Social Selection and Peer Influence in an Online Social Network
This article maps the homogeneity of social networks on Facebook. Researchers captured network and profile information from students at a U.S. college once a year between March 2006 and March 2009. They then classified students’ 100 most popular self-reported book, movie and music preferences, identified defining attributes of the students’ social networks, and then correlated […]
Overcoming Winner’s Curse
https://www.pon.harvard.edu/daily/business-negotiations/two-examples-of-the-winners-curse-in-business-negotiations-microsofts-acquisition-of-yammer-and-the-purchase-of-edvard-munchs-the-scream/ As stated in lecture, auctions are useful for sellers when they are unaware of buyers’ willingness to pay for a good. However, auctions serve as a benefit to sellers, and a loss for buyers, when there is already an established selling price for said good. This twist comes in the form of the […]
The European Union: A Zero-Sum Game
source: https://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/24/business/global/using-game-theory-to-predict-the-euros-future.html The 2012 New York Times article entitled, “Using Game Theory to Predict the Euro’s Future” by Paul Taylor, explores the existential threat facing the European Union as Greece’s potential withdrawal from the euro zone, due to the country’s government-debt crisis, is put into question. Proponents of the withdrawal assert that removing Greece from the […]
Online Dating and Interracial Marriage
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/609091/first-evidence-that-online-dating-is-changing-the-nature-of-society/ While traditional dating may have consisted of a conversation over a quick cup of coffee with someone you met in the workplace or through mutual friends, technology is changing the way dating is done nowadays. In particular, dating websites have allowed people of all sorts of background to meet. This article from the MIT […]
Weak Ties Are Important
(https://techcrunch.com/2016/04/26/weak-ties-matter/) You have ‘ties’ or connections with people in your social network. This article discusses the importance of ‘weak ties’ – our subsidiary relationships with acquaintances or friends of friends. The author of the article discusses Mark Granovettor’s interviews about job placement and his discovery that jobs with higher compensation and levels of happiness surprisingly […]
Human and monkey responses in a symmetric game of conflict with asymmetric equilibria.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268117302159?via%3Dihub We think a lot of things when it comes to monkeys, phrases like “Monkey see, monkey do,” that they will snatch and screech for bananas or grapes or whatever else they can grasp. It seems as if only humans are capable of altruistic actions; isn’t it human to sacrifice for others? To forgo one’s […]
Serve-and-Volley… Is it worth it?
As we discussed in class, tennis is one apt example where we can observe game theory. Even though one person technically makes a move, or hits the ball first, it’s a matter of seconds so the returner already has to start to anticipate where the ball will go. It’s hard for viewers unfamiliar with the […]
Hacking the Election
Since the start of Trump’s presidency, there have been rumors of Russian meddling in the election and collusion between Trump’s staff and the Russians. Multiple sources and investigations have led to the conclusion that the Russians had interfered in our election, an idea so outrageous and upsetting to Americans that it has remained in the […]
Can you guarantee that the Nash Equilibrium will be achieved?
In class, we learned about the concept of the Nash Equilibrium which is the state when all the players in the game don’t have the incentive to change their strategies. Whether it results in pure or mixed strategy, there exist mutual best responses among players. One of the articles from Quanta Magazine, however, asserts something […]
Merger Bidding War – Fox News vs Comcast
Over the past year, Fox News and Comcast have engaged in a bidding war over Sky News, a British news network. Fox News currently owns a 39% stake in the company and is looking to acquire the rest in order to sell its stake to Disney (which recently acquired much of Fox News). Comcast intends […]
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