43,254 research outputs found
Moving from Data-Constrained to Data-Enabled Research: Experiences and Challenges in Collecting, Validating and Analyzing Large-Scale e-Commerce Data
Widespread e-commerce activity on the Internet has led to new opportunities
to collect vast amounts of micro-level market and nonmarket data. In this paper
we share our experiences in collecting, validating, storing and analyzing large
Internet-based data sets in the area of online auctions, music file sharing and
online retailer pricing. We demonstrate how such data can advance knowledge by
facilitating sharper and more extensive tests of existing theories and by
offering observational underpinnings for the development of new theories. Just
as experimental economics pushed the frontiers of economic thought by enabling
the testing of numerous theories of economic behavior in the environment of a
controlled laboratory, we believe that observing, often over extended periods
of time, real-world agents participating in market and nonmarket activity on
the Internet can lead us to develop and test a variety of new theories.
Internet data gathering is not controlled experimentation. We cannot randomly
assign participants to treatments or determine event orderings. Internet data
gathering does offer potentially large data sets with repeated observation of
individual choices and action. In addition, the automated data collection holds
promise for greatly reduced cost per observation. Our methods rely on
technological advances in automated data collection agents. Significant
challenges remain in developing appropriate sampling techniques integrating
data from heterogeneous sources in a variety of formats, constructing
generalizable processes and understanding legal constraints. Despite these
challenges, the early evidence from those who have harvested and analyzed large
amounts of e-commerce data points toward a significant leap in our ability to
understand the functioning of electronic commerce.Comment: Published at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/088342306000000231 in the
Statistical Science (http://www.imstat.org/sts/) by the Institute of
Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org
Uncertain Price Competition in a Duopoly with Heterogeneous Availability
We study the price competition in a duopoly with an arbitrary number of
buyers. Each seller can offer multiple units of a commodity depending on the
availability of the commodity which is random and may be different for
different sellers. Sellers seek to select a price that will be attractive to
the buyers and also fetch adequate profits. The selection will in general
depend on the number of units available with the seller and also that of its
competitor - the seller may only know the statistics of the latter. The setting
captures a secondary spectrum access network, a non-neutral Internet, or a
microgrid network in which unused spectrum bands, resources of ISPs, and excess
power units constitute the respective commodities of sale. We analyze this
price competition as a game, and identify a set of necessary and sufficient
properties for the Nash Equilibrium (NE). The properties reveal that sellers
randomize their price using probability distributions whose support sets are
mutually disjoint and in decreasing order of the number of availability. We
prove the uniqueness of a symmetric NE in a symmetric market, and explicitly
compute the price distribution in the symmetric NE.Comment: 45 pages, Accepted for publication in IEEE Transaction on Automatic
Contro
Temporal Price Dispersion: Evidence from an Online Consumer Electronics Market
Economic theory indicates that E-retailers competing at price comparison sites, such as Shopper.com, must charge prices that cannot be systematically predicted by their rivals. Consistent with theory, we find significant variation in the identity of the lowprice firm as well as the level of the lowest price for 36 of the best-selling consumer electronics products sold at Shopper.com between November 1999 and May 2001. The observed pricing patterns can be explained by firms engaging in short-term price promotions in an attempt to avoid the deleterious outcome associated with price competition. Based on our arguments and the evidence presented, the managerial implications are clear: Strategic unpredictability in pricesâthrough the use of hit and run salesâis a widely used and effective weapon for avoiding all-out price competition in online markets.Temporal price dispersion, price comparison sites, e-retail, sales promotion
Is America Exporting Misguided Telecommunications Policy? The U.S.-Japan Telecom Trade Negotiations and Beyond
Global telecommunications markets have traditionally been closed to foreign trade and investment. Recent World Trade Organization negotiations resulted in a Basic Telecommunications agreement that sought to construct a multilateral framework to reverse that trend and begin opening telecom markets worldwide. Regrettably, this new WTO framework is quite ambiguous and open to pro-regulatory interpretations by member states. In fact, during recent bilateral trade negotiations with Japan, U.S. government officials adopted the position that the new framework allowed them to demand that the Japanese government adopt very specific regulatory provisions regarding telecom network interconnection and pricing policies. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative argued that Japanese officials should require their domestic telecom providers to share their networks with rivals at a generously discounted price to encourage greater resale competition. Those interconnection and line-sharing rules were borrowed directly from the U.S. Telecommunications Act of 1996, a piece of legislation that remains the subject of intense debate within the United States. Good evidence now exists that those rules generally retard net-work investment and innovation by encouraging infrastructure sharing over facilities-based investment. Consequently, the USTR has generated resentment on the part of Japan and other trading partners as it has attempted to force them to adopt heavy-handed telecommunications mandates that have very little to do with legitimate free-trade policy. The USTR must discontinue efforts to impose American telecommunications regulations on other countries as part of free-trade negotiations and should instead focus on reforming or eliminating the most serious barriers to foreign direct investment both here and abroad
Network neutrality and the evolution of the internet
In order to create incentives for Internet traffic providers not to discriminate with respect to certain applications on the basis of network capacity require-ments, the concept of market driven network neutrality is introduced. Its basic characteristics are that all applications are bearing the opportunity costs of the required traffic capacities. An economic framework for market driven network neutrality in broadband Internet is provided, consisting of congestion pricing and quality of service differentiation. However, network neutrality regulation with its reference point of the traditional TCP would result in regulatory micro-management of traffic network management. --
Platform Ownership
Lecture on the first SFB/TR 15 meeting, Gummersbach, July, 18 - 20, 2004We develop a general theoretical framework of trade on a platform on which buyers and sellers interact. The platform may be owned by a single large, or many small independent or vertically integrated intermediaries. We provide a positive and normative analysis of the impact of platform ownership structure on platform size. The strength of network effects is important in the ranking of ownership structures by induced platform size and welfare. While vertical integration may be welfare-enhancing if network effects are weak, monopoly platform ownership is socially preferred if they are strong. These are also the ownership structures likely to emerge
Stepping stones and access holidays: the fallacies of regulatory micro-management
Good intentions are no substitute for sound economic regulation. Using the âin-vestment ladderâ as the stick and access holidays as the carrot is hardly an ef-fective way to generate competition. On the contrary, this approach creates a regulatory spiral. What regulators plead for today is in effect an obligatory shar-ing regime for nearly all network elements. However, this splitting up of net-works into their elements by ad hoc regulatory interventions is destroying con-sumer welfare. Instead, rule-based regulation of network-specific market power should be implemented by means of a disaggregated regulatory mandate, limit-ing incentive regulation to essential facilities as a whole. --
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âUnfairâ Discrimination in Two-sided Peering? Evidence from LINX
âUnfairâ Discrimination in Two-sided Peering? Evidence from LINX
Abstract: Does asymmetry between Internet Providers affect the âfairnessâ of their interconnection contracts?
While recent game theoretic literature provides contrasting answers to this question, there is a lack of empirical research.
We introduce a novel dataset on micro-interconnection policies and provide an econometric analysis of the determinants
of peering decisions amongst the Internet Service Providers interconnecting at the London Internet Exchange Point (LINX).
Our key result shows that two different metrics, introduced to capture asymmetry, exert opposite effects. Asymmetry in
âmarket sizeâ enhances the quality of the link, while asymmetry in ânetwork centralityâ induces quality degradation, hence
âunfairerâ interconnection conditions
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