algorithm. Their open sourced Pyrex code consisted of a simple algorithm designed to rate stories according to their “hotness” and gradually bubble up the popular ones to the front page. In this flawed algorithm, it was […]
Facebook Ads and VCG Auctions
Facebook doesn’t want you to stop using Facebook. Facebook also wants to make money by serving ads. Those seem like orthogonal objectives, no? The worse their ad algorithm, and the more irrelevant the ads they serve you, the more likely you are to switch to another social network (Myspace, if you’re desperate enough, though I […]
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