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some references of interest on the field of These references
will be frequently updated. Due to their diversity, Most of these articles
can be found on the web through Last update: March 3, 2004 Commerce électronique: Jucker A.H., Smith
S.W., Lüdge T. [2003], "Interactive aspects of vagueness in
conversation", Journal of Pragmatics, Volume 35, Issue 12
, December 2003, pp.1737-1769. Vagueness
in reference is often seen as a deplorable deviation from precision
and clarity. Using a relevance theoretical framework of analysis, we
demonstrate instead that vague expressions may be more effective than
precise ones in conveying the intended meaning of an utterance. That
is, they may carry more relevant contextual implications than would
a precise expression. In introducing entities into a conversation, we
found that vague referring expressions often served as a focusing device,
helping the addressee determine how much processing effort should be
devoted to a given referent. In characterising events and experiences,
they may indicate a closer or looser assignment of a characteristic
to a conceptual category. For expressing quantities, they may convey
the speaker's attitude about the quantity itself, and they may convey
assumptions about the speaker's and/or the hearer's beliefs. They may
be used to directly express the degree of commitment a speaker makes
to a proposition, or they may convey other propositional attitudes such
as newsworthiness and personal evaluation more indirectly. Finally,
they may serve social functions such as engendering camaraderie and
softening implicit criticisms. They may thus be seen as managing conversational
implicature. Our analysis is based on a corpus of semi-controlled spoken
interactions between California students, who were asked to converse
on specific topics, such as movies, sports or opera. Following the categories
proposed by Channell (Channell, Joanna. 1994. Vague Language. Oxford
University Press, Oxford), we analysed examples of vague additives,
i.e., approximators, downtoners, vague category identifiers and shields,
and examples of lexical vagueness, i.e., vague quantifying expressions,
vague adverbs of frequency, vague adverbs of likelihood, and placeholder
words. Such expressions are used regularly in everyday conversations
and they rarely lead to detectable misunderstandings; we argue that
their success depends on the exploitation of common ground. Bird A., Stevens
M.J. [2003], "Toward an emergent global culture and the effects
of globalization on obsolescing national cultures", Journal
of International Management, Volume 9, Issue 4 : Globalization and
the Role of the Global Corporation, 2003, pp.395-407. One of the major
effects of globalization is the creation of a new and identifiable class
of persons who belong to an emergent global culture. As membership in
this new global culture rises, many critics find a distinct threat to
national cultures, resulting quite possibly in their eventual obsolescence.
In this paper, we consider the trends driving the growth of this newly
emerging global culture, the process by which new members are socialized
into it, the characteristics, or features, that appear to be descriptive
of its members, and the impact of this emerging global culture on the
obsolescence of national cultures. Finally, while it is unrealistic
to expect that the emerging global culture will replace national cultures,
we nevertheless conclude that national cultures must be adaptable and
able to emphasize the attractiveness of their core elements if they
wish to remain relevant in some viable fashion. C. C. Williams,
Williams C.C. [2003],
"Evaluating the penetration of the commodity economy", Futures,
Volume 35, Issue 8 , October 2003, pp.857-868. A recurring theme
across the social sciences is that there is a natural and inevitable
shift towards commodification. In this linear view of the trajectory
of economies, `non-commodified' economic activities are rapidly vanishing
as the commodity economy, in which goods and services are produced by
capitalist firms for a profit under conditions of market exchange, becomes
ever more victorious, powerful and hegemonic. Until now, few have questioned
this meta-narrative. Here, however, the intention is to evaluate critically
the penetration of commodification. Investigating the depth and speed
of the permeation of the advanced economies by the commodity economy,
it is revealed that the non-commodified sphere has far from disappeared.
Indeed, over the past 40 years, it has grown relative to the commodity
economy and is now equal in size when the time spent working in these
spheres is measured. Explaining this in terms of both the inherent contradictions
embedded in the pursuit of commodification as well as the existence
of `cultures of resistance', the paper concludes that commodification
is not only far from inevitable but the possibility of alternative futures
for work beyond the all-conquering on-going advance of capitalism. Nick Bostrom, Bostrom N. [2003],
"When machines outsmart humans", Futures, Volume 35,
Issue 7 , September 2003, pp.759-764. The annals of artificial
intelligence are littered with broken promises. Half a century after
the first electric computer, we still have nothing that even resembles
an intelligent machine, if by `intelligent' we mean possessing the kind
of general-purpose smartness that we humans pride ourselves on. Maybe
we will never manage to build real artificial intelligence. The problem
could be too difficult for human brains ever to solve. Those who find
the prospect of machines surpassing us in general intellectual abilities
threatening may even hope that is the case. Miranda J. Lubbers,
Lubbers M.J. [2003],
"Group composition and network structure in school classes: a multilevel
application of the p* model", Social Networks, Vol.25, Iss.4
, October 2003, pp.309-332 This paper describes
the structure of social networks of students within school classes and
examines differences in network structure between classes. In order
to examine the network structure within school classes, we focused in
particular on the principle of homophily, i.e. the tendency that people
associate with similar others. When differences between classes were
observed, it was investigated whether these were related to group compositional
characteristics. A two-stage regression procedure is proposed to analyze
social networks of multiple groups. The random coefficient model is
discussed briefly as an alternative to the two-stage method. a Department of
Educational Psychology, University of Illinois, Champaign, USA Anderson C.J., Wasserman
S., Crouch B. [1999], "A p* primer: logit models for social networks",
Social Networks, Vol.21, Iss.1, January 1999, pp.37-66 A major criticism
of the statistical models for analyzing social networks developed by
Holland, Leinhardt, and others [Holland, P.W., Leinhardt, S., 1977.
Notes on the statistical analysis of social network data; Holland, P.W.,
Leinhardt, S., 1981. An exponential family of probability distributions
for directed graphs. Journal of the American Statistical Association.
76, pp. 33-65 (with discussion); Fienberg, S.E., Wasserman, S., 1981.
Categorical data analysis of single sociometric relations. In: Leinhardt,
S. (Ed.), Sociological Methodology 1981, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass,
pp. 156-192; Fienberg, S.E., Meyer, M.M., Wasserman, S., 1985. Statistical
analysis of multiple sociometric relations. Journal of the American
Statistical Association, 80, pp. 51-67; Wasserman, S., Weaver, S., 1985.
Statistical analysis of binary relational data: Parameter estimation.
Journal of Mathematical Psychology. 29, pp. 406-427; Wasserman, S.,
1987. Conformity of two sociometric relations. Psychometrika. 52, pp.
3-18] is the very strong independence assumption made on interacting
individuals or units within a network or group. This limiting assumption
is no longer necessary given recent developments on models for random
graphs made by Frank and Strauss [Frank, O., Strauss, D., 1986. Markov
graphs. Journal of the American Statistical Association. 81, pp. 832-842]
and Strauss and Ikeda [Strauss, D., Ikeda, M., 1990. Pseudolikelihood
estimation for social networks. Journal of the American Statistical
Association. 85, pp. 204-212]. The resulting models are extremely flexible
and easy to fit to data. Although Wasserman and Pattison [Wasserman,
S., Pattison, P., 1996. Logit models and logistic regressions for social
networks: I. An introduction to Markov random graphs and p*. Psychometrika.
60, pp. 401-426] present a derivation and extension of these models,
this paper is a primer on how to use these important breakthroughs to
model the relationships between actors (individuals, units) within a
single network and provides an extension of the models to multiple networks.
The models for multiple networks permit researchers to study how groups
are similar and/or how they are different. The models for single and
multiple networks and the modeling process are illustrated using friendship
data from elementary school children from a study by Parker and Asher
[Parker, J.G., Asher, S.R., 1993. Friendship and friendship quality
in middle childhood: Links with peer group acceptance and feelings of
loneliness and social dissatisfaction. Developmental Psychology. 29,
pp. 611-621]. e-Science The Web supports
wide area data/information location and retrieval. You are looking at
this web page with no knowledge of where the data is stored but you
are using your own PC to interpret the code and present you with the
information Professor Tom Rodden Rob Procter The Human-Computer
Interaction Group (University of York) CSCL - Computer
Supported Collaborative Learning http://www.eurogrid.org/ The DataGrid Project
(EU) Dupouët O.,
Yildizoglu M., Cohendet P. [2003], "Morphogenèse de communautés
de pratique", Working Papers IFReDE - E3i Cette contribution
est consacrée à l'étude et à la simulation
de la formation et de la dynamique des communautés de pratique,
mises en évidence en sociologie au début des années
90 par les travaux de Lave et Wenger (1990) et Brown et Duguid (1991).
Après avoir rappelé, dans un premier temps les principes
théoriques sur lesquels repose la notion de communauté
de pratique, l'article expose, successivement, les principes de la simulation
retenue et enfin les résultats. Frédéric
Creplet, Olivier Dupouet, Francis Kern & Francis Munier Creplet F., Dupouet
O., Kern F., Munier F. [2003], Dualité cognitive et organisationnelle
de la firme au travers du concept de communauté, 15ème
édition du séminaire annuel pluridisciplinaire Organisation,
Innovation, International (OI2)(UTC, Costech) Dualité cognitive
et organisationnelle de la firme au travers du concept de communauté Organizational and
Cognitive Duality of the firm with community concept Morad Diani Diani M. [2002],
"NTIC, communautés virtuelles et nouvelles formes de coordination",
Communication aux 1ères Journées Doctorants du GDR TIC
et Société - 3-4 octobre 2002 Les modes de coordination
classiques - par le marché et la hiérarchie - ne sont
plus en mesure de rendre compte de la nouvelle dynamique économique
axée sur la connaissance et portée par les Nouvelles Technologies
de l'Information et de la Communication (NTIC). La communauté
émerge comme un troisième mode de coordination autonome,
plus adapté à ce nouveau cadre économique. A travers
la notion-clé de confiance, ce travail se propose d'étudier
la nature et les mécanismes implicites de la coordination par
la communauté dans une économie basée sur la connaissance,
en se focalisant sur la catégorie particulière de communautés
assises sur les NTIC, les communautés virtuelles. Paul Muller : BETA,
Pôle Européen de Gestion et d'Economie, Université
Louis Pasteur (Strasbourg 1), 61 Avenue de la Forêt Noire, 67085
STRASBOURG Cedex (France), Muller P. [2003],
"The role of authority in the governance of knowledge communities",
Paper prepared for the DRUID, Winter 2003 Conference, January 16th-18th,
Aalborg, Denmark The aim of this
contribution is to pinpoint some elements dealing with the governance
of knowledge intensive communities. Traditional approaches are usually
dealing with hierarchy as a transaction costs reducing device. However,
such approaches are mainly based on the assumption of opportunistic
behaviours resulting from divergences between personal objectives and
the objectives of the organization. At the opposite, the governance
of knowledge intensive communities relies on the close coupling existing
between impersonal and personal authority. The first coordination mechanism
is materialized through norms governing the cognitive work of the community
by allowing a better assessment of future behaviours. On the other hand,
personal authority constitutes a complementary coordination device which
relies on the strong complementarities between reputation and trust. Sperber D., Wilson
D. [2002], "Pragmatics, Modularity and Mind-reading", Mind
and Language 17(1):3-33. The central problem
for pragmatics is that sentence meaning vastly underdetermines speaker's
meaning. The goal of pragmatics is to explain how the gap between sentence
meaning and speaker's meaning is bridged. This paper defends the broadly
Gricean view that pragmatic interpretation is ultimately an exercise
in mind-reading, involving the inferential attribution of intentions.
We argue, however, that the interpretation process does not simply consist
in applying general mind-reading abilities to a particular (communicative)
domain. Rather, it involves a dedicated comprehension module, with its
own special principles and mechanisms. We show how such a metacommunicative
module might have evolved, and what principles and mechanisms it might
contain. Notre activité
mentale s'appuie sur des mémoires externes qui ont évolué
avec le développement de l'écriture, de l'imprimerie,
et maintenant des nouvelles technologies de l'information. Une évolution
dont doivent tenir compte aussi bien les sciences sociales que les sciences
cognitives.Mots-clés
: mémoire, cognition, cognition distribuée, société,
mémoire sociale, technologies de l'information Origgi G., Sperber
D. [2003], "Qu'est-ce que la pragmatique peut apporter à
l'étude de l'évolution du langage ?", in Jean-Marie
Hombert, Ed. L'origine de l'homme, du langage et des langues.
L'esprit humain
se caractérise par deux capacités cognitives sans véritable
équivalent dans d'autres espèces terrestres : le langage
et la psychologie naïve. Nous suggérons que c'est grâce
à l'interaction de ces deux capacités que la communication
humaine a pu se développer et acquérir une puissance incomparable.
Dans une perspective pragmatique, il est clair en effet que la faculté
de langage et les langues humaines, avec leur richesse et leur imperfections,
ne sont adaptatives que dans une espèce déjà capable
de psychologie naïve et de communication inférentielle.
L'évolution relativement rapide des langues elles-mêmes
et leur manque d'homogénéité à l'intérieur
même d'une communauté linguistique (ces deux traits étant
associés) ne s'expliquent bien, eux aussi, que si la fonction
du langage dans la communication est de fournir des indices sur le sens
voulu et non de l'encoder. Heng-Li Yang : Department
of Management Information Systems, National Cheng-Chi University, 64
Section 2, Chihnan Road, Mucha Dist., 116, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC Yang H.L., Tang
J.H. [2003], "Team structure and team performance in IS development:
a social network perspective", Information & Management,
Vol. 41, Iss 3 , January 2004, pp.335-349 Technology in Society
Robert Plant : Department
of Computer Information Systems, University of Miami, Coral Gables,
FL 33124, USA Plant R. [2003],
"Online communities", Technology in Society, Article
in press. The combination
of low-cost access to increasingly powerful computing and networking
capabilities combined with a deregulated internet has facilitated the
rapid development of a new social phenomena, that of the online community.
The potential for near universal internet access and the ability to
communicate at costs lower than ever before in human existence has facilitated
the development of online communities which work to fulfill two basic
human desires, first, to reach out and connect to other human beings
and secondly to obtain knowledge. James Andreoni :
Department of Economics, University of Wisconsin, 7434 Social Science
Bldg., 1180 Observatory Drive, Madison, WI 53706, USA Andreoni J., Petrie
R. [2004], "Public goods experiments without confidentiality: a
glimpse into fund-raising", Journal of Public Economics,
Vol.88, Iss.7-8 , July 2004, p.1605-1623 Laboratory researchers
in economics assiduously protect the confidentiality of subjects. Why?
Presumably because they fear that the social consequences of identifying
subjects and their choices would significantly alter the economic incentives
of the game. But these may be the same social effects that institutions,
like charitable fund-raising, are manipulating to help overcome free
riding and to promote economic efficiency. We present an experiment
that unmasks subjects in a systematic and controlled way. We show that,
as intuition suggests, identifying subjects has significant effects.
Surprisingly, we found that two supplemental conditions meant to mimic
common fund-raising practices actually had the most dramatic influences
on behavior. Mari Rege : Case
Western Reserve University, Department of Economics, 11119 Bellflower
Road, Cleveland, OH 44106, USA Rege M., Telle K.
[2004], "The impact of social approval and framing on cooperation
in public good situations", Journal of Public Economics,
Vol.88, Iss.7-8 , July 2004, p.1605-1623 Several economists
have maintained that social and internalized norms can enforce cooperation
in public good situations. This experimental study investigates how
two important channels for social and internalized norms, social approval
and framing, affect cooperation among strangers in a public good game.
The experiment has two treatment effects. Firstly, it reveals each person's
identity and his contribution to the public good. Secondly, it presents
the public good game in a language that suggests associations to social
and internalized norms for cooperation. The first treatment effect increases
voluntary contributions significantly. Avner Ben-Ner :
Industrial Relations Center, University of Minnesota, USA Ben-Ner A., Putterman
L., Kong F., Magan D. [2004], "Reciprocity in a two-part dictator
game", Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization,
Vol.53, Iss.3 , March 2004, p.333-352 We conduct a dictator
game experiment in which recipients in an initial game become dictators
in a second game. When the subjects paired remain the same, the amount
sent back is strongly correlated with the amount received despite the
fact that the interaction is anonymous and is known to be one-time and
zero-sum in nature. When the initial recipient is instead paired with
a third subject, a less significant and lower-valued correlation between
amounts received and sent is exhibited. Intelligence and personality
test results, gender, and other characteristics also help to predict
sending behavior and degree of reciprocity. Ségolène
Barbou des Places : European University Institute, Florence, Italy,
and Faculté de droit et Sciences Economiques, Université
Nancy 2, France Barbou des Places
S., Deffains B. [2004], "Cooperation in the shadow of regulatory
competition: the case of asylum legislation in Europe", International
Review of Law and Economics, Vol.23, Iss.4 , December 2003, p.345-364
Traditional analysis
considers that the granting of protection to refugees is an international
public good, and thus explains both the heterogeneousness in refugee
protection in Europe and the spiral that has hardened the EU Member
States' asylum legislation from the mid-1980s onwards as the result
of free riding in the provision of the good. In contrast, the paper
considers that the heterogeneousness in refugee distribution is best
explained by the joint product model and that the spiral of restriction
is best explained by the common pool resource model and regulatory competition
theory. The paper explains, and gives empirical evidence of the emergence
and development of a competitive game among the EU Member States, and
shows the result and the consequence of this upon cooperative attempts
among States. Vincenzo Denicolò
and Luigi Alberto Franzoni, Denicolò
V., Franzoni L.A. [2004], "The contract theory of patents",
International Review of Law and Economics, Vol.23, Iss.4 , December
2003, p.365-380 Two distinct theories
of patents, the "reward theory" and the "contract theory,"
are customarily adopted by the courts to justify the patent system.
The reward theory maintains that the function of the patent system is
to remunerate successful innovators so as to encourage R&D effort.
In contrast, the contract theory holds that the function of the patent
system is to promote the diffusion of innovative knowledge. Assuming
that in the absence of patent protection innovators would rely on trade
secrecy, it views patents as a contract between innovators and society
whereby a property right is granted in exchange for disclosure. 19th Annual conference
of the European Association of Law and Economics, Athens, Greece, September
2002. Lewisch P. [2004],
"A theory of identification", International Review of Law
and Economics, Vol.23, Iss.4 , December 2003, p.439-451 This paper analyzes
the phenomenon of "identification" by an individual with actors
in his environment. It argues that individuals interpret their environment
according to "frames," which they, as recipients of a message,
derive by a complex process of interpretation of the communication setting.
The paper also argues that individuals identify with actors in their
environment, because this identification increases their utility vis-à-vis
a "neutral" watching of their environment. The paper applies
this approach to a variety of real life examples, in particular to voting.
Kieron Meagher :
School of Economics, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia Meagher K., Rogers
M. [2004], "Network density and R&D spillovers", Journal
of Economic Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.2 , February
2004, p.237-260 Abstract Joseph Henrich,
Henrich J. [2004],
"Cultural group selection, coevolutionary processes and large-scale
cooperation", Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization,
Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism], January 2004, p.3-35 In constructing
improved models of human behavior, both experimental and behavioral
economists have increasingly turned to evolutionary theory for insights
into human psychology and preferences. Unfortunately, the existing genetic
evolutionary approaches can explain neither the degree of prosociality
(altruism and altruistic punishment) observed in humans, nor the patterns
of variation in these behaviors across different behavioral domains
and social groups. Ongoing misunderstandings about why certain models
work, what they predict, and what the place is of "group selection"
in evolutionary theory have hampered the use of insights from biology
and anthropology. This paper clarifies some of these issues and proposes
an approach to the evolution of prosociality rooted in the interaction
between cultural and genetic transmission. I explain how, in contrast
to non-cultural species, the details of our evolved cultural learning
capacities (e.g., imitative abilities) create the conditions for the
cultural evolution of prosociality. By producing multiple behavioral
equilibria, including group-beneficial equilibria, cultural evolution
endogenously generates a mechanism of equilibrium selection that can
favor prosociality. Finally, in the novel social environments left in
the wake of these cultural evolutionary processes, natural selection
is likely to favor prosocial genes that would not be expected in a purely
genetic approach. Comments on
this article: Kenichi Aoki, Yuji Aruka, Michael D. Cohen,
, Robert Axelrod and Rick Riolo James F. Crow, Herbert Gintis,
John M. Gowdy, Werner Güth
: Max-Plank-Institute for Research into Economic Systems, Strategic
Interaction Unit, von Wirtschafts systemen, Wernor Gth Kahlaische Strasse
10, D 07745, Jena, Germany Geoffrey M. Hodgson Daniel Houser, Kevin
McCabe, and Vernon Smith Elias L. Khalil
Richard B. Norgaard,
Alex Possajennikov Louis Putterman Rajiv Sethi : Department
of Economics, Barnard College, Columbia University, 3009 Broadway, New
York, NY 10027, USA Gordon Tullock,
David Sloan Wilson,
Joseph Henrich J.
[2004], "Reply", Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization,
Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism], January 2004, p.127-143. Oded Stark Starl O. [2004],
"Cooperation and wealth", Journal of Economic Behavior &
Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism], January 2004,
p.109-115. We calculate the
equilibrium fraction of cooperators in a population in which payoffs
accrue from playing a single-shot prisoner's dilemma game. Individuals
who are hardwired as cooperators or defectors are randomly matched into
pairs, and cooperators are able to perfectly find out the type of a
partner to a game by incurring a recognition cost. We show that the
equilibrium fraction of cooperators relates negatively to the population's
level of wealth. http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=966409&jmp=abstract&dl=ACM&dl=ACM Glass R.L. [2004],
"A look at the Economics of Open Source - Is open source the future
of the software field or a passing fad ?", Communications of
the ACM, Vol.47, N°2, p.25-27 Cette tribune de
la rubrique "Practical Programmer" prétend répondre
à une vaste question : quel est l'avenir de l'open source d'un
point de vue économique. L'auteur, qui est par ailleurs éditeur
des revues Software Practitioner et Journal of Systems and Software
(Elsevier), affiche un parti pris anti open source. Son argumentaire
est très pauvre (l'article est étonnamment creux pour
une revue telle que Communications of the ACM), et se résume
en deux points : Parmi les rares
choses que j'ai remarquées dans cet article : George J. Stigler;
Gary S. Becker Lancaster K.J. [1971],
Consumer Demand: a New Approach, Columbia University Press, 1971 Gary S. Becker;
Kevin M. Murphy We develop a theory
of rational addiction in which rationality means a consistent plan to
maximize utility over time. Strong addiction to a good requires a big
effect of past consumption of the good on current consumption. Such
powerful complementarities cause some steady states to be unstable.
They are an important part of our analysis because even small deviations
from the consumption at an unstable steady state can lead to large cumulative
rises over time in addictive consumption or to rapid falls in consumption
to abstention. Our theory also implies that "cold turkey"
is used to end strong addictions, that addicts often go on binges, that
addicts respond more to permanent than to temporary changes in prices
of addictive goods, and that anxiety and tensions can precipitate an
addiction. Jean-Samuel Beuscart
: Groupe d'analyse des politiques publiques (Gapp), École normale
supérieure de Cachan, Département de sciences sociales,
61, avenue du Président-Wilson, 94235 Cachan cedex, France Napster, système
horizontal d'échange de fichiers musicaux, est un cas exemplaire
de dispositif sociotechnique ouvert, objet d'interprétations
contradictoires. Nous examinons ici deux grands récits du fonctionnement
de l'innovation Napster : le premier envisage le dispositif comme une
communauté d'échange autorégulée, emblématique
de l'avènement d'un nouveau mode de régulation sociale
fondé sur le don ; le second l'analyse à l'inverse comme
un dispositif de consommation, régi par le calcul et les comportements
opportunistes, et précurseur des structures d'un marché
de la musique en ligne. Par l'observation empirique de la genèse
et des usages du dispositif, nous montrons que ces interprétations
en occultent la dimension technique et surestiment la mise en œuvre
par les usagers de leur compétence morale ou de calcul. La régulation
du collectif relève plutôt de la solidarité technique,
dans laquelle les calculs et les actions morales des utilisateurs composent
avec les instances plus ou moins contraignantes et éclatées
du système technique. Eytan Adar is a
member of the Internet Ecologies Area at the Xerox Palo Alto Research
Center in Palo Alto, Calif. Most recently he has been involved in Internet
characterization research and the design of new systems fusing economic
and computer science ideas. He holds a BS and MEng degrees from the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. An extensive analysis
of user traffic on Gnutella shows a significant amount of free riding
in the system. By sampling messages on the Gnutella network over a 24-hour
period, we established that almost 70% of Gnutella users share no files,
and nearly 50% of all responses are returned by the top 1% of sharing
hosts. Furthermore, we found out that free riding is distributed evenly
between domains, so that no one group contributes significantly more
than others, and that peers that volunteer to share files are not necessarily
those who have desirable ones. We argue that free riding leads to degradation
of the system performance and adds vulnerability to the system. If this
trend continues copyright issues might become moot compared to the possible
collapse of such systems. Frédéric
Creplet, Olivier Dupouet, Francis Kern & Francis Munier En partant des concepts
récents de communautés épistémiques et de
communautés de pratique, nous montrons que l'entreprise peut
être définie selon une forme de double dualité :
cognitive et organisationnelle. L'intérêt de cette approche
est de mettre en avant le comportement différencié du
manager et de l'entrepreneur dans l'entreprise. Elle met également
en perspective les questions importantes des tensions organisationnelles
sous l'angle de l'économie des connaissances. Godbout J.T. [2000],
Le don, la dette et l'identité, La découverte, M.A.U.S.S.
Paris, 2000. Anne Revillard Natalia Komarova
: Institute for Advanced Study, Einstein Drive, Princeton, NJ 08540,
USA Komarova N., Niyogi
P. "Optimizing the mutual intelligibility of linguistic agents
in a shared world", Artificial Intelligence, Vol.154, Iss.1-2
, April 2004, p. 1-42 We consider the
problem of linguistic agents that communicate with each other about
a shared world. We develop a formal notion of a language as a set of
probabilistic associations between form (lexical or syntactic) and meaning
(semantic) that has general applicability. Using this notion, we define
a natural measure of the mutual intelligibility, F(L,L'), between two
agents, one using the language L and the other using L'. We then proceed
to investigate three important questions within this framework: (1)
Given a language L, what language L' maximizes mutual intelligibility
with L? We find surprisingly that L' need not be the same as L and we
present algorithms for approximating L' arbitrarily well. (2) How can
one learn to optimally communicate with a user of language L when L
is unknown at the outset and the learner is allowed a finite number
of linguistic interactions with the user of L? We describe possible
algorithms and calculate explicit bounds on the number of interactions
needed. (3) Consider a population of linguistic agents that learn from
each other and evolve over time. Will the community converge to a shared
language and what is the nature of such a language? We characterize
the evolutionarily stable states of a population of linguistic agents
in a game-theoretic setting. Our analysis has significance for a number
of areas in natural and artificial communication where one studies the
design, learning, and evolution of linguistic communication systems.
Callon M. [1994],
"Is Science a Public Good?", Science, Technology, &
Human Values, Vol.19, Iss.4, Autumn 1994, p.395-424. Should governments
accept the principle of devoting a proportion of their resources to
funding basic research? From the standpoint of economics, science should
be considered as a public good and for that reason it should be protected
from market forces. This article tries to show that this result can
only be maintained at the price of abandoning arguments traditionally
deployed by economists themselves. It entails a complete reversal of
our habitual ways of thinking about public goods. In order to bring
this reversal about, this article draws on the central results obtained
by the anthropology and sociology of science and technology over the
past several years. Science is a public good, not because of its intrinsic
properties but because it is a source of diversity and flexibility. Extrait: "One of the
first - and maybe one of the only - results of social studies of science
has been to show that an isolated statement or theory is quite simply
useless. (…) From the above, it follows that, in order to become
an economic good susceptible of being mobilized in consumption or production
activity, a statement must be accompanied by a series of investments
I without which it lacks any use value. (…) Now the property of
nonrivalry, which holds only for the very few who have borne I (and
which in the case of science or technology constitutes the community
of specialists), is the result of a series of strategic (investment)
decisions taken by those actors. It is in no way an intrinsic property
of the statements themselves: it would be better to call it an extrinsic
property and to consider variable degrees of (non)rivalry." Michel Callon et
Bruno Latour, CSI, ENSMP, Paris Callon M., Latour
B. [1997],"'Tu ne calculeras pas!' ou comment symétriser
le don et le capital", in Le capitalisme aujourd'hui, (Alain
Caillé, ed), La Découverte, MAUSS n°9. Polanyi K., [1944],
The Great Transformation, New York, 1944 (traduit en français
: La grande transformation, aux origines politiques et économiques
de notre temps, Paris, Gallimard, 1983). The Great Transformation
is organized into three parts. Parts I and III focus on the immediate
circumstances that produced the first World War, the Great Depression,
the rise of fascism in Continental Europe, the New Deal in the United
States, and the first five year plan in the Soviet Union. In these introductory
and concluding chapters, Polanyi sets up a puzzle: Why did a prolonged
period of relative peace and prosperity in Europe, lasting from 1815
to 1914, suddenly gave way to economic collapse and the savagery of
two World Wars. Part II--the core of the book--provides Polanyi's solution
to the puzzle. Going back to the English Industrial Revolution , in
the first years of the 19th Century, Polanyi shows how English thinkers
responded to the disruptions of early industrialization by developing
the theory of market liberalism, with its core belief that human society
should be subordinated to self-regulating markets. As a result of England's
leading role as "workshop of the world," he explains these
beliefs became the organizing principle for the world economy. In the
second half of Part II, chapters 11 through 18, Polanyi argues that
market liberalism produced an inevitable response--concerted efforts
to protect society from the market. These efforts meant that market
liberalism could not work as intended, and the institutions governing
the global economy created increasing tensions within and between nations.
The collapse of peace that led to World War I, and the collapse of economic
order leading to the Great Depression, are shown to be the direct consequence
of attempting to organize the global economy on the basis of market
liberalism. The second "great transformation"--the rise of
fascism-- is a result of the first "great transformation"--the
rise of market liberalism. William W. FISHER
: (professeur à Harvard) Chapter 6 outlines
the best of the possible solutions to the crisis: an administrative
compensation system that would provide an alternative to the increasingly
creaky copyright regime. In brief, here's how such a system would work:
The owner of the copyright in an audio or video recording who wished
to be compensated when it was used by others would register it with
the Copyright Office and would receive, in return, a unique file name,
which then would be used to track its distribution, consumption, and
modification. The government would raise the money necessary to compensate
copyright owners through a tax - most likely, a tax on the devices and
services that consumers use to gain access to digital entertainment.
Using techniques pioneered by television rating services and performing
rights organizations, a government agency would estimate the frequency
with which each song and film was listened to or watched. The tax revenues
would then be distributed to copyright owners in proportion to the rates
with which their registered works were being consumed. Once this alternative
regime were in place, copyright law would be reformed to eliminate most
of the current prohibitions on the unauthorized reproduction and use
of published recorded music and films. The social advantages of such
a system, we will see, would be large: consumer convenience; radical
expansion of the set of creators who could earn a livelihood from making
their work available directly to the public; reduced transaction costs
and associated cost savings; elimination of the economic inefficiency
and social harms that result when intellectual products are priced above
the costs of replicating them; reversal of the concentration of the
entertainment industries; and a boost to consumer creativity caused
by the abandonment of encryption. The system would certainly not be
perfect. Some artists would try to manipulate it to their advantage,
it would cause some distortions in consumer behavior, and the officials
who administer it might abuse their power. But, on balance, it is the
most promising solution of the three models. The chapter concludes with
a brief discussion of how a variant of this approach might be implemented
on a voluntary basis - as either a prelude to or as an alternative to
its creation and management by the government. Michele Boldrin:
Department of Economics, University of Minnesota Boldrin M., Levine
D. [2002], "The Case Against Intellectual Property", American
Economic Review, Vol.92, N°2, May 2002. Richard Cornes:
School of Economics, (University of Nottingham) We exploit the aggregative
structure of the public good model to provide a simple analysis of the
voluntary contribution game. In contrast to the best response function
approach, ours avoids the proliferation of dimensions as the number
of players is increased, and can readily analyse games involving many
heterogeneous players. We demonstrate the approach at work on the standard
pure public economic model and show how it can analyse extensions of
the basic model. Florian Herold:
University of Munich This paper studies
the evolution of both characteristics of reciprocity - the willingness
to reward friendly behavior and the willingness to punish hostile behavior.
Firstly, preferences for rewarding as well as preferences for punishing
can survive evolution provided individuals interact within separated
groups. This holds even with randomly formed groups and even when individual
preferences are unobservable. Secondly, preferences for rewarding survive
only in coexistence with self-interested preferences. But preferences
for punishing tend either to vanish or to dominate the population entirely.
Finally, the evolution of preferences for rewarding and the evolution
of preferences for punishing in?uence each other decisively. The existence
of rewarders enhances the evolutionary success of punishers, but punishers
crowd out rewarders. Jonathan Zittrain
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/zittrain.html Michael Turner Economic
History at the University of Hull James Boyle (Duke
Law School) Boyle J. [2003],
"The Second Enclosure Movement and the Construction of the Public
Domain", Law and Contemporary Problems, Vol.66, Winter/Spring 2003. Michael Barrett
: Judge Institute of Management, University of Cambridge, UK M. Barrett M., S.
Cappleman S., G. Shoib G., G. Walsham G. [2004], "Learning in Knowledge
Communities: - Managing Technology and Context", European Management
Journal, Vol.22, Iss.1, Feb-2004, p.1-11 In contemporary
organizations, significant emphasis is placed on the processes of knowledge
sharing and learning, which are increasingly seen as crucial to organizational
success. Information and communication technologies play an important
role in these areas, but to many there is a lack of clarity regarding
how such technologies can be best deployed. In this article, we provide
a wide range of examples of where technology has been used to support
learning in knowledge communities, with varying degrees of success.
We use this material to develop specific characteristics of effective
knowledge communities, and detail ways in which both the context and
the technology should be managed. A key message we derive is that the
maintenance of a supportive culture and context for learning and knowledge
sharing is crucial, and that an integrated approach to technology deployment
and use needs to be developed in conjunction with this. We argue that
action in this arena is important for all levels and functions of management,
not just senior managers or IT staff, since the support of effective
learning and knowledge sharing in and between communities involves everyone
in the organization in all job roles. Rian Van Der Merwe
: Curtin University of Technology, Australia Van Der Merwe R.,
Pitt L., Berthon P. [2004], "Elucidating Elusive Ensembles: - The
Strategic Value of Informal Internet Networks", European Management
Journal, Vol.22, Iss.1, Feb-2004, p.12-26 For many years,
sociologists have conceptualized and debated the value of `social capital':
the resources embedded in an individual's social network. More recently,
the notions of network organizations and strategic alliances have become
important forms of entrepreneurial venture. An important and often overlooked
form of alliance on the Internet is what we call the `elusive ensemble'.
These associations of individuals and organizations are typically undocumented,
difficult to identify by third parties, and even pass unrecognized by
their constituent members. They consist of informal Internet networks
that are extremely valuable because of the strategic social capital
embedded in them. Drawing on Social Network Theory, this paper outlines
a methodology for viewing and valuing informal Internet networks, and
in doing so offers guidance on improving the strategic efficacy of these
elusive ensembles. Teck-Yong Eng :
Aston University, Birmingham, UK Eng T.Y. [2004],
"Implications of the Internet for Knowledge Creation and Dissemination
in Clusters of Hi-tech Firms", European Management Journal,
Vol.22, Iss.1, Feb-2004, p.87-98 Recent advances
in Internet-based telecommunication technologies have enabled firms
to compete across their own regional and national borders regardless
of physical presence, location and size. While studies on regional economics
stress the importance of localized specialization for the creation and
dissemination of knowledge, the Internet is introducing a new competitive
landscape for the conduct of business through virtual networks. However,
there is little research on the influence of the Internet on regional
development of clusters particularly concepts and theories for explaining
the role of the Internet in the creation and dissemination of knowledge
-- as a source of regional competence. This paper draws on cases of
Cambridge's high-tech firms in the United Kingdom to examine and develop
concepts pertaining to drivers of Internet technology that facilitate
the creation and dissemination of knowledge. The data analysis suggests
the presence of four Internet drivers: open systems, virtual channels,
multi-user engagement and extended customizability. The Internet facilitates
communications, extends customization capabilities and presents new
virtual channels that further strengthen the close and intensive interactions
of spatial localization of firms for production and innovation. Jeff Dayton-Johnson
: Department of Economics, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, Canada
B3H 3J5 Dayton-Johnson J.
[2003], "Knitted warmth: the simple analytics of social cohesion",
The Journal of Socioeconomics, Vol.32, Iss.6, Dec-2003, p. 623-645. Self-interested
agents are randomly matched to play a variant of the prisoners dilemma
in which social capital increases the return to mutual cooperation.
The stock of society-wide social-capital investments is social cohesion;
the rate of return to social-capital investment increases with social
cohesion. I derive sufficient conditions for equilibrium cooperation
when agents know only the level of social cohesion. In communities,
there exists better information and some social standard of behavior
that supports equilibrium cooperation. I distinguish between characteristics
of individuals and those of populations, and between mechanisms that
favor cooperation in low-information "mass society" and in
information-rich settings. Youngjin Yoo : Weatherhead
School of Management, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH
44106-7135, USA Yoo Y., Alavi M.
[2004], "Emergent leadership in virtual teams: what do emergent
leaders do?", Information and Organization, Vol.14, Iss.1,
Jan-2004, p.27-58. We conducted an
exploratory study to examine the behaviors and roles that are enacted
by emergent leaders in virtual team settings. Specifically, we analyzed
quantitative and qualitative data to identify differences between team
members who emerged as leaders and as non-leaders in terms of their
behavior as manifested in their electronic mail messages. The longitudinal
study involved seven ad hoc and temporary virtual teams composed of
senior executives of a US federal government agency who participated
in an executive development program at a university. Werner Güth
: Max Planck Institute for Research into Economic Systems, Strategic
Interaction Group, Kahlaische Strasse 10, D-07745, Jena, Germany Guth W., Pull K.
[2004], "Will equity evolve?: an indirect evolutionary approach",
European Journal of Political Economy, Vol.20, Iss.1 [Special
Issue], Mar-2004, p.273-282 It has been claimed
that people often prefer equity-like considerations and tend to ignore
strategic aspects in fair division problems. Here, this is explored
by analysing whether or not such a behavioural disposition is evolutionarily
stable. The answer, however, is ambiguous: Both, reacting to and neglecting
strategic aspects can be evolutionarily stable strategies when power
discrepancies are minor. Equity, in particular, is restricted to situations
where structural asymmetries are subtle. Dan Sperber : Institut
Jean-Nicod, CNRS, EHESS, and ENS, Paris, France Sperber D., Hirschfeld
L.A. [2004], "The cognitive foundations of cultural stability and
diversity" [review article], Trends in Cognitive Sciences,
Vol.8, Iss.1, Jan. 2004p.40-46 The existence and
diversity of human cultures are made possible by our species-specific
cognitive capacities. But how? Do cultures emerge and diverge as a result
of the deployment, over generations and in different populations, of
general abilities to learn, imitate and communicate? What role if any
do domain-specific evolved cognitive abilities play in the emergence
and evolution of cultures? These questions have been approached from
different vantage points in different disciplines. Here we present a
view that is currently developing out of the converging work of developmental
psychologists, evolutionary psychologists and cognitive anthropologists.
Ignacio Palacios-Huerta
: Brown University, Box B Department of Economics, Providence, RI 02912,
USA Palacios-Huerta
I., Santos T.J. [2004], "A theory of markets, institutions, and
endogenous preferences", Journal of Public Economics, Vol.88,
Iss.3-4, Mar-2004, p.601-627. The endogeneity
of preferences implies that not only individual preferences--along with
technologies, government policies, and the organization of society and
markets--determine economic outcomes, but also that the economic, social,
legal, and cultural structure of society affects preferences. This paper
develops a general equilibrium model of incomplete markets in which
preferences are endogenously determined. The key feature in the model
is the interplay between the extent of the market, competitive endogenous
interactions among individuals, and the heterogenous formation of preferences.
We develop our model through an example in which individuals' attitudes
toward risk are formed as a function of the exposure to market risks,
market incompletenesses, and non-market uncertainties. The model can
easily accommodate the consideration of the formation of other preference
parameters, and their relationship with other characteristics of the
economic, social, and institutional environment. We discuss and present
empirical evidence that supports the implication that the degree of
risk aversion responds to market arrangements. Bilodeau M., Gravel
N. [2004], "Voluntary provision of a public good and individual
morality", Journal of Public Economics, Vol.88, Iss.3-4,
Mar-2004, p.645-666. We examine, both
in general games in strategic form and in games of voluntary provision
of a public good, some implications of the assumption that individuals
may obey ethical codes of conduct. The notion of morality considered
captures the intuition (often attributed to Kant) that a moral action
leads to the best outcome when it is properly universalized. We propose
a formalization of this idea which generalizes earlier attempts made
in this direction in the literature by allowing the players to differ
both in their strategy sets and their preferences. We show that it is
easy to find examples of games in which no moral behavior of this type
exists or where the only existing `Kantian' code of conduct leads to
a Pareto-inefficient outcome. We then more specifically examine the
issues of existence and Pareto-efficiency of Kantian norms of behavior
in games of voluntary provision of a public good. We find in this context
that there is no conflict between morality and Pareto-efficiency since
any Kantian norm of behavior is Pareto-efficient. We also prove the
existence of a Kantian norm of individual contribution. Journal of
Pragmatics, Vol.36, Iss.1, Jan-2004 : Polylogue Catherine Kerbrat-Orecchioni
: Groupe de Recherches sur les Interactions Communicatives, CNRS-Université
Lumière Lyon 2, 5 av. Pierre Mendès France, 69676, Bron,
France Kerbrat-Orecchioni
C. [2004], "Introducing polylogue", Journal of Pragmatics,
Vol.36, Iss.1, Jan-2004, p.1-24 The introduction
to this special issue begins by defining the notion of `polylogue'.
Then, after having summarized the results of our previous work on `trilogues',
I propose a survey of the general perspective adopted by the authors,
and of the main analytical tools they use. Finally, the articles gathered
in the volume are introduced in more detail in relation to the particular
situations and data they deal with. Grosjean M. [2004],
"From multi-participant talk to genuine polylogue: shift-change
briefing sessions at the hospital", Journal of Pragmatics,
Vol.36, Iss.1, Jan-2004, p.25-52 The analysis of
multi-participant talk in workplace settings raises new questions not
only about specific features of polylogues, but also about the intricate
connections between talk and working activity. The objects and cognitive
artifacts of the work setting, the workers' functions and status, and
the actions, transactions, and social rules that organize activity in
the workplace all play key roles in the structuring of this multi-participant
talk. Based on data from meetings between the leaving shift and the
in-coming shift in three French hospital wards, the article compares
different types of structuring in multi-participant talk, switching
from basic participation structures (symmetrical dilogues between leaving
nurses and in-coming nurses, or between leaving parties and in-coming
ones) to genuine polylogues occurring at specific moments. We attempt
to determine what triggers such phenomena. The resulting comparative
study allows us to investigate not only the role of local norms (talk
and activity organization, use of cognitive artifacts), but also the
role of professional status and production formats in constructing participation
frameworks during shift changeovers. Véronique
Traverso : Groupe de Recherche sur les Interactions Communicatives,
CNRS - Université Lumière Lyon2, 5 avenue Pierre Mendès
France, 69500, Bron, France Traverso V. [2004],
"Interlocutive 'crowding' and 'splitting' in polylogues: the case
of a researchers' meeting", Journal of Pragmatics, Vol.36,
Iss.1, Jan-2004, p.53-74 The study of polylogues
raises numerous problems. This paper deals with one of the most challenging
among them, which can be called the `observer-describer paradox', and
which makes it necessary to adopt the `multi-access description' (global,
macro-local, micro-local) presented in the first part of the paper.
In the second part, a semi-formal meeting of a group of researchers
is described using this approach. The characteristics of this type of
meeting justify that the analysis focuses, in a second phase, on the
`macro-local level'. On this level, the hypothesis is made that the
analysis of the organization of the participants' topical lines is an
accurate method for throwing light on the way in which a polylogue is
configured. This analysis leads to the description of two polylogue-linked
phenomena: `crowding' and `splitting'. Bruxelles S., Kerbrat-Orecchioni
C. [2004], "Coalitions in polylogues", Journal of Pragmatics,
Vol.36, Iss.1, Jan-2004, p.75-113. As regards interpersonal
relationships, all polylogues share one specific feature: they allow
the participants to build `alliances' or `coalitions' with each other.
After defining the notion of `coalition', we will examine the various
devices one participant may use in order to form a coalition with another
one, such devices being considered by the analyst as markers of an on-going
coalition among the members of the conversational group. We will present
two main types of coalitions: those conditioned by the interactional
setting and those independent of that setting (`emerging coalitions').
These different notions will be investigated through the analysis of
two sets of data collected from two quite different multi-participant
situations: (1) a radio discussion among film critics about a movie,
consisting of five participants (including one moderator), in which
the opposing sides are formed in the course of the discussion in quite
an unforseeable way; (2) interactions in notaries' offices during divorce
proceedings, in which coalitions are broadly determined by the institutional
setting in which they take place, according to two main outlines: the
first one opposes two teams, each composed of one member of the divorced
couple supported by his or her notary, the second opposes the notaries-cum-experts
on one side and the clients-cum-laypersons on the other. A third type
of coalition emerges as well, which is less `natural' and brings together
the two notaries opposing one of the divorcees, upon whom they both
try to exert pressure. In the conclusion, we will emphasize the flexibility
of polylogues and then re-examine the assumption that verbal communication
is essentially a dual phenomenon. Michel Marcoccia
: Université de Technologie de Troyes, Laboratoire Tech-CICO,
12, rue Marie Curie, BP 2060, 10010, Troyes Cedex, France Marcoccia M. [2004],
"On-line polylogues: conversation structure and participation framework
in internet newsgroups", Journal of Pragmatics, Vol.36,
Iss.1, Jan-2004, p.115-145. This paper deals
with discussions within internet (usenet) newsgroups. These discussions
can be described as computer-mediated or `on-line' polylogues. We observe
that the specific features of newsgroups (computer-mediated communication,
asynchronicity, and the public nature of the messages) have many repercussions
on conversation structure and on participation framework. A newsgroup
is a set of multiple conversations in which exchanges of messages are
often truncated. The conversational sequences are generally very short.
Messages are sometimes inaccurately positioned in the sequential structure
of the conversation. The conversation structure is sometimes misunderstood
by the newsgroup users. Newsgroups also have a specific participation
framework. There are three kinds of participant roles in a newsgroup:
simple readers (or eavesdroppers), casual senders, and hosts. We can
distinguish three levels in the production format: the transmitter (or
animator) is the physical source of the message; the writer (or author)
is the person who formulates the message; and the enunciator (or principal)
is the participant to whose position the message attests. We can also
distinguish several configurations of these production roles corresponding
to several modes of participation (transmission, form, motive). Last,
we can observe a three-party configuration of reception format: eavesdropper,
favored recipient, and addressed recipient. Aaron Schiff : Department of Economics, The University
of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, New Zealand Schiff A. [2003],
"Open and closed systems of two-sided networks", Information
Economics and Policy, Volume 15, Issue 4, December 2003, p.425-442.
Firms with two-sided
networks facilitate connections or transactions between two distinct
populations of consumers. This paper analyzes the behavior of such firms
where there are no intrinsic benefits to consumers other than the network
effects, such as employment agencies, real estate agents and videogame
platforms. The modelling framework encompasses both matching service
and platform business models and allows for subscription or per-transaction
pricing. Three different market structures are considered: monopoly,
and duopoly with and without compatibility. Comparisons of prices, profits,
consumer surplus, and welfare are made between the three regimes. It
is shown that duopoly with compatibility is socially preferable to the
other regimes, while monopoly is socially preferable to duopoly without
compatibility. Amit Gayer : Department
of Economics, University of Haifa, Haifa 31905, Israel Gayer A., Shy O.
[2003], "Copyright protection and hardware taxation", Information
Economics and Policy, Volume 15, Issue 4 , December 2003, p.467-483. This paper investigates
the recently practiced method of taxing hardware and transferring the
proceeds to software makers, or artists in general. We characterize
the conditions under which the policy of compensating copyright owners
for infringements on their intellectual property using hardware taxation
is inefficient. Hiroshi Kinokuni,
Kinokuni H. [2003],
"Copy-protection policies and profitability", Information
Economics and Policy, Volume 15, Issue 4 , December 2003, p.521-536.
This paper examines
the publisher's optimal copy-protection policies. Even if copying is
more cost-efficient than producing an original, private copying harms
the publisher for two reasons. First, the copy users' contribution to
the original's price is too small, and second, there is a time lag between
providing the original and distributing copies. If and only if both
production costs of copies and institutional costs of the distribution
of copies are sufficiently small; does controlling the number of copies
benefit the publisher. However, the publisher's optimal number of copies
is too low from a social welfare perspective. Gayer A., Shy O.
[2003], "Internet and peer-to-peer distributions in markets for
digital products", Economics Letters, 81 (2003) p.51-57 This short paper
investigates how publishers of digitally-stored products (such as computer
software, movies, books and music titles) can utilize the Internet's
distribution channels, such as peer-to-peer (P2P) and Gnutella, to enhance
sales of their product sold in stores. D 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights
reserved. Edwina L. Rissland:
Department of Computer Science, University of Massachusetts at Amherst,
Amherst, MA 01003, USA Kevin D. Ashley:
Learning Research and Development Center, University of Pittsburgh,
Pittsburgh, PA 15260, USA Edwina L. Rissland:
Department of Computer Science, University of Massachusetts, Amherst,
MA 01003, USA Ashley K.D., Rissland
E.L. [2003], "Law, learning and representation", Artificial
Intelligence, Volume 150, Issues 1-2 , (AI and Law), November 2003,
p. 17-58. In machine learning
terms, reasoning in legal cases can be compared to a lazy learning approach
in which courts defer deciding how to generalize beyond the prior cases
until the facts of a new case are observed. The HYPO family of systems
implements a "lazy" approach since they defer making arguments
how to decide a problem until the programs have positioned a new problem
with respect to similar past cases. In a kind of "reflective adjustment",
they fit the new problem into a patchwork of past case decisions, comparing
cases in order to reason about the legal significance of the relevant
similarities and differences. Empirical evidence from diverse experiments
shows that for purposes of teaching legal argumentation and performing
legal information retrieval, HYPO-style systems' lazy learning approach
and implementation of aspects of reflective adjustment can be very effective.
L. Karl Branting:
North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA Branting L.K. [2003],
"A reduction-graph model of precedent in legal analysis",
Artificial Intelligence, Volume 150, Issues 1-2 , (AI and Law),
November 2003, p. 59-95. Legal analysis is
a task underlying many forms of legal problem solving. In the Anglo-American
legal system, legal analysis is based in part on legal precedents, previously
decided cases. This paper describes a reduction-graph model of legal
precedents that accounts for a key characteristic of legal precedents:
a precedent's relevance to subsequent cases is determined by the theory
under which the precedent is decided. This paper identifies the implementation
requirements for legal analysis using the reduction-graph model of legal
precedents and describes GREBE, a program that satisfies these requirements.
Trevor Bench-Capon:
Department of Computer Science, The University of Liverpool, Liverpool,
UK Bench-Capon T.,
Sartor G. [2003], "A model of legal reasoning with cases incorporating
theories and values", Artificial Intelligence, Volume 150,
Issues 1-2 , (AI and Law), November 2003, p. 97-143 Reasoning with cases
has been a primary focus of those working in AI and law who have attempted
to model legal reasoning. In this paper we put forward a formal model
of reasoning with cases which captures many of the insights from that
previous work. We begin by stating our view of reasoning with cases
as a process of constructing, evaluating and applying a theory. Central
to our model is a view of the relationship between cases, rules based
on cases, and the social values which justify those rules. Having given
our view of these relationships, we present our formal model of them,
and explain how theories can be constructed, compared and evaluated.
We then show how previous work can be described in terms of our model,
and discuss extensions to the basic model to accommodate particular
features of previous work. We conclude by identifying some directions
for future work. Peter Jackson: Thomson
Legal & Regulatory, R&D, D1-N329, 610 Opperman Drive, Eagan,
MN 55123, USA Jackson P., Al-Kofahi
K., Tyrrell A., Vachher A. [2003], "Information extraction from
case law and retrieval of prior cases", Artificial Intelligence,
Volume 150, Issues 1-2 , (AI and Law), November 2003, p.239-290. We describe an information
extraction and retrieval system, called History Assistant, which extracts
rulings from court opinions and retrieves relevant prior cases from
a citator database. The technology employed is similar to that adopted
in the Message Understanding Conferences, but attempts a fuller parse
in order to distinguish current rulings from previous rulings reported
in a case. In addition, we employ a combination of information retrieval
and machine learning techniques to link each new case to related documents
that it may impact. We present experimental results, in terms of precision
and recall, for all tasks performed by the extraction and linking programs.
Part of the finished system has been deemed worthy of further development
into a computer-assisted database update tool to help editors assimilate
historical relationships between cases into a concordance of court decisions,
called a citator. Brynjolfsson E.,
Dick A.A., Smith M.D. [2003], "Search and Product Differentiation
at an Internet Shopbot", Working Paper, SSRN Abstract: Erik Brynjolfsson:
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Sloan School of Management Brynjolfsson E.,
Smith M.D., Hu Y.J. [2003], "Consumer Surplus in the Digital Economy:
Estimating the Value of Increased Product Variety at Online Booksellers",
Working Paper, SSRN, MIT Sloan Working Paper No. 4305-03. Abstract: Forthcoming, Telecommunications
Policy Research Conference Proceedings, 2003 This is our contribution
to the policy debate regarding appropriate mechanisms for allocating
radio spectrum. It has attracted quite a bit of attention and controversy;
I presented this work at several fora of the FCC's Spectrum Policy Task
Force in 2002. Since 1927, the
electromagnetic spectrum has been allocated to uses and users by the
Federal government, covering broadcast radio, microwave communications
systems, broadcast television, satellites, dispatch, police and national
defense needs, among many others. Assignees receive a license to broadcast
certain material (say, taxi dispatch) at a specified frequency and a
specified power level (and perhaps direction). For many purposes, this
license is time-limited, but with a presumption of renewal; in fact,
radio licenses are almost always renewed. Licensees can only use the
spectrum for the specified purpose and may not sell or lease it to others.
Economists since Ronald Coase (1959) have argued strongly and persuasively
that allocating a scarce resource by administrative fiat makes little
sense; establishing a market for spectrum, in which owners could buy,
sell, subdivide and aggregate spectrum parcels would lead to a much
more efficient allocation of this scarce resource. The Federal Communications
Commission (FCC) has gradually been allocating more spectrum for flexible
use and since 1993 has been using auctions to award most new spectrum
licenses. However, this experiment in bringing market forces to bear
to allocate radio spectrum has been applied to only about 10 percent
of the most valuable spectrum. Economists continue to press for "marketizing"
spectrum as the surest means to use this important national resource
efficiently (White (2001)). Meanwhile, substantial strides have been
made in radio technology, including wideband radio (such as spread spectrum
and ultra wideband (UWB)), "agile" radio (one of several applications
of software defined radio (SDR)) and mesh networks (including ad hoc
networks and other forms of peer-to-peer infrastructure architectures).
The developers of these technologies note that the products based on
these technologies undermine the current system of administrative allocation
of exclusive-use licenses, and call for an "open range," or
commons, approach to the spectrum that would do away with exclusive
use. "Removing the fences," in this view, will lead to more
efficient use of the spectrum. While both economists and radio engineers
believe the present system of spectrum allocation is inefficient and
wasteful, they appear to have diametrically opposed views of what should
replace it. Economists seek to unleash the power of the market to achieve
efficient outcomes; engineers seek to unleash the power of the commons
to achieve efficient outcomes. Which is right? Michael D. Smith Smith M.D., Heinz
H.J. [2003], "The Law of One Price? The Impact of IT-Enabled Markets
on Consumer Search and Retailer Pricing", Working Paper Wang Y., Fesenmaier
D.R. [2003], "Towards understanding members' general participation
in and active contribution to an online travel community", Tourism
Management, in Press. Abstract Geisler W.S., Diehl
R.L. [2003], "A Bayesian approach to the evolution of perceptual
and cognitive systems", Cognitive Science, Volume 27, Issue
3 , May-June 2003, p. 379-402 Abstract Laurence T. Maloney
: Department of Psychology, Center for Neural Science, New York University,
6 Washington Place, New York, NY 10003, USA Maloney L.T. [2003],
"Statistical decision theory and evolution", Trends in
Cognitive Sciences, Volume 7, Issue 11 , November 2003, p. 473-475 Abstract DeSanctis G., Fayard
A.L., Roach M., Jiang L. [2003], "Learning in Online Forums",
European Management Journal, Volume 21, Issue 5 , October 2003,
p. 565-577. Abstract Maura Soekijad and
Erik Andriessen Soekijad M., Andriessen
E. [2003], "Conditions for Knowledge Sharing in Competitive Alliances",
European Management Journal, Volume 21, Issue 5 , October 2003,
p. 578-587 Abstract Benson-Rea M., Wilson
H. [2003], "Networks, Learning and the Lifecycle", European
Management Journal, Volume 21, Issue 5 , October 2003, p. 588-597. Abstract Subirana B., Bain
M. [2003], "Architecting and Managing Virtual Learning Networks:
A Business Process-orientated Approach to Legal Compliance", European
Management Journal, Volume 21, Issue 5 , October 2003, p. 598-613
Abstract Barnes D., Mieczkowska
S., Hinton M. [2003], "Integrating Operations and Information Strategy
in e-Business", European Management Journal, Volume
21, Issue 5 , October 2003, p. 626-634 Abstract Author Keywords:
e-business; Operations strategy; Information systems; Internet Riquelme J.C., Aguilar-Ruiz
, Del Valle C. [2003], "Supervised learning by means of accuracy-aware
evolutionary algorithms", Information Sciences, Vol.156,
Iss.3-4 ("Evolutionary Computation", Edited by U.K. Chakraborty),
15 November 2003, Pages 173-188 Abstract Chuan-Kang Ting
(a), Sheng-Tun Li (b) and Chungnan Lee (c) Ting C.K., Li S.T.
Chungnan Lee C. [2003], "On the harmonious mating strategy through
tabu search", Information Sciences, Volume 156, Issues 3-4
, 15 November 2003, Pages 189-214. Abstract Adamic L.A., Adar
E. [2003], "Friends and neighbors on the Web", Social Networks,
Vol.25, Iss.3 , July 2003, Pages 211-230. Abstract Abbink K., Darziv
K., Gilula Z, Goren H, Irlenbusch B., Keren A., Rockenbach B., Sadrieh
A., Selten R., Zamir S. [2003], The Fisherman's Problem: Exploring the
tension between cooperative and non-cooperative concepts in a simple
game, Journal of Economic Psychology, Volume 24, Issue 4 , August
2003, Pages 425-445. Abstract Marc Willinger (a),
Claudia Keser (b) (c), Christopher Lohmannd (e) and Jean-Claude Usunier
(f) Willinger M., Keser
C., Lohmannd C., Usunier J.C. [2003], "A comparison of trust and
reciprocity between France and Germany: Experimental investigation based
on the investment game", Journal of Economic Psychology,
Vol.24, Iss.4 , August 2003, Pages 447-466. Abstract Atip Asvanund, Karen
Clay, Ramayya Krishnan, Michael D. Smith Asvanund A., Clay
K., Krishnan R., Smith M.D. [2003], "An Empirical Analysis of Network
Externalities in Peer-To-Peer Music Sharing Networks", Working
Paper, SSRN, N° 433780. Abstract Kai-Lung Hui, Ivan
Png [2003], "Piracy and the Legitimate Demand for Recorded Music",
Contributions to Economic Analysis & Policy, Vol. 2: No.
1, Article 11. Abstract R. Cowan: MERIT,
University of Maastricht, P.O. Box 616, 6200 MD, Maastricht, The Netherlands Cowan R., Jonard
N. [2003], "The dynamics of collective invention", Journal
of Economic Behavior & Organization, Vol.52, Iss.4 , December
2003, Pages 513-532. Abstract John Gowdy: Department
of Economics, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Sage Hall, Troy, NY
12180, USA Gowdy J., Iorgulescua
R., Onyeiwu S. [2003], "Fairness and retaliation in a rural Nigerian
village", Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization,
Volume 52, Issue 4 , December 2003, Pages 469-479. Abstract Michael D. McGinnis
(Ed.), McGinnis M.D. [2000],
Polycentric Games and Institutions: Readings from the Workshop in Political
Theory and Policy Analysis, University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor,
USA, 2000, 541 pp. Alexander V. Outkin Outkin A.V. [2003],
"Cooperation and local interactions in the Prisoners' Dilemma Game",
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Vol.52, Iss.4
, December 2003, Pages 481-503. Abstract Luca Molteni and
Andrea Ordanini Molteni L., Ordanini
A. [2003], "Consumption Patterns, Digital Technology and Music
Downloading", Long Range Planning, Vol.36, Iss.4 , August
2003, Pages 389-406. Abstract Salvatore Attardo
S. [2003], "Introduction: the pragmatics of humor", Journal
of Pragmatics, Vol.35, Iss.9 (The Pragmatics of Humor), September
2003, Pages 1287-1294. Francisco Yus Yus F. [2003], "Humor
and the search for relevance", Journal of Pragmatics, Vol.35,
Iss.9 (The Pragmatics of Humor), September 2003, Pages 1295-1331. Abstract Neal R. Norrick
Norrick N.R. [2003],
"Issues in conversational joking", Journal of Pragmatics,
Vol.35, Iss.9 (The Pragmatics of Humor), September 2003, Pages 1333-1359. Abstract Catherine Evans
Davies Davies C.E. [2003],
"How English-learners joke with native speakers: an interactional
sociolinguistic perspective on humor as collaborative discourse across
cultures", Journal of Pragmatics, Vol.35, Iss.9 (The Pragmatics
of Humor), September 2003, Pages 1361-1385. Abstract Helga Kotthoff Kotthoff H. [2003],
"Responding to irony in different contexts: on cognition in conversation",
Journal of Pragmatics, Vol.35, Iss.9 (The Pragmatics of Humor),
September 2003, Pages 1387-1411. Abstract Mary Crawford Crawford M. [2003],
"Gender and humor in social context", Journal of Pragmatics,
Vol.35, Iss.9 (The Pragmatics of Humor), September 2003, Pages 1413-1430. Abstract Jyotsna Vaid, Rachel
Hull, David Gerkens and Francisco Martinez: Department of Psychology,
Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843-4235, USA Vaid J., Hull R.,
Heredia R., Gerkens D., Martinez F. [2003], "Getting a joke: the
time course of meaning activation in verbal humor", Journal
of Pragmatics, Vol.35, Iss.9 (The Pragmatics of Humor), September
2003, Pages 1431-1449. Abstract Alfred P. Rovai,
Rovai A.P. [2003],
The relationships of communicator style, personality-based learning
style, and classroom community among online graduate students, The Internet
and Higher Education, Article in Press. Abstract Quah D. [2003],
"Digital goods and the New Economy", CEP Discussion Paper
NO.563 March 2003 Digital goods are
bitstrings, sequences of 0s and 1s, that have economic value. They are
distinguished from other goods by five characteristics: digital goods
are nonrival, infinitely expansible, discrete, aspatial, and recombinant.
The New Economy is one where the economics of digital goods importantly
influence aggregate economic performance. This Article considers such
influences not by hypothesizing ad hoc inefficiencies that the New Economy
can purport to resolve, but instead by beginning from an Arrow-Debreu
perspective and asking how digital goods affect outcomes. (This is not
only analytically better disciplined, but since friction-free, transparent,
well-functioning markets are where the New Economy is supposed to be
headed anyway, there is where the more enduring economic questions arise.)
This approach sheds light on why property rights on digital goods differ
from property rights in general, guaranteeing neither appropriate incentives
nor social efficiency; provides further insight into why Open Source
Software is a successful model of innovation and development in digital
goods industries; and helps explain how geographical clustering matters.
Thomas J. Miceli
(University of Connecticut) Miceli T.J., Sirmans
C.F. [2003], "Time-Limited Property Rights and Investment Incentives",
Working papers / University of Connecticut, Department of Economics Abstract: Although
it is axiomatic that property rights of infinite duration are necessary
for owners to make efficient long term investments in their property,
time limits on property rights are pervasive in the law. This paper
provides an economic justification for such limits by arguing that they
actually enhance property values in the presence of various sorts of
market failure. The analysis offers a coherent approach for understanding
what otherwise appear to be unrelated doctrines in the law. Miceli Th.J., Adelstein
R.P. [2003], "An Economic Model of Fair Use", Working papers
/ University of Connecticut, Department of Economics. Abstract: The doctrine
of fair use allows unauthorized copying of original works of art, music,
and literature for limited purposes like criticism, research, and education,
based on the rationale that copyright holders would consent to such
uses if bargaining were possible. This paper develops the first formal
analysis of fair use in an effort to derive the efficient legal standard
for applying the doctrine. The model interprets copies and originals
as differentiated products and defines fair use as a threshold separating
permissible copying from infringement. Application of the analysis to
several key cases (including the recent Napster case) shows that this
interpretation is consistent with actual legal reasoning. The analysis
also underscores the role of technology in shaping the efficient scope
of fair use. Michael S. Dahl Dahl M.S., Pedersen
C.O.R. [2003], "Knowledge Flows through Informal Contacts in Industrial
Clusters: Myths or Realities?", DRUID Working Papers, Copenhagen
Business School. Abstract: The role
of informal networks in the development of regional clusters has received
a lot of attention in the literature recently. Informal contact between
employees in different firms is argued to be one of the main carriers
of knowledge between firms in a cluster. This paper empirically examines
the role of informal contacts in a specific cluster. In a recent questionnaire,
we ask a sample of engineers in a regional cluster of wireless communication
firms in Northern Denmark, a series of questions on informal networks.
We analyze whether the engineers actually acquire valuable knowledge
through these networks. We find that the engineers do share even valuable
knowledge with informal contacts. This shows that informal contacts
are important channels of knowledge diffusion. Peter Nielsen Nielsen P., Lundvall
B.A. [2003], "Innovation, Learning Organizations and Industrial
Relations", DRUID Working Papers, Copenhagen Business School. Adner, Ron : http://www.insead.edu/facultyresearch/strategy/adner/ Adner R., Zemski
P. [2003], "Disruptive Technologies and the Emergence of Competition",
CEPR Discussion Papers, INSEAD. Abstract: We formalize
the phenomenon of disruptive technologies (Christensen, 1997) that initially
serve isolated market niches and, as they mature, expand to displace
established technologies from mainstream segments. Using a model of
horizontal and vertical differentiation with discrete customer segmentation,
we show how the threat of disruption varies with the rate of technological
advance, the number of firms using each technology, segments sizes,
marginal costs, and the ability of firms to price discriminate. We characterize
the effect of disruption on prices, market shares, social welfare and
innovation incentives. We show that a shift from isolation to disruption
lowers prices and increases social welfare, but may either increase
or decrease the profits of firms using the new technology. By identifying
the drivers and implications of technology competition, we contribute
to debates about market definition that are often central in anti-trust
deliberations. Moreover, we call into question standard results on the
effects of mergers in Cournot models. Prior work finds that, absent
efficiency gains, mergers among Cournot competitors lower welfare and
are only profitable for the merging firms at high levels of concentration.
We show that neither of these results need hold when mergers can alter
the boundaries of technology competition. Mike T. Hübler
and Diana Calhoun Bell, Hübler M.T.,
Bell D.C. [2003], "Computer-mediated humor and ethos: Exploring
threads of constitutive laughter in online communities", Computers
and Composition, Volume 20, Issue 3 , September 2003, Pages 277-294. Abstract Woo Gon Kim (a)
Chang Lee (b) and Stephen J. Hiemstra (c) Kim W.G., Lee C.,
Hiemstra S.J. [2003], "Effects of an online virtual community on
customer loyalty and travel product purchases", Tourism Management,
Article in Press. Abstract J. Koh, and Y. -G.
Kim Koh J., Kim Y.-G.
[2003], "Knowledge sharing in virtual communities: an e-business
perspective", Expert Systems with Applications Article in
Press. Abstract Marianne C. Bickle,
Judy McKenna (Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO 80523, USA) Bickle M.C., McKenna
J., Meyer S.T., Mabry G.C. [2003], "Creating a virtual community
to enhance member services: credit unions and e-commerce", Telematics
and Informatics, Article in Press. Abstract Hock-Hai Teo (a),
Hock-Chuan Chan (a), Kwok-Kee Wei (b) and Zhongju Zhang (c) Abstract Dimitris Kardaras
(a), Bill Karakostas (b), Eleutherios Papathanassiou (c) Kardaras D., Karakostas
B., Papathanassiou E. [2003], "The potential of virtual communities
in the insurance industry in the UK and Greece", International
Journal of Information Management, Volume 23, Issue 1 , February
2003, Pages 41-53. Abstract Elaine M. Raybourn
(a), Nicholas Kings (b) John Davies (b) Raybourn E.M., Kings
N., Davies J. [2003], "Adding cultural signposts in adaptive community-based
virtual environments", Interacting with Computers, Volume
15, Issue 1, January 2003, Pages 91-107 Abstract Philip E. Tetlock
University of California, Berkeley, USA Tetlock P.E. [2003],
"Thinking the unthinkable: sacred values and taboo cognitions",
Trends in Cognitive Sciences, Vol. 7, Iss. 7, July 2003, pp.
320-324 Abstract Andreas Lange, ,
a, b and Carsten Vogt, a Lange A., Vogt C.
[2003], Cooperation in international environmental negotiations due
to a preference for equity, Journal of Public Economics, Volume
87, Issues 9-10 , September 2003, pp. 2049-2067 Abstract Helmuth Cremer,
and Jean-Jacques Laffont Cremer H., Laffont
J.-J. [2003], Public goods with costly access, Journal of Public
Economics, Volume 87, Issues 9-10 , September 2003, pp. 1985-2012 Abstract Michael Goold and
Andrew Campbell Goold M., Campbell
A. [2003], "Structured Networks: Towards the Well-Designed Matrix",
Long Range Planning, Volume 36, Issue 5, October 2003, pp. 427-439 Abstract Lilach Nachum and
David Keeble Nachum L., Keeble
D. [2003], "Neo-Marshallian Clusters and Global Networks: The Linkages
of Media Firms in Central London", Long Range Planning,
Volume 36, Issue 5 , October 2003, pp. 459-480 Abstract Jan Van den Ende,
Rianne Vogels and Michiel Kerstens Van den Ende J.,
Vogels R., Kerstens M. [2003], "Organizing Innovative Projects
to Interact with Market Dynamics: A Coevolutionary Approach", European
Management Journal, Volume 21, Issue 3 , June 2003, pp. 273-284
Abstract Link A.N., Scott
J.T., Siegel D.S. [2003], "The economics of intellectual property
at universities", International Journal of Industrial Organization,
Volume 21, Issue 9 , November 2003, pp. 1217-1225 Ajay Agrawal, Iain
Cockburna, Agrawal A., Cockburna
I. [2003], "The anchor tenant hypothesis: exploring the role of
large, local, R&D-intensive firms in regional innovation systems",
International Journal of Industrial Organization, Volume 21,
Issue 9 , November 2003, pp 1227-1253. Abstract Stéphanie
Monjon and Patrick Waelbroeck S. Monjon S., P.
Waelbroeck P. [2003], "Assessing spillovers from universities to
firms: evidence from French firm-level data", International
Journal of Industrial Organization, Volume 21, Issue 9 , November
2003, pp 1255-1270 Abstract Richard A. Jensen
a, Jerry G. Thursby b, and Marie C. Thursby c Jensen R.A., Thursby
J.G., Thursby M.C. [2003], "Disclosure and licensing of University
inventions: 'The best we can do with the s**t we get to work with'",
International Journal of Industrial Organization, Volume 21,
Issue 9 , November 2003, pp 1271-1300. Abstract John Beath, , a,
Robert F. Owen b, Joanna Poyago-Theotoky c and David Ulph d Beath J., Owen R.F.,
Poyago-Theotoky J., Ulph D. [2003], "Optimal incentives for income-generation
in universities: the rule of thumb for the Compton tax", International
Journal of Industrial Organization, Volume 21, Issue 9 , November
2003, pp 1301-1322. Abstract Albert N. Link,
a and John T. Scott, , b Link A.N., Scott
J.T. [2003], "U.S. science parks: the diffusion of an innovation
and its effects on the academic missions of universities", International
Journal of Industrial Organization, Volume 21, Issue 9, November
2003, pp 1323-1356 Abstract Donald S. Siegel,
, a, Paul Westhead, b and Mike Wright, b Siegel D.S., Westhead
P., Wright M. [2003], "Assessing the impact of university science
parks on research productivity: exploratory firm-level evidence from
the United Kingdom", International Journal of Industrial Organization,
Volume 21, Issue 9 , November 2003, pp 1357-1369 Abstract Bhaven N. Sampat,
, a, David C. Mowery, b, d and Arvids A. Ziedonis, c Abstract Atul Nerkar, , a
and Scott Shaneb Nerkar A., Shane
S. [2003], "When do start-ups that exploit patented academic knowledge
survive?", International Journal of Industrial Organization,
Volume 21, Issue 9 , November 2003, pp 1391-1410 Abstract Andreas Panagopoulos
Panagopoulos A.
[2003], "Understanding when universities and firms form RJVs: the
importance of intellectual property protection", International
Journal of Industrial Organization, Volume 21, Issue 9 , November
2003, pp 1411-1433 Abstract Stephen P. King,
a and Ryan Lampe b King S.P., Lampe
R. [2003], "Network externalities, price discrimination and profitable
piracy", Information Economics and Policy, Volume 15, Issue
3 , September 2003, pp. 271-290 Abstract Andrea Mangàni,
Mangani A. [2003],
"Profit and audience maximization in broadcasting markets",
Information Economics and Policy, Volume 15, Issue 3 , September
2003, pp. 305-315 Abstract Giampiero Giacomelloa
and Lucio Picci, b Giacomello G., L.
Picci L. [2003], "My scale or your meter? Evaluating methods of
measuring the Internet", Information Economics and Policy,
Volume 15, Issue 3 , September 2003, pp. 363-383 Abstract A. Kaufmann (a),
P. Lehnerb and F. Tödtling (b) Kaufmann A., Lehner
P., Todtling F. [2003], "Effects of the Internet on the spatial
structure of innovation networks", Information Economics and
Policy, Volume 15, Issue 3 , September 2003, pp. 402-424 Abstract Kenton K. Yee Yee K.K. [2003],
"Ownership and trade from evolutionary games", International
Review of Law and Economics, Volume 23, Issue 2 , June 2003, Pages
183-197 Abstract Dominique Demougin
a, , and Robert Schwager, b Demougin D., Schwager
R. [2003], "Law enforcement and criminality: Europe vs. USA",
International Review of Law and Economics, Volume 23, Issue 2
, June 2003, pp.217-225 Abstract
information
and knowledge economy and more
specifically
of virtual communities.
they are not broken down into
different domains like
the "References
for the project
virtual communities in a knowledge-based economy"
Elsevier (www.sciencedirect.com).
http://www.minefi.gouv.fr/minefi/chiffres/comelec/tbce/
Andreas H. Jucker : Department of English, University of Zurich, Plattenstrasse
47, CH-8032, Zurich, Switzerland
Sara W. Smith : California State University, Long Beach, CA, USA
Tanja Lüdge : Justus Liebig University, Giessen, Germany
Author Keywords: Conversation; Relevance; Vagueness; Loose talk; Common
ground; Attitude; Focus; Softener
Allan Bird
Michael J. Stevens
College of Business Administration, University of Missouri-St. Louis,
8001 Natural Bridge Road, St. Louis, MO 63121-4499, USA
Author Keywords: Emerging global culture; National cultures; Obsolescing
cultures
Department of Geography, University of Leicester, Leicester LE1 7RH,
UK
Yale University, Department of Philosophy, PO Box 208306;, New Haven,
CT 06520, USA
However, neither the fact that machine intelligence would be scary nor
the fact that some past predictions were wrong is a good ground for
concluding that artificial intelligence will never be created. Indeed,
to assume that artificial intelligence is impossible or will take thousands
of years to develop seems at least as unwarranted as to make the opposite
assumption. At a minimum, we must acknowledge that any scenario about
what the world will be like in 2050 that simply postulates the absence
of human-level artificial intelligence is making a big assumption that
could well turn out to be false.
It is therefore important to consider the alternative possibility, that
intelligent machines will be built within fifty years. In the past year
or two, there have been several books and articles published by leading
researchers in artificial intelligence and robotics that argue for precisely
that projection (see, e.g., Moravec[1] and Kurzweil [2]). This essay
will first outline some of the reasons for this, and then discuss some
of the consequences of human-level artificial intelligence.
Institute for Educational Research, GION, University of Groningen, Grote
Rozenstraat 3, 9712 TG, Groningen, The Netherlands
Author Keywords: Social networks; School classes; Logit p* model; Homophily
JEL classification codes: C51
Carolyn J. Anderson (a & b),
Stanley Wasserman (b & c & d),
Bradley Crouch (b)
b Department of Psychology, University of Illinois, Champaign, USA
c Department of Statistics, University of Illinois, Champaign, USA
d The Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, University
of Illinois, Champaign, USA
http://www.escience-grid.org.uk/
The world wide web provides seamless access to information that is stored
in many millions of different geographical locations. When you read
a web page you do not care what computer it is coming from and in a
typical web session you are likely to read pages from different computers
in different countries without realising.
Grid technology takes this concept one stage further by allowing seamless
access and use of computing resources as well as information. An enquiry
to a Grid search engine will not only find the data you need but also
the data processing techniques and the computing power to carry them
out before sending you the results.
A typical Grid application might involve a Physician in Oxford carrying
out medical research using specialist knowledge and analysis techniques
held in a London Teaching Hospital computer system, a patient database
in Cardiff and utilising computing power for Manchester.
"means science increasingly done through distributed global collaborations
enabled by the Internet, using very large data collections, terascale
computing resources and high performance visualisation"
Grid
"the word 'Grid' is chosen by analogy with the electric power grid,
which provides pervasive access to power and, like the computer and
a small number of other advances, has had a dramatic impact on human
capabilities and society. We believe that by providing pervasive, dependable,
consistent and inexpensive access to advanced computational capabilities,
databases, sensors and people, computational grids will have a similar
transforming effect, allowing new classes of applications to emerge."
The Grid supports complete process initiation and execution including
any necessary data location and retrieval. You will ask questions and
not know what computer was used to process the data, or where the data
came from. This allows it to carry out significantly large tasks and
opens up new capabilities for knowledge generation.
Project Involvement: Equator (http://machen.mrl.nott.ac.uk/), SHAPE
(http://www.shape-dc.org/), MIME (http://mime.cs.nott.ac.uk/)
http://www.dcs.ed.ac.uk/home/rnp/
Professor John A. McDermid
http://www-users.cs.york.ac.uk/~jam/
http://www.cs.york.ac.uk/hci/
http://lexus.physics.indiana.edu/~rwg/escience/
e-Science Grid for Indiana University
Objective : To establish and utilize a community-based, internationally
integrated, "e-Science Grid Infrastructure" that will facilitate
development and integration of scientific applications with advanced
data grid software technologies and collaborations, enabling access
to local and globally distributed computing resources.
Eurogrid du programme IST
The objectives of the EUROGRID project are:
" To establish a European GRID network of leading High Performance
Computing centres from different European countries.
" To operate and support the EUROGRID software infrastructure.
The EUROGRID software will use the existing Internet network and will
offer seamless and secure access for the EUROGRID users.
" To develop important GRID software components and to integrate
them into EUROGRID (fast file transfer, resource broker, interface for
coupled applications and interactive access).
" To demonstrate distributed simulation codes from different application
areas (Biomolecular simulations, Weather prediction, Coupled CAE simulations,
Structural analysis, Real-time data processing).
" To contribute to the international GRID development and to liase
with the leading international GRID projects.
" To productise the EUROGRID software components. After project
end the EUROGRID software will be available as supported product.
http://cisad.adc.education.fr/reperes/public/reperes/wp/ifrede/default.htm
Strasbourg (Cournot)
http://www.utc.fr/oi2/Textes_intervenants/Creplet.rtf
Résumé
En partant des concepts récents de communautés épistémiques
et de communautés de pratique, nous montrons que l'entreprise
peut être définie selon une forme de double dualité
: cognitive et organisationnelle. L'intérêt de cette approche
est de mettre en avant le comportement différencié du
manager et de l'entrepreneur dans l'entreprise. Elle met également
en perspective les questions importantes des tensions organisationnelles
sous l'angle de l'économie des connaissances.
Abstract
On the basis of the recent concepts of epistemic communities and communities
of practice, we show that the firm can be defined according to a form
of double duality: cognitive and organisational. The interest of this
approach is to put ahead the differentiated behavior from the manager
and the entrepreneur inside the firm. It also puts in light the important
questions concerning the organisational tensions under the vision of
the knowledge-based economies.
BETA, Université Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg I
http://www.enssib.fr/gdr/pdf/doctorants/2002-10_diani.pdf
Abstract. - The advent of a new economy turned towards the production
of knowledge and intangible goods rests largely on the revolution of
the New Information and Communication Technologies (NICT). Traditional
modes of coordination -the market and the hierarchy - are unable to
account for this new economic dynamics centred on knowledge; and the
community emerges as a third autonomous mode of coordination, more adapted
to this paradigm. This work explores the nature of coordination by means
of communities in a Knowledge-based Economy, and focuses on the category
of communities resting on the ICT, virtual communities.
http://www.druid.dk/conferences/winter2003/Paper/Muller.pdf
Dan Sperber et Deirdre
Wilson (2002) Pragmatics, Modularity and Mind-reading. Mind and Language
17(1):3-33.
http://jeannicod.ccsd.cnrs.fr/documents/disk0/00/00/00/02/index_fr.html
Mots-clés : linguistic communication, theory of mind, mind-reading,
mindreading, modularity, evolutionary psychology, evolution of language,
linguistics, philosophy of language, pragmatics, relevance, relevance
theory
Sperber D. [2001], "L'individuel sous influence du collectif",
La Recherche(344):32-35.
http://jeannicod.ccsd.cnrs.fr/documents/disk0/00/00/04/30/index_fr.html
Jih-Hsin Tang : Department of Management Information Systems, Tak Ming
Institute of Technology, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VD0-49G5SNF-1&_coverDate=01%2F31%2F2004&_alid=135444506&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_qd=1&_cdi=5968&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000028498&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=771355&md5=a49d8059bc36175ce80ca7781f7b49ec
Abstract
Teamwork during IS development (ISD) is an important issue. This paper
discusses the relationship between team structure and ISD team performance
using a social network approach. Based on empirical evidence collected
from 25 teams in a system analysis and design course, we found that:
(1)Group cohesion was positively related to overall performance.
(2)Group conflict indexes were not significantly correlated with overall
performance.
(3)Group characteristics, e.g., cohesion and conflict, fluctuated in
different phases, but in later stages, much less cohesion occurred and
the advice network seemed to be very important.
(4)Group structures seemed to be a critical factor for good performance.
Further in-depth studies were conducted on teams exhibiting the highest
and lowest performance to determine their differences from a sociogram
analysis perspective.
Author Keywords: Information system development; Social network analysis;
Teamwork
Online communities
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_aset=W-WA-A-A-A-MsSAYWA-UUW-AUDWDYCYWZ-AZZUECVWC-A-A&_rdoc=1&_fmt=summary&_udi=B6V80-4B8B88P-1&_coverDate=12%2F19%2F2003&_cdi=5856&_orig=alert&_st=4&_sort=d&view=c&_ArchiveHandle=0x00033149%2F0x000c9333%2F20031220%2F05%3A19%3A28&_alertKey=824115&_acct=C000028498&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=932579&md5=3614ba9fc25e2568d89cf92e08afe58e
This paper examines the concept and practice of online communities:
first, by establishing an understanding of their historical and technological
roots; and then by developing a three-dimensional taxonomy through which
the properties of the communities can be examined. Case study examples
are utilized to illustrate the community types within the taxonomy.
Author Keywords: Internet; Online community; Networks; Cyberspace; World
Wide Web
Andy Clark
Clark A. [2003], Natural-Born Cyborgs: Minds, technologies, and the
Future of Human Intelligence, Oxford University Press.
Ragan Petrie : Department of Economics, Andrew Young School of Policy
Studies, Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA 30303, USA
Author Keywords: Public goods; Fund-raising; Economic efficiency
Kjetil Telle : Statistics Norway, Research Department, Kongensgt. 6,
0033, Oslo, Norway
Author Keywords: Cooperation; Framing; Public good; Social approval;
Social norms
JEL classification codes: A13; C91; D11; H41
Louis Putterman : Department of Economics, Brown University, Providence,
RI 02912, USA
Fanmin Kong : Guanghua School of Management, Peking University, Beijing,
China
Dan Magan : Industrial Relations Center, University of Minnesota, USA
Author Keywords: Reciprocity; Dictator game; Cognition; Personality;
Altruism
JEL classification codes: C78; C91; D64
Bruno Deffains : CREDES, Faculté de Droit et Sciences Economiques,
Université Nancy 2, 13 Place Carnot, c.o. #26, c.o. 26-13 Place
Carnot, Nancy Cedex 54 035, France
Author Keywords: Asylum; Refugees; Regulatory competition; Joint product;
Common pool resource
JEL classification codes: K3
Department of Economics, University of Bologna, Piazza Scaravilli 2,
Bologna 40126, Italy
19th Annual conference of the European Association of Law and Economics,
Athens, Greece, September 2002.
This paper develops an economic analysis of the contract theory of patents.
To disentangle the disclosure from the reward motive for granting patents,
we assume that the innovation process is entirely serendipitous, so
that R&D effort is not a concern. Our main finding is that the disclosure
motive alone suffices to justify the grant of patents. The optimal patent
duration should strike a balance between the incentive to induce disclosure
and the aim of limiting the monopoly distortion induced by patents.
Author Keywords: Reward theory; Contract theory; Patent system
Peter Lewisch
Imadec University, Mauerbachstraße 43, Vienna 1140, Austria
Author Keywords: Framing; Constructivism; Communication theory; Expressive
voting
JEL classification codes: K10
Mark Rogers : Harris Manchester College, Oxford University, Mansfield
Road, Oxford OX1 3TD, UK
This paper models how the structure and function of a network of firms
affects their aggregate innovativeness. Each firm has the potential
to innovate, either from in-house R&D or from innovation spillovers
from neighboring firms. The nature of innovation spillovers depends
upon network density, the commonality of knowledge between firms, and
the learning capability of firms. Innovation spillovers are modelled
in detail using ideas from organizational theory. Two main results emerge:
(i) the marginal effect on innovativeness of spillover intensity is
non-monotonic, and (ii) network density can affect innovativeness but
only when there are heterogeneous firms.
Author Keywords: Spillovers; Innovation; Networks; Heterogeneity; Information
processing
JEL classification codes: D83; O31
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1
, [Evolution and Altruism], January 2004, p.3-35
Department of Anthropology, Emory University, Geosciences Building,
Atlanta, GA 30322-1720, USA
Author Keywords: Cooperation; Altruism; Group selection; Coevolution;
Dual inheritance theory
JEL classification codes: D00; C72
Department of Biological Sciences, The University of Tokyo, Hongo 7-3-1,
Bunkyoku, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan
Aoki K. [2004], "Altruism may be sexy: Comment on cultural group
selection, coevolutionary processes and large-scale cooperation",
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution
and Altruism], January 2004, p.37-40.
Faculty of Commerce, Chuo University, 742-1 Higashinakano Hachioji-shi,
Tokyo 192-0393, Japan
Aruka Y. [2004], "How to measure social interactions via group
selection? Cultural group selection, coevolutionary processes, and large-scale
cooperation: a comment", Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization,
Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism], January 2004, p.41-47.
School of Information, University of Michigan, 312 West Hall, Ann Arbor,
MI 48109-1092, USA
Cohen M.C., Axelrod R., Riolo R. [2004], "Must there be human genes
specific to prosocial behavior?", Journal of Economic Behavior
& Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism], January
2004, p.49-51.
Genetics Department, University of Wisconsin, 445 Henry Mall, Madison,
WI 53706-1574, USA
Crow J.F. [2004], "Cultural group selection, coevolutionary processes
and large-scale cooperation, by J. Henrich", Journal of Economic
Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism],
January 2004, p.53-56.
15 Forbes Avenue, Northampton, MA 01060, USA
Gintis H. [2004], "The genetic side of gene-culture coevolution:
internalization of norms and prosocial emotions", Journal of Economic
Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism],
January 2004, p.57-67.
Department of Economics, Rennselaer Polytechnic Institute, 110, 8th
Street, Troy, NY 12180, USA
Gowdy J.M. [2004], "Altruism, evolution, and welfare economics",
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution
and Altruism], January 2004, p.69-73.
Hartmut Kliemt : Philiosophy Department GMU, Duisburg, Germany
Güth W., Kliemt H. [2004], "Evolutionary parallelism versus
co-evolution: a comment on Joseph Henrich", Journal of Economic
Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism],
January 2004, p.75-79.
The Business School, University of Hertfordshire, Mangrove Road, Hertford,
Hertfordshire SG13 8QF, UK
Hodgson G.M. [2004], "A comment on the paper by Joseph Henrich",
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution
and Altruism], January 2004, p.81-84.
Interdisciplinary Center for Economic Science, George Mason University,
4400 University Drive, Mail Stop 1B2, Fairfax, VA 22030, USA
Houser D., McCabe K., Smith V. [2004], "Cultural group selection,
co evolutionary processes and large-scale cooperation (by Joseph Henrich)",
Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution
and Altruism], January 2004, p.85-88.
Behavioral Research Council, Division of American Institute for Economic
Research, P.O. Box 1000, Great Barrington, MA 01230, USA
Department of Economics, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY 12604, USA
Khalil E.L. [2004], "Is a group better off with more altruists?
Not necessarily", Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization,
Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism], January 2004, p.89-92.
Energy and Resources Group, 310 Barrows Hall, University of California
at Berkeley, Mail Code 3050, Berkeley, CA 94720-3050, USA
Norgaard R.B. [2004], "Cultural group selection, coevolutionary
processes, and large-scale cooperation: a comment", Journal of
Economic Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and
Altruism], January 2004, p.93-95.
University of Mannheim, SFB 504, Mannheim, Germany
Alex Possajennikov A. [2004], "Comment on "cultural group
selection, coevolutionary processes and large-scale cooperation"
by Joseph Henrich", Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization,
Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism], January 2004, p.97-100.
Department of Economics, Brown University, Box B, Providence, RI 02912,
USA
Putterman L. [2100], "Culture, genes and cooperation: comment on
Henrich", Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Vol.53,
Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism], January 2004, p.101-104.
E. Somanathan : Planning Unit, Indian Statistical Institute, 7 SJS Marg,
New Delhi 110016, India
Sethi R., Somanathan E. [2004], "What can we learn from cultural
group selection and co-evolutionary models?", Journal of Economic
Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism],
January 2004, p.105-108.
3301 N Fairfax Drive, Arlington, VA 22201, USA
Tullock G. [2004], "Comments", Journal of Economic Behavior
& Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism], January
2004, p.117-120.
Department of Biological Sciences, Binghamton University, State University
of New York, Binghamton, NY 13902-6000, USA
Wilson D.S. [2004], " A whole new ball game", Journal of Economic
Behavior & Organization, Vol.53, Iss.1, [Evolution and Altruism],
January 2004, p.121-125.
University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany
University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
ESCE Economic and Social Research Center, Cologne, Germany and, Eisenstadt,
Austria
Author Keywords: Equilibrium fraction of cooperators; Population's level
of wealth; Single-shot prisoner's dilemma game
JEL classification codes: A13; C70
Robert L. Glass
Robert L. Glass (rlglass@acm.org) is the publisher/editor of the Software
Practitioner newsletter and editor emeritus of Elsevier's Journal of
Systems and Software.
+) L'open source, c'est quelque part comme le communisme, et c'est donc
la preuve que ça ne peut marcher ;
+) L'Open Source est un retour au début du logiciel, lorsqu'il
n'était pas vendu séparément, mais fourni avec
du matériel ; c'est donc une régression par rapport au
logiciel commercial.
+) un amalgame entre open source et activité non lucrative
+) la négation de l'avancée de l'open source, argumentée
sur la base de "prédictions" d'Eric Raymond qui ne
sont pas - selon l'auteur - avérées pour l'instant.
Intérêt de l'article : 1/10 (critique de Éric Cousin)
extrait : "The open source movement, where people perform their
software development activities principally for the accolades of their
peers, seems terribly noble, and in fact that nobility is undoubtedly
part of its appeal. It also seems faintly utopian, as we saw in the
previous column. There have been many utopian movements in the past,
where workers banded together to work for the satisfaction of a job
well done and for the common good (and, once again, for the accolades
of their peers). There are two interesting things about utopian movements:
They typically begin in enormous enthusiasm and they end, usually a
few decades later, in failure. What's the most common cause of utopian
failure? The impractical nature of the economic model and the political
splintering. (…) Then there is the issue of communism, an issue
that is usually present in discussions about the problems of open source,
although it rarely surfaces. There is a faint whiff of communism about
the concept of working for no financial gain. (…) Whether communism
is a good thing or not is, of course, a determination that must be made
by the reader. But in this discussion of the practicality of the open
source economic model, it is worth noting that the communist system
is in considerable decline and disfavor in today's world."
Stigler G.J., Becker GS [1977], "De gustibus non est disputendum",
American Economic Review, March 1977, Vol. 67, N°2, p. 76-90
Becker G.S., Murphy K.M. [1988], "A Theory of Rational Addiction",
Journal of Political Economy, August 1988, Vol. 96, N°4,
p. 675-699.
Beuscart J.S. [2002], "Les usagers de Napster, entre communauté
et clientèle Construction et régulation d'un collectif
sociotechnique", Sociologie du travail, 44 (2002) p.461-480
Bernardo Huberman is a Research Fellow at the Xerox Palo Alto Research
Center, where he heads the Internet Ecologies Area, a group involved
in studying the dynamics of distributed processes in social organizations
and the Internet. His recent research has concentrated in the World
Wide Web, with particular emphasis on the dynamics of its growth and
use. This work helps uncover the nature of electronic markets and the
law of surfing. He has been involved in the design of novel mechanisms
for enforcing privacy and trust in e-commerce and negotiations.
Huberman B., Adar E., [2001], "Free Riding on Gnutella", Firstmonday.com
http://citeseer.nj.nec.com/adar00free.html.
Créplet F., Dupouet O., Kern F., Munier F. [2002], "Dualité
cognitive et organisationnelle de la firme au travers du concept de
communauté", Working Paper.
www.utc.fr/oi2/Textes_intervenants/Creplet.rtf
Revillard A. [2000], "Les interactions sur l'Internet", Terrains
& Travaux n°1[2000], p. 108-129
http://www.oui.net/modules/wfsection/article.php?articleid=2
and Department of Applied Mathematics, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2
9JT, UK
Partha Niyogi : Department of Computer Science, University of Chicago,
Chicago, IL 60637, USA
Author Keywords: Author Keywords: Linguistic agents; Optimal communication;
Language learning; Language evolution; Game theory; Multi-agent systems
Michel Callon ( transl. Geof Bowker)
"One of the first - and maybe one of the only - results of social
studies of science has been to show that an isolated statement or theory
is quite simply useless. You might print thousands of copies of an article
or a book and air-drop copies in Lapland or in Bosnia-Herzegovina. You
might similarly send well-trained students or well-calibrated instruments
to the far corners of the earth. However, if all these elements do not
come together in a single place at the same time, then the dissemination
will have been a waste of time. Nobody will adopt the statement; the
skills will not have any object to which they can be applied; the instruments
and the machines will remain in their boxes. I cannot resist telling
you the following anecdote, not borrowed from the sociology of science,
but that brings out the necessity of this complementarity.
On 7 May 1992, following up on the Los Angeles riots, Reuters sent the
following dispatch: "It is reported that a rioter who could not
work out how to use a VCR he had stolen during the riots took it straight
back to the police." This fable, which clarifies what, following
Austin, we could refer to as the conditions of the felicity of usage
of technology, can be applied perfectly well to science and its statements.
You will never see a mafioso carrying out a holdup in a theoretical
physics laboratory. If Watson was able to remove the X-ray diffraction
diagrams from Franklin's wastepaper basket, they were only useful because
Crick was there to decipher them. I propose calling this thesis the
thesis of the intrinsic inutility of statements (the thesis can be applied
equally to skills and instruments). It is quite simply a consequence
of Harry Collins's (1974) fundamental work on duplication. If I were
not totally opposed to prizes being awarded for individual work, I would
suggest that we call it Collins's Law. What he successfully demonstrated
- contrary to what he sometimes affirms - was not so much the thesis
of experimenters' regress as the impossibility of endowing a statement
with any meaning if the work of the duplication of skills and instruments
has not been done. In other words, it is impossible to mobilize the
different elements independently of each other."
http://www.ensmp.fr/~latour/poparticles/poparticle/p071.html
http://www.tfisher.org/
Fisher W.W. [2004], Promises to Keep: Technology, Law, and the Future
of Entertainment, Stanford University Press. (ch. 6: An Alternative
Compensation System).
http://www.econ.umn.edu/~mboldrin/
David Levine: Department of Economics, University of California, Los
Angeles
http://levine.sscnet.ucla.edu/
Roger Hartley: Economics Department, Keele University, Staffordshire
http://www.keele.ac.uk/depts/ec/web/wpapers/kerp0305.pdf
Cornes R., Hartley R. [2003], "Aggregative Public Good Games",
NAJ Economics, Vol.6, June 14, 2003
Key words: noncooperative games, public goods JEL classi…cations:
C72, H41
http://www.vwl.uni-muenchen.de/ls_schmidt/who/personen/fhext.html
Herold F. [2003],"Carrot or Stick? Group Selection and the Evolution
of Reciprocal Preferences", NAJ Economics, Vol.6, June 14,
2003
JEL-Classi?cation: C72, D63, D64, D83 Keywords: Reciprocity, Evolution
of Preferences, Group Selection, Co-evolution, Fairness
le Berkman Center http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/home/
Turner M.E. [1998], "Enclosures re-opened", ReFRESH (Recent
Findings of Research in Economic & Social History), Spring 1998,
N°26
http://www.ehs.org.uk/society/pdfs/Turner%2026a.pdf
Sam Cappleman : Hewlett Packard Global Alliances, UK
Gamila Shoib : School of Management, University of Bath, UK
Geoff Walsham : Judge Institute of Management, University of Cambridge,
UK
Author Keywords: Knowledge community; Information and communication
technologies; Organizational context; Learning
Leyland Pitt : Rotterdam School of Management, The Netherlands
Pierre Berthon : Bentley College, Massachusetts, USA
Author Keywords: Elusive ensembles; Informal Internet networks; Social
capital; Social network theory; Strategic alliances; Network organizations
Author Keywords: Internet drivers; Clustering phenomenon; Knowledge
dissemination
The Journal of Socioeconomics, Vol.32, Iss.6, Dec-2003, p. 623-645
Author Keywords: Social capital; Social cohesion; Community; Cooperation
Maryam Alavi : Goizueta Business School, Emory University, Atlanta,
GA 30322, USA
The study indicated that overall, the emergent leaders sent more and
longer email messages than their team members did. The number of task-oriented
messages, particularly those that were related to logistics coordination,
sent by emergent leaders was higher than that of non-leaders. However,
there were no differences between emergent leaders and non-leaders in
terms of expertise-related messages. No significant differences in relationship-oriented
and technology management messages between emergent leaders and other
team members existed. Furthermore, the emergent leaders enacted three
roles: initiator, scheduler, and integrator. These findings are discussed
and their implications for research and practice are described in the
paper.
Kerstin Pull : Institute of Labour Law and Industrial Relations in the
European Community, Trier University, Trier D-54286, Germany
Author Keywords: Indirect evolution; Equity; Asymmetry of conflict payoffs;
Social norms
JEL classification codes: C71; C78; Z13
Lawrence A. Hirschfeld : Department of Anthropology, University of Michigan,
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1092, USA
Tano J. Santos : University of Chicago, Chicago IL, USA
Author Keywords: Endogenous preferences; Incomplete markets; General
equilibrium; Risk aversion
Marc Bilodeau : Department of Economics, IUPUI, Indianapolis, IN 46202-5140,
USA
Nicolas Gravel : Université Paul Valéry, Montpellier and
GREQAM-IDEP, Centre de la Vieille Charité, 2, rue de la Charité,
13 002, Marseille, France
Author Keywords: Voluntary provision; Public good; Individual morality
Author Keywords: Dilogue/trilogue/polylogue; Plurilevel analysis; Typology
of polylogues; Participation framework
Michèle Grosjean : Groupe de Recherche sur les Interactions Communicatives
UMR CNRS 5612, Université Lumière Lyon 2, Campus de Porte
des Alpes CP 11, 69676, Bron Cedex, France
Author Keywords: Polylogues; Meetings; Hospital; Situated cognition;
Participation framework
Author Keywords: Semi-formal meeting; Topical organization; Participation
framework; Interlocutive `crowding'; Interlocutive `splitting'
Sylvie Bruxelles and Catherine Kerbrat-Orecchioni : Groupe de Recherches
sur les Interactions Communicatives, CNRS-Université Lumière
Lyon 2, 5 av. Pierre Mendès, 69676, Bron, France
Author Keywords: Polylogue flexibility; emerging vs. situation-dependent
coalitions; coalition markers; Radio debates; Meetings in notaries'
offices
Author Keywords: Computer-mediated polylogues; Conversation structure;
Participation framework
Author Keywords: Two-sided networks; Platforms; Compatibility
JEL classification codes: L12; L13; L89
Oz Shy, Humboldt University at Berlin, Berlin, Germany
Author Keywords: Software piracy; Hardware taxation; Intellectual property;
Copyright violation
JEL classification codes: L86; O34
Faculty of Economics, Ritsumeikan University, 1-1-1 Nojihigashi, Kusatsu,
Shiga 525-8577, Japan
Author Keywords: Information goods; Private copying; Copy-protection;
Appropriability
JEL classification codes: D21; D42; K11; L11; M31
Amit Gayer, Oz Shy
Department of Economics, University of Haifa, Mount Carmel, 31905 Haifa,
Israel
Keywords: Internet; Digitally-stored products; Peer-to-peer; Gnutella;
Piracy; Intellectual property
JEL classification: L86
Economics Letters 81 (2003) 51-57
Kevin D. Ashley: Graduate Program in Intelligent Systems and School
of Law, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260, USA
R. P. Loui: Department of Computer Science, Washington University, St.
Louis, MO 63130, USA
Rissland E.L., Ashley K.D., Loui R.P. [2003], "AI and Law: A fruitful
synergy", Artificial Intelligence, Volume 150, Issues 1-2
, (AI and Law), November 2003, p. 1-15.
Author Keywords: Legal reasoning; Case-based reasoning; Lazy learning;
Legal knowledge representation; Legal information retrieval; Version
spaces; Reflective adjustment; Argument
Author Keywords: Legal reasoning; Case-based reasoning; Analogy; Reduction
graph
Giovanni Sartor: CIRSFID, Faculty of Law, University of Bologna, Italy
Author Keywords: Legal reasoning; Case-based reasoning; Theory construction
Khalid Al-Kofahi, Alex Tyrrell, Arun Vachher: Thomson Legal & Regulatory,
R&D, B5-3, 50 Broad Street, Rochester, NY 14694, USA
Author Keywords: Information extraction; Partial parsing; Case law;
Case history; Legal publishing
Erik Brynjolfsson: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Sloan
School of Management
Astrid Andrea Dick: Federal Reserve Board - Research & Statistics
Department
Michael D. Smith: Carnegie Mellon University - H. John Heinz III School
of Public Policy and Management
Price dispersion among commodity goods is typically attributed to consumer
search costs. We explore the magnitude of consumer search costs using
a data set obtained from a major Internet shopbot. For the median consumer,
the benefits to searching lower screens are $2.24 while the cost of
an exhaustive search of the offers is a maximum of $2.03. Interestingly,
in our setting, consumers who search more intensively are less price
sensitive than other consumers, reflecting their increased weight on
retailer differentiation in delivery time and reliability. Our results
demonstrate that even in this nearly-perfect market, substantial price
dispersion can exist in equilibrium from consumers preferences over
both price and non-price attributes.
Keywords: search costs, shopbot, product differentiation, random coefficients
choice model
Michael D. Smith: Carnegie Mellon University - H. John Heinz III School
of Public Policy and Management
Yu (Jeffrey) Hu: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Sloan
School of Management
We present a framework and empirical estimates that quantify the economic
impact of increased product variety made available through electronic
markets. While efficiency gains from increased competition significantly
enhance consumer surplus, for instance by leading to lower average selling
prices, our present research shows that increased product variety made
available through electronic markets can be a significantly larger source
of consumer surplus gains.
One reason for increased product variety on the Internet is the ability
of online retailers to catalog, recommend and provide a large number
of products for sale. For example, the number of book titles available
at Amazon.com is over 23 times larger than the number of books on the
shelves of a typical Barnes & Noble superstore and 57 times greater
than the number of books stocked in a typical large independent bookstore.
Our analysis indicates that the increased product variety of online
bookstores enhanced consumer welfare by $731 million to $1.03 billion
in the year 2000, which is between seven to ten times as large as the
consumer welfare gain from increased competition and lower prices in
this market. There may also be large welfare gains in other SKU-intensive
consumer goods such as music, movies, consumer electronics, and computer
software and hardware.
Keywords: Consumer Surplus, Product Variety, Electronic Markets
Spectrum Management: Property Rights, Markets, and the Commons (89Kb)
(with Dave Farber)
Faulhaber G., Farber D. [2003], "Spectrum Management: Property
Rights, Markets, and the Commons", Working Paper, TPRC,
Telecommunications Policy Research Conference Proceedings, 2003
H. John Heinz III
School of Public Policy and Management
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh
http://www.heinz.cmu.edu/~mds/papers/lop/
Abstract:
Recent IT research has analyzed how the performance of IT-enabled markets
may differ from conventional markets. This literature has made two unexpected
empirical findings. First, IT-enabled markets for commodity goods exhibit
significant price dispersion. Second, well-known retailers in these
markets appear to cooperate to set high prices.
This paper presents an analytic model, and confirmatory empirical evidence,
that explains this behavior as a response to the unique characteristics
of consumer search in electronic markets. In conventional markets, consumer
search costs are primarily a function of the consumer's physical proximity
to retailer outlets - and physical proximity is distributed relatively
equally across retailers. In electronic markets, consumer search costs
are primarily a function of the consumer's mental awareness of different
retailers - and this awareness is likely to be concentrated in the hands
of a few retailers.
Based on this model of consumer search, IT-enabled markets for commodity
goods exhibit high price dispersion in equilibrium and a few well-known
retailers are able to cooperate to set high prices. The predictions
of the model are shown to be consistent with empirical data for 23,744
books collected from 24 Internet retailers in late 1999. Viewing consumer
search in this manner provides a useful starting point for understanding
the likely development of IT-enabled markets, and for understanding
the importance of advertising and first-mover advantage for electronic
market participants.
Youcheng Wang : Rosen School of Hospitality Management, University of
Central Florida, P.O. Box 16140, Orlando, FL 32816 1450, USA
Daniel R. Fesenmaier : National Laboratory for Tourism and eCommerce,
Department of Leisure Studies, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,
USA
Online travel community has been considered central to models of Internet
marketing and electronic commerce in the travel industry. The successful
operation of an online travel community depends on the understanding
of member participation in and active contribution to the online travel
community. This study evaluates an integrated model of an online travel
community using structural equation modeling. The results of the study
indicate that participation in the travel community is driven mainly
by social and hedonic benefits, while level of active contribution can
be explained by three instrumental, efficacy, and expectancy related
incentives. Implications for the development of a dynamic and sustainable
online travel community are discussed.
Author Keywords: Online travel community; Member needs; Motivation;
Tourism marketing
Wilson S. Geisler
Randy L. Diehl
Department of Psychology, Center for Perceptual Systems, University
of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA
We describe a formal framework for analyzing how statistical properties
of natural environments and the process of natural selection interact
to determine the design of perceptual and cognitive systems. The framework
consists of two parts: a Bayesian ideal observer with a utility function
appropriate for natural selection, and a Bayesian formulation of Darwin's
theory of natural selection. Simulations of Bayesian natural selection
were found to yield new insights, for example, into the co-evolution
of camouflage, color vision, and decision criteria. The Bayesian framework
captures and generalizes, in a formal way, many of the important ideas
of other approaches to perception and cognition.
Author Keywords: Natural selection; Ideal observer; Scene statistics;
Color perception; Camouflage evolution
Two recent articles by Geisler and Diehl use Bayesian statistical decision
theory to model the co-evolution of predator and prey in a simple, game-like
environment. The prey is characterized by its coloration. The predator
is characterized by the chromatic sensitivity of its visual system and
its willingness to attack. The authors demonstrate how the coloration
of prey and the perceptual system of the predator co-evolve, converging
to a Nash equilibrium for both species.
Gerardine DeSanctis & Michael Roach & Lu Jiang : Duke University,
USA
Anne-Laure Fayard : INSEAD, Singapore
Information and communication technologies afford different levels and
types of support for learning networks. We draw on our studies of video-conferenced
classrooms, group discussion spaces, and online communities to suggest
a framework for understanding how learning networks can benefit from
various e-learning venues. We show how the design of computer-mediated
environments influence the kinds of learning processes that are likely
to unfold as business professionals interact with one another across
time and space barriers. The extent to which participants experience
these types of learning depends upon how the electronic environments
are structured and, more importantly, on how participants manage their
interaction processes. Though all venues provide access to distributed
social resources, some settings are more effective than others in addressing
the specific learning needs of knowledge workers.
Author Keywords: Learning; Virtual teams; Knowledge management; Online
communities
Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands
This paper examines the conditions for successful knowledge sharing
and learning in inter-organisational alliances. In order to improve
competitive advantage, organisations try to learn and develop knowledge
in alliances. But how do they `succeed' in these processes? We present
several factors that are important for the `successful' knowledge sharing
and learning in alliances where competing organisations co-operate.
Whereas much alliance literature seems to have a bias towards conditions
at the inter-organisational level, we suggest that attention should
be paid to inter-personal conditions as well. Our two case studies located
in The Netherlands present some inter-personal conditions for `successful'
knowledge sharing and learning in alliances.
Author Keywords: Knowledge sharing; Learning; Co-opetition; Inter-organisational
alliances
Maureen Benson-Rea and Heather Wilson
University of Auckland, New Zealand
This empirically-driven paper presents a conceptual framework relating
the use of inter-organisational networks to learning, moderated by the
firm and industry lifecycles. The data imply that the ability to fundamentally
change network focus, which we have called network revolution, could
enhance firm learning. This network-structure-process-learning nexus
is explored by combining the entrepreneurial and industrial, marketing
and purchasing (IMP) literatures. We suggest that bringing these two
literatures together in this way will contribute to expanding the scope
of network studies by focusing on the dynamic processes and learning
outcomes of networks, both from an intentional (revolutionary) and from
an emergent (evolutionary) perspective.
Author Keywords: Inter-organisational networks; Horizontal networks;
Evolutionary networks; Emergent networks; Revolutionary networks; Intentional
networks; Organisational learning; Firm lifecycle; Industry lifecycle
Brian Subirana : IESE, Barcelona and MIT Sloan School of Management,
USA
Malcolm Bain : IESE, Barcelona, Spain
Virtual Learning Networks (VLN) offer many novel business opportunities.
We show an illustrative scenario where these novel opportunities offer
significant new legal challenges. Thus, regulation -- including privacy
and IPR issues -- is a highly relevant issue for executives managing
VLN. Legal breaches raise liability issues for VLN organisers, while
affecting the design of the VLN, and raise questions of business and
academic reputation and value. We show that these legal issues highlight
the need for careful consideration when using Agent Technologies and
the need for a `legal architecture' supporting system design. We contend
that a novel process view of organisations enhances the possibilities
for creating legally compliant VLNs, as models can be developed that
embed legal processes at the design time, enhancing the value proposition
of VLNs.
Author Keywords: Software agents; Law; IPR; Privacy; Computer programming;
Processes; Virtual learning networks; Legal architecture
David Barnes : Royal Holloway University of London, UK
Suzanne Mieczkowska, Matthew Hinton : Open University Business School,
UK
Businesses today operate in a fast-evolving environment where Internet-based
technologies are not only ubiquitous but are having a fundamental impact
on the way that businesses manage their operations and compete. An ever
increasing number of organisations, whether dotcom start-ups or established
businesses, are becoming e-businesses. Operations management academics
have always highlighted the strategic importance of operations, and
its role in corporate success. Consideration of operations strategy
surely has no less importance in e-business than in traditional business.
Yet there is evidence from practice that many companies have adopted
e-applications without thinking through their strategic impact. Similarly,
operations strategy theory appears to have done little to adapt to the
changes wrought by the advent of Internet-based ICT. This paper considers
what impact the Internet has had on operations strategy and whether
new strategic thinking is required in response to the powerful external
forces that are re-shaping industry. The paper postulates that new thinking
is required and that effective operations strategy must now also integrate
the consideration of information systems strategy within its subject
matter.
José C. Riquelme, Jesús S. Aguilar-Ruiz,
and Carmelo Del Valle
Departamento de Lenguajes y Sistemas Informáticos, Universidad
de Sevilla, Avda, Reina Mercedes s/n, 41012, Sevilla, Spain
This paper describes a new approach, HIerarchical DEcision Rules (HIDER),
for learning generalizable rules in continuous and discrete domains
based on evolutionary algorithms. The main contributions of our approach
are the integration of both binary and real evolutionary coding; the
use of specific operators; the relaxing coefficient to construct more
flexible classifiers by indicating how general, with respect to the
errors, decision rules must be; the coverage factor in the fitness function,
which makes possible a quick expansion of the rule size; and the implicit
hierarchy when rules are being obtained. HIDER is accuracy-aware since
it can control the maximum allowed error for each decision rule. We
have tested our system on real data from the UCI Repository. The results
of a 10-fold cross-validation are compared to C4.5's and they show a
significant improvement with respect to the number of rules and the
error rate.
Author Keywords: Evolutionary algorithms; Supervised learning; Decision
trees
a Department of Computer Science and Engineering, National Sun Yat-Sen
University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan
b Department of Information Management, National Kaohsiung First University
of Science and Technology, 2 Juoyue Rd. Nantz District, Kaohsiung, Taiwan
c Department of Computer Science and Engineering, National Sun Yat-Sen
University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan
Genetic algorithms (GAs) are well-known heuristic algorithms and have
been applied to solve a variety of complicated problems. When adopting
GA approaches, two important issues--selection pressure and population
diversity--must be considered. This work presents a novel mating strategy,
called tabu genetic algorithm (TGA), which harmonizes these two issues
by integrating tabu search (TS) into GA's selection. TGA incorporates
the tabu list to prevent inbreeding so that population diversity can
be maintained, and further utilizes the aspiration criterion to supply
moderate selection pressure. An accompanied self-adaptive mutation method
is also proposed to overcome the difficulty of determining mutation
rate, which is sensitive to computing performance. The classic traveling
salesman problem is used as a benchmark to validate the effectiveness
of the proposed algorithm. Experimental results indicate that TGA can
achieve harmony between population diversity and selection pressure.
Comparisons with GA, TS, and hybrids of GA and TS further confirm the
superiority of TGA in terms of both solution quality and convergence
speed.
Author Keywords: Genetic algorithm; Tabu search; Restrictive mating;
Sexual selection; Traveling salesman problem
Lada A. Adamic, and Eytan Adar
HP Labs, 1501 Page Mill Road, Palo Alto, CA 94304, USA
The Internet has become a rich and large repository of information about
us as individuals. Anything from the links and text on a user's homepage
to the mailing lists the user subscribes to are reflections of social
interactions a user has in the real world. In this paper we devise techniques
and tools to mine this information in order to extract social networks
and the exogenous factors underlying the networks' structure. In an
analysis of two data sets, from Stanford University and the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology (MIT), we show that some factors are better
indicators of social connections than others, and that these indicators
vary between user populations. Our techniques provide potential applications
in automatically inferring real world connections and discovering, labeling,
and characterizing communities.
Author Keywords: Homepage analysis; Small worlds; Web communities
Klaus Abbink (a), Ron Darziv (b), Zohar Gilula (b), Harel Goren (b),
Bernd Irlenbusch (c), Arnon Keren (b), Bettina Rockenbach (c), Abdolkarim
Sadrieh (d), Reinhard Selten (e) and Shmuel Zamir, (b) (f)
a University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK
b Center for Rationality, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem,
Israel
c University of Erfurt, Erfurt, Germany
d CentER and Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands
e University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany
f CNRS, Paris, France
We introduce and experiment the Fisherman's Game in which the application
of economic theory leads to four different benchmarks. Non-cooperative
sequential rationality predicts one extreme outcome while the core (which
coincides with the competitive market equilibrium) predicts the other
extreme. Intermediate, disjoint outcomes are predicted by fairness utility
models and the Shapley value. None of the four benchmarks fully explains
the observed behavior. However, since elements of both cooperative and
non-cooperative game theory are crucial for organizing our data, we
conclude that effort towards bridging the gap between the various concepts
is a promising approach for future economic research.
Author Keywords: Competition; Backward induction; Game theory; Experimental
economics
JEL classification codes: C78; C91; C92; D82Psychological classification
codes: 2360
a Institut Universitaire de France, BETA-Theme, Université Louis
Pasteur, 61 av. de la Foret Noire, Strasbourg 67085, France
b IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, NY, USA
c CIRANO, Montreal, Canada
d Universität Freiburg, Freiburg, Germany
e Allianz AG, Munich, Germany
f Graduate School of Business, Université de Lausanne, Lausanne,
Switzerland
We compare the results of a one-shot investment game, studied earlier
by Berg et al. [Games and Economic Behavior 10 (1995) 122], for France
and Germany. In this game, player A is the trustor and player B the
trustee. The average level of investment is significantly larger in
Germany, but the level of reciprocity is not significantly different
between the two countries. This implies that German B-players earned
significantly more than French B-players. Furthermore, in both countries
B-players earned significantly more than A-players. Our results support
Fukuyama's conjecture that the level of trust is higher in Germany than
in France, a situation which can explain a higher rate of investment
and a higher level of performance. However, our results also show that
the increased revenue which is attributable to the higher level of trust,
is not shared in a more equitable way, but essentially increases B-players'
payoffs. Finally, based on an intercultural trust experiment, we show
that French A subjects did not find German B subjects less trustworthy
and German A subjects did not find French B subjects less trustworthy.
Author Keywords: Trust; Reciprocity; Experimental economics; Social-psychology
Psychological classification codes: 2910; 3000JEL classification codes:
C91; C70
Carnegie Mellon University - H. John Heinz III School of Public Policy
and Management
Peer-to-peer file sharing networks are becoming an important medium
for the distribution of information goods. However, there is little
academic research into the optimal design of these networks under real-world
conditions. Our research represents an initial effort to analyze the
impact of positive and negative network externalities on the optimal
size of these P2P networks. Our analysis uses a unique dataset collected
from the six most popular OpenNap peer-to-peer networks between December
19, 2000 and April 22, 2001.
We find that users contribute value to the network in terms of additional
content and additional replicas of content at a diminishing rate, while
they impose costs on the network in terms of congestion on shared resources
at an increasing rate. Together these results suggest that the optimal
size of peer-to-peer networks is bounded - at some point the costs a
marginal user imposes on the network will exceed the value they provide.
Keywords: peer-to-peer, file sharing, empirical, network externalities,
network size
JEL Classifications: L86, L11
http://www.bepress.com/bejeap/contributions/vol2/iss1/art11
Publishers of computer software and music claimed losses of over $17.6
billion to piracy in 2002. Theoretically, however, piracy may raise
legitimate demand through positive demand-side externalities, sampling,
and sharing. Accordingly, the actual impact of piracy on the legitimate
demand is an empirical issue. Addressing this issue in the context of
recorded music, we develop and test hypotheses from theoretical models
of piracy on international data for music CDs over the period 1994-98.
Empirically, we find that the demand for music CDs decreased with piracy,
suggesting that "theft" outweighed the "positive"
effects of piracy. However, the impact of piracy on CD sales was considerably
less than estimated by industry. We estimated that, in 1998, actual
losses amounted to about 6.6% of sales, or 42% of industry estimates.
But, we found evidence that publishers would have raised prices in the
absence of piracy, suggesting that the actual revenue loss would have
been higher.
N. Jonard: CNRS, CREA Ecole Polytechnique, 1 rue Descartes, 75005, Paris,
France
This paper models the phenomenon of collective invention as it exists
when the disclosure of information among competing entities creates
a positive feedback that allows for high innovation rates and fast knowledge
accumulation. Develop a formal model that accounts for the dynamics
of knowledge and collective invention and examining how the architecture
of the network of agents influences patterns and rate of innovation,
we find that the communication network structure has a strong influence
on system performance. The small world structure is an efficient architecture
when absorption capacities are low, while large absorbing capacities,
by contrast, emphasise the value of short path length.
Author Keywords: Collective invention; Knowledge; Networks; Small worlds
JEL classification codes: L00; O31; O38; R10
Raluca Iorgulescua, Stephen Onyeiwu: Department of Economics, Allegheny
College, Meadville, PA 16335, USA
Results from ultimatum and dictator games played in western societies
routinely violate the canonical economic model. Results from non-western
societies are even more problematic. In this study ultimatum and dictator
games were played in the small Igbo village of Umuluwe in southeastern
Nigeria. Follow-up interviews to high acceptance rates suggested that
fairness, not fear of retaliation, was the overwhelming reason for high
offers, suggesting the limited predictive power of the neoclassical
behavioral model. The economically rational prediction of a high acceptance
rate of ultimatum game offers holds in traditional societies but not
for the reasons the standard model assumes.
Author Keywords: Ultimatum and dictator games; Nigerian village; Igbo
people
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, BiosGroup, Inc.,
317 Paseo de Peralta, Santa Fe, NM 87501, USA
We consider a population of players playing a Prisoners' Dilemma Game
in a local interaction setting, using a formalism of automata networks.
Sufficient conditions for existence of an equilibrium where cooperation
coexists with non-cooperation (a mixed equilibrium) are derived and
properties of an equilibrium are discussed. In a mixed equilibrium the
highest payoff will be obtained by a cooperator. For a special one-dimensional
case the equilibrium set is fully characterized. We further consider
a model where agents can choose (to some extent) whom of their neighbors
they want to play with. Results of computer simulations are reported.
The most striking feature of simulations is the fact that very organized
structures can be observed starting with completely random initial conditions.
Author Keywords: Cooperation; Evolutionary games; Bounded rationality;
Local interactions; Automata networks; Computer simulations
JEL classification codes: C62; C72; D74; D83
As today's digital technologies modify the ways in which cultural goods
are consumed and produced, the analysis of consumption patterns becomes
one of the most important activities for producers in the cultural industries.
Information on consumers' behaviour becomes a strategic resource with
which to anticipate competitors and improve the fit between supply and
demand. This article contains an empirical analysis on the music industry,
where analysis of on-line survey results show that music downloading
is not a unique phenomenon and consumers are approaching the digital
environment in different ways. The presence of these differing consumption
profiles entails a deep segmentation strategy, requiring that both sides
of the strategy -- from selection of artists to promotion and pricing
policies -- be addressed to deal with this segmentation. Managers working
in the cultural industries will have to face fundamental changes associated
with the shift to a world without physical artefacts, and will need
to be able to predict emerging consumption profiles in advance and prepare
mixed strategies to handle the period of transition.
Salvatore Attardo
Department of EnglishYoungstown State UniversityOne University Plaza,
Youngstown, OH 44555, USA
Department of English Studies, University of Alicante, Spain, Address:
Apartado 99, E-03080, Alicante, Spain
In this paper, Sperber and Wilson's Relevance theory is analyzed as
to its explanation of how humorous interpretations are produced. The
main foundation of this cognitive theory is the hypothesis that human
beings rely on one single interpretive principle, which they invariably
use in their attempt to select the interlocutors' intended interpretation.
This principle states that the first interpretation which provides an
optimal balance of interest--cognitive effects-and mental effort, is
the one that the speaker possibly intends to communicate, and hence
it is the one selected, and interpretation stops at this point. As will
be shown in the article, this theoretical claim is valid for any type
of ostensive communication (in which communicators intend to make mutually
manifest to the addressee some information), humorous utterances included.
Besides, the steps involved in this interpretive procedure may be predicted
to a greater or lesser extent, which provides communicators with the
key to the necessary control over the eventual interpretation of their
humorous discourse.
Author Keywords: Relevance theory; Humorous strategies; Humorous effects;
Incongruity
Chair of English Linguistics, Saarland University, 66041 Saarbrücken,
Germany
In this article, I explore the main theoretical issues facing researchers
in conversational humor today. In particular, I address (1) the structure
of humorous discourse; (2) the forms of conversational humor: jokes,
anecdotes, wordplay, irony; (3) the interpersonal functions of conversational
humor: aggression versus rapport; (4) single-stage versus multi-stage
processing of humor; and (5) the description of timing in word play
and narrative jokes.
Author Keywords: Humor; Jokes; Conversation; Relevance; Frames; Aggression;
Rapport
Department of English, University of Alabama, 103 Morgan Hall, Tuscaloosa,
AL 35487, USA
An approach to humor grounded in interactional sociolinguistics starts
not with reified abstractions such as `humor', `wit', or `irony' but
rather with the situated interpretation of joking as a speech activity.
Using videotaped data of crosscultural conversation groups, and employing
a close linguistic analysis based in Gumperz's theory of conversational
inference, this paper documents the ability of beginning language learners
to collaborate in the construction of conversational joking discourse
with native English speakers. The claim is made that communication is
achieved indirectly within these jointly-constructed joking episodes
through displaying understanding by playing within the frame set out
by the other. Such fine-tuning of understanding is the core of why the
ability to participate in such joking is important in the development
of rapport. Illustrative joking episodes represent differences along
several dimensions: the exploitation of limited sociolinguistic resources,
with examples of primary reliance on the nonverbal and lexical, on the
prosodic, and on the pragmatic; the interactional roles of the native
English speaker and learner(s), with examples of different patterns
of initiation and collaboration; and the focus of the joking within
the general theme of the learners' perspective on the language learning
experience, in effect, the culture of the language learner, with examples
highlighting the apparently arbitrary nature of idiomatic expressions,
the difficulty of coping with interaction in the new language, and the
general powerlessness of the language learner in a world of native speakers.
Author Keywords: Discourse; Humor; Joking; Conversation; Crosscultural
communication; Language socialization; Interactional sociolinguistics
Freiburg University of Education, German Department, Kunzenweg 21, 79117
Freiburg, Germany
My article deals with responses to irony in two different contexts.
As an interaction analyst, I am interested in what interlocutors do
with the ironic in the co-construction of the ongoing conversational
sequence. Many reactions to an ironic act reveal that, in irony, a gap
in evaluative perspective is communicated as the most central information.
The said represents a perspective which is combined with a counter-perspective--the
intended. Listeners can in principle react to both perspectives. Reacting
to the said continues the play with clashing perspectives and confirms
the gap. I combine data analytic methods from interactional sociolinguistics
with questions from cognition theory. I shall point out how an interaction
analysis of different responses to an ironic act contributes to the
development of irony theory. A look at two data sets (informal dinner
conversations among friends, and pro and con TV debates) provides interesting
differences in responses to irony. From the format of the responses,
we can often (though not always) access the processing of irony. If
there are responses to the literal meaning, this does not necessarily
indicate that the listener was not able to bridge the ironic gap (as
former theories of irony have suggested), but most often that both the
implicated and the literal message are processed. The data confirm that
there are definitely different types of responses to irony: from responses
to the literal level of the ironic act, to the implicated, mixed, or
ambiguous reactions, to just laughter. The data further confirm that
the different types of responses to irony create different activity
types. Responses to the literally said (the dictum) develop a humorous
discourse type of joint teasing; they cultivate the clash of perspectives
and are frequent in dinner table conversations among friends. In the
context of pro and con debates, responses within the group differ in
accordance with the line of arguing. Here, responses to the implicatum
are more frequent; they recontextualize the serious debate.
Author Keywords: Irony; Ironic gap; Teasing; Contextualization; Perspective;
Conversational sequencing
Department of Psychology, University of Connecticut, 406 Babbidge Road,U-20,
Storrs, CT 06269, USA
This critical review of research on gender and humor describes a theoretically
and pragmatically fruitful framework for studying the intersection of
these topics. Gender is conceived as a system of meanings that influences
access to power, status, and material resources. Humor is conceived
as a mode of discourse and a strategy for social interaction. Within
this theoretical framework, it is argued that women and men use humor
in same-gender and mixed-gender settings as one of the tools of gender
construction. Through it and other means, they constitute themselves
as masculine men and feminine women. At the same time, the unique properties
of humor make it a valuable tool of gender deconstruction. In the political
humor of the women's movement, and in the conversational humor of women
friends, resistance to dominant social constructions of gender can be
voiced.
Author Keywords: Humor; Social context; Gender construction; Male-female
differences; Community of practice; Feminism
Roberto Heredia: Department of Psychology, 5201 University Boulevard,
Texas A&M International University, Laredo, TX 78041-1900, USA
Two lexical decision semantic priming experiments examined when, in
the course of reading a joke, the initial and the intended meanings
are primed; whether the meanings overlap in time; and what happens to
the initial reading when the punchline is encountered. In Experiment
1, probes related to the first activated sense (S1) vs. the second sense
(S2), or true meaning, were presented at each of three temporal sites
for visually displayed joke tests: shortly after joke onset, at an intermediary
position, and at punchline offset, whereas in Experiment 2, probes were
presented at joke offset following prolonged viewing. The results from
Experiment 1 showed S1 priming effects at the initial and intermediary
time point. Priming for S2 also emerged at the intermediary time point
and persisted at the final time point. In Experiment 2, the priming
effect at joke offset was reliable only for S2. The results are taken
to support a concurrent meaning activation view [in line with Attardo,
Humor 10 (1997) 395] at incongruity detection, and a selective activation
view [in line with Giora, Journal of Pragmatics 16 (1991) 465] at incongruity
resolution.
Author Keywords: Jokes; Humor; Incongruity; Ambiguity; Time course
School of Education, Regent University, 1000 Regent University Drive,
Virginia Beach, VA 23464-9800, USA
This study examined the relationships among communicator style, personality-based
learning style, and sense of classroom community among 72 graduate students
enrolled in online doctoral coursework. Findings suggested that communicator
style patterns were related to learning styles and to classroom community.
Moreover, the results of a canonical correlation suggested that friendly
and open communicator styles were significantly related to feelings
of being connected and the precise communicator style was related to
both feelings of connectedness and to feelings that membership in the
online learning community fostered educational goal attainment. No significant
relationships were found between learning styles and classroom community.
Author Keywords: Community; Learning style; Communicator style; Distance
education; ALN; Personality
http://econ.lse.ac.uk/staff/dquah/dp-0212hbne.html
C. F. Sirmans (University of Connecticut)
http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uct:uconnp:2003-39&r=tid
Thomas J. Miceli (University of Connecticut)
Richard P. Adelstein (Wesleyan University)
http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uct:uconnp:2003-38&r=tid
Christian O.R. Pedersen
DRUID, Copenhagen Business School, Department
of Industrial Economics and Strategy/Aalborg University, Department
of Business Studies
http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aal:abbswp:03-01&r=tid
JEL Codes: L63 O15 D83
Keywords: informal contacts; regional clusters; communication technology
Bengt-Åke Lundvall
DRUID Working Papers / DRUID, Copenhagen Business School, Department
of Industrial Economics and Strategy/Aalborg University, Department
of Business Studies
http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aal:abbswp:03-07&r=tid
Abstract: Innovation may be seen as a process of knowledge creation
and the speed and direction of knowledge creation reflects the organizational
set-up of the firm as well as its investments in R&D and training.
Establishing 'a learning organization' where horizontal interaction
and communication inside and across the borders of the firm is a major
factor promoting knowledge creation in the context of a learning economy.
An important issue is to what extent direct and indirect participation
of employees in shaping the new form of organization is critical for
its realization. On the basis of a unique data set covering 2000 Danish
private firms it is demonstrated that firms combining several of the
organizational traits of the learning organization are much more prone
to introduce new products than the others. It is also demonstrated that
such firms have involved employees in different forms of direct and
indirect participation much more frequently than the rest. As more sectors
become exposed to the need to engage in incremental product and service
innovation the economic potential of diffusing good practices in terms
of organization and participation is growing and needs to be reflected
in firm strategies and public policies aiming at promoting innovation
and knowledge creation.
JEL Codes: L22 O31 O32
Keywords: innovation; knowledge creation; learning economy
Zemsky, Peter
JEL Codes: L10 L40 M20
Keywords: market definition; mergers; threat of substitutes
The University of Alabama--Huntsville, Huntsville, AL 35899, USA
Joking seems to be an inescapable part of the culture of email and mailing
lists, and yet few have described the rhetorical functions of humor
in these text-based forms of computer-mediated communication (CMC).
In this article, we argue that humor serves a critical ethos function
in online communities created by mailing lists. By connecting what humor
theorists already recognize as a social dimension in joking to the contemporary
interpretation of ethos as a constitutive force, we find that humor
constitutes a virtual group ethos. Our model of ethos-building humor
emphasizes its computer mediation, drawing close attention to what we
identify as threads of constitutive laughter that form in mailing list
discourse. We apply the model to the rhetoric of a university writing
center mailing list.
Author Keywords: CMC; Ethos; Humor; Jokes; Laughter; L; Mailing list;
Online discourse; Virtual community; Writing centers
a School of Hotel and Restaurant Administration, Oklahoma State University,
210 Human Environment Science West, Stillwater, OK 74078-6173, USA
b College of Business and Technology at Black Hills State University,
1200 University St., Unit 9062, Spearfish, SD 57799-9062, USA
c Hospitality and Tourism Management Department, Purdue University,
USA
This study is designed to: (a) investigate whether demographic and behavioral
characteristics differ significantly among groups of online virtual
community members; (b) identify factors that affect the community members'
loyalty; and (c) determine if the loyalty to an online virtual community
would lead members to purchase products. A modified psychological sense
of community scale coined by Davidson and Cotter (J. Appl. Soc. Psychol.
116 (7) (1986)), and principles offered by McMillan and Chavis (J. Community
Psychol. 14 (1986)), Bressler and Grantham (Community Commerce, McGraw-Hill,
New York, 2000), and McMillan (J. Community Psychol. 24 (4) (1996) 315)
is used as a foundation to develop new measurements for this study.
The four factors of membership, influence and relatedness, integration
and fulfillment of need, and shared emotional connection were found
to be associated with a sense of online virtual community. Sixteen variables
were found to explain the four factors. This study was based on empirical
investigation of 351 travel related online virtual community members.
Factor analysis, ANOVA, and multiple regression procedures were used
to test the hypotheses.
Author Keywords: Online virtual community; Travel; Loyalty; Travel product
purchases; Membership
Graduate School of Management, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and
Technology (KAIST) 207-43 Cheongryangri-dong, Dongdaemoon-gu, Seoul
130-012, Seoul, South Korea
Thanks to availability of the Internet, virtual communities are proliferating
at an unprecedented rate. In-depth understanding of virtual community
dynamics can help us to address critical organizational and information
systems issues such as communities-of-practice, virtual collaboration,
and knowledge management. In this article, we develop a virtual community
activity framework, integrating community knowledge sharing activity
into business activities in the form of an e-business model. We examine
how the level of community knowledge sharing activity leads to virtual
community outcomes and whether such community outcomes are related to
loyalty toward the virtual community service provider. Based on a field
survey of 77 virtual communities currently operating in Freechal.com,
one of Korea's largest Internet community service providers, we found
that the level of community knowledge sharing activity is related to
virtual community outcomes and such outcomes are significantly associated
with loyalty to the virtual community service provider. These results
imply that the level of community knowledge sharing activity may be
a proper proxy for the state of health of a virtual community. Implications
of the findings and future virtual community research directions are
discussed.
Author Keywords: Knowledge management; Virtual community; Knowledge
sharing activity; Virtual community provider
Susan T. Meyer, G. Charles Mabry (CEO of Norlarco Credit Union, Colorado,
USA)
The purpose of this paper is to describe how credit unions that incorporate
a virtual community into their e-commerce efforts are able to expand
traditional services to better support its mission of democracy, volunteerism,
and self-sufficiency. A virtual community is particularly suited to
the credit union philosophy and while published data regarding the development
of a virtual community is nonexistent, the paper describes the case
of Norlarco Credit Union and its efforts to build a virtual community.
Collaborative efforts among credit union executives and Colorado State
University researchers resulted in a work-in-progress, virtual community
framework for credit unions.
a Department of Information Systems School of Computing, National University
of Singapore, 3 Science Drive 2, Singapore 117543, Singapore
b Department of Information Systems, City University of Hong Kong, 83
Tat Chee Avenue, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong
c Department of Management Science, University of Washington, Box 353200,
Seattle, WA 98195-3200, USA
Teo H.H., Chan H.C., Wei K.K., Zhang Z. [2003], "Evaluating information
accessibility and community adaptivity features for sustaining virtual
learning communities", International Journal of Human-Computer
Studies, Article in Press.
Virtual communities have been identified as the "killer applications"
on the Internet Information Superhighway. Their impact is increasingly
pervasive, with activities ranging from the economic and marketing to
the social and educational. Despite their popularity, little is understood
as to what factors contribute to the sustainability of virtual communities.
This study focuses on a specific type of virtual communities--the virtual
learning communities. It employs an experiment to examine the impact
of two critical issues in system design--information accessibility and
community adaptivity--on the sustainability of virtual learning communities.
Adopting an extended Technology Acceptance Model, the experiment exposed
69 subjects to six different virtual learning communities differentiated
by two levels of information accessibility and three levels of community
adaptivity, solicited their feelings and perceptions, and measured their
intentions to use the virtual learning communities. Results indicate
that both information accessibility and community adaptivity have significant
effects on user perceptions and behavioural intention. Implications
for theory and practice are drawn and discussed.
Author Keywords: Virtual learning community; Community sustainability;
Information accessibility; Community adaptivity; Technology acceptance
model; Sense of belonging
a School of Computing and Information Systems, South Bank University,
103 Borough Road, London SE1 0AA, UK
b Centre for HCI Design, School of Informatics, City University, Northampton
Square, London EC1V OHB, UK
c Laboratory for Business Informatics, Department of Business Administration,
Athens University of Economics and Business, 76 Patission Street, 104
34, Athens, Greece
Virtual communities (VCs) are formed on the Internet and are expected
to evolve to a strategically important e-business model. VCs foster
trust among their members and allow them to interact, exchange ideas
and experiences, regardless of their geographical or ethnic origin.
Organisations should consider VCs as a new market place since their
members are current or future customers. Through the interaction with
the members of a VC, companies will eventually learn more about the
needs of their customers, they will strengthen their relationships and
they will be able to customise their services. This exploratory study
reports on a survey of 43 information systems and marketing managers
of insurance companies in the UK and Greece. It investigates the potential
of VCs in the services sector with respect to their contribution to
consumers' loyalty and discusses the requirements for the functionality
of a VC. The results of this study are useful both for the design of
VCs and the evaluation of their business value. Author Keywords: Virtual
communities; Insurance companies; Survey
a Computational Initiatives Sandia National Laboratories, P.O. Box 5800
MS 1188, Albuquerque, NM 87185, USA
b Knowledge Management Research BTexact Technologies Adastral Park,
Ipswich IP5 3RE, UK
This paper describes an experimental, adaptive community-based system,
the Forum, designed to facilitate communication where there are mutual
concerns or interests among virtual communities within or across organizations.
Our description of the Forum is presented from the perspective of user-centered
interaction design. The system consists of a WWW-based collaborative
virtual environment comprised of intelligent software agents that support
explicit information sharing, chance meetings, and real time informal
communication. The Forum provided the technological support for users
to interact informally, but lacked the social support necessary to motivate
users to interact with strangers in their community of practice. Context,
or the reasons why two persons might want to meet, was overlooked. We
propose future directions for the Forum including cultural signposts
that provide contextual cues in the intelligent community-based system
to better support information sharing and real time communication between
strangers. The contribution of the present paper is to provide lessons
learned about design considerations from a series of user trials over
a period of one year for developing adaptive community-based systems.
Author Keywords: Adaptive; Community-based system; Information sharing;
Culture; Intelligent agents; Intercultural communication; Collaborative
virtual environment; Interaction design
Many people insist that their commitments to certain values (e.g. love,
honor, justice) are absolute and inviolable - in effect, sacred. They
treat the mere thought of trading off sacred values against secular
ones (such as money) as transparently outrageous - in effect, taboo.
Economists insist, however, that in a world of scarce resources, taboo
trade-offs are unavoidable. Research shows that, although people do
respond with moral outrage to taboo trade-offs, they often acquiesce
when secular violations of sacred values are rhetorically reframed as
routine or tragic trade-offs. The results reveal the peculiar character
of moral boundaries on what is thinkable, alternately punitively rigid
and forgivingly flexible.
a Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW), Postfach 103443, 68034,
Mannheim, Germany
b Interdisciplinary Institute for Environmental Economics, University
of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany
This paper demonstrates that cooperation in international environmental
negotiations can be explained by preferences for equity. Within a N-country
prisoner's dilemma in which agents can either cooperate or defect, in
addition to the standard non-cooperative equilibrium, cooperation of
a large fraction or even of all countries can establish a Nash equilibrium.
In an emission game, however, where countries can choose their abatement
level continuously, equity preferences cannot improve upon the standard
inefficient Nash equilibrium. Finally, in a two stage game on coalition
formation, the presence of equity-interested countries increases the
coalition size and leads to efficiency gains. Here, even a stable agreement
with full cooperation can be reached.
Author Keywords: International environmental negotiations; Cooperation;
Equity preference; Coalition formation
JEL classification codes: C7; D63; H41; Q00
University of Toulouse, IDEI Place Anatole France, 31042, Toulouse,
France
We examine the optimal allocation of excludable public goods with a
private access cost that some consumers may not be able to afford. The
full-information benchmark is presented first. Then, individuals' access
costs and income levels are private information. When high income consumers
have low access cost, asymmetric information increases the cost of subsidizing
the poor for accessing the public good, and inequality increases. When
the low access cost consumers have the lower income, subsidizing the
poor may involve countervailing incentives, but inequality decreases.
Finally, monopoly provision exacerbates underprovision of the poor,
particularly of those with low access cost.
Author Keywords: Public goods; Access costs; Information goods
JEL classification codes: H41; D82; L86
Many companies face market and competitive conditions that have led
them to adopt multidimensional, matrix organisation structures. But
these matrix structures have often proved difficult for the managers
working within them. This article puts forward the concept of a "structured
network" as a means of overcoming the problems typically associated
with traditional matrix organisations. In structured networks, the organisational
units retain considerable autonomy, but collaborate extensively through
voluntary networking between units. The organisation is largely self-managing,
but has sufficient structure, process and hierarchy to achieve coordination
and implement the corporate strategy. The objective is to obtain the
benefits of interdependence that are designed into a typical matrix,
but without sacrificing clear responsibilities, managerial initiative
and accountability, speed of decision-making and lean hierarchy. To
design a structured network, it is necessary to achieve clarity about
each unit's role without hemming managers in with too much detail. It
is also necessary to support mutual learning without compromising distinctive
differences, to defend specialist culture units from domination by mainstream
units, to promote cooperation without embarking on unnecessary synergy
initiatives, to recognise shared responsibilities without diluting unit
accountability, and to encourage the corporate hierarchy to add value
without creating redundant overheads and interference. Organisations
designed in this way will have enough, but not too much structure.
This paper examines the nature of the external linkages of firms in
the media cluster of Central London, and draws implications for the
competitive advantages that firms in clusters develop. The analysis
suggests that although these firms are strongly embedded in the local
cluster and rely heavily on resources and processes available locally,
they also maintain linkages that extend well beyond the local cluster.
We argue that firms need to identify a successful balance between localised
sources of interaction and those residing at wider geographic areas,
and to establish linkages at these different geographic scales in order
for them to compete successfully.
Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University, The Netherlands
Nachoem Wijnberg,
University of Groningen, The Netherlands
This paper is about the coevolutionary processes that take place between
the way firms organize their innovative activities and the dynamics
of the relevant markets, especially those having to do with bandwagon
and network effects. We focus on the decision-making actors and propose
a categorization of causes of increasing returns and definitions of
bandwagon and network effects that are consistent with this aim. We
investigate the extent of internal autonomy of the unit, the extent
of the integration of R&D, production and other activities in the
product development process, and the extent of external autonomy. Based
on three cases of projects creating software products, two of them in
the same firm, we develop hypotheses concerning the relation between
the organization of innovation and bandwagon and network effects. Also,
on the basis of the discussion of the cases and the coevolutionary framework,
a number of research questions are formulated dealing with the relation
between the organization of innovative activities by firms, bandwagon
and network effects and long-term dynamics, especially of industry life-cycles.
Author Keywords: Organization of innovation; Increasing returns; Project
teams
Albert N. Link,
, a, John T. Scott, b and Donald S. Siegel, c
a Department of Economics, 462 Bryan Building, University of North Carolina
at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC 27402, USA
b Department of Economics, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH 03755, USA
c Department of Economics, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 3502 Russell
Sage Laboratory, 110 8th Street, Troy, NY 12180, USA
Queen's University, Goodes Hall, Kingston, Ont., Canada K7L 3N6
Boston University, 595 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, MA 02215, USA
NBER, 1050 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
We examine the geographic co-location of university research and industrial
R&D in three technology areas. While we find strong evidence of
co-location of these vertically connected activities, regional economies
appear to vary markedly in their ability to convert local academic research
into local commercial innovation. We develop and test the hypothesis
that the presence of a large, local, R&D-intensive firm--an anchor
tenant--enhances the regional innovation system such that local university
research is more likely to be absorbed by and to stimulate local industrial
R&D.
Author Keywords: Regional innovation systems; University technology
transfer; Spillovers; Absorptive capacity
JEL classification codes: 018; O31; O33; L1
a University College London and EUREQua, University of Paris I, Paris,
France
b ECARES, Free University, Brussels, Belgium
We assess the importance of information flows from universities to innovative
firms and determine the relative contribution of formal collaboration
and pure knowledge spillovers in this process. We find that spillovers
provide the most benefit to firms that imitate existing technologies
or those that are involved in incremental innovation. On the other hand,
highly innovative firms appear to derive most benefit from collaborative
research with foreign universities. Indeed, highly innovative firms
are at the frontier of the academic knowledge in their industry. Therefore,
they only marginally benefit from aggregate (or industry-wide) spillovers.
They require new forms of academic knowledge that they acquire through
formal cooperation with foreign universities.
Author Keywords: Innovation; Spillovers; Collaboration; Universities
a University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN 46556, USA
b Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA
c Georgia Institute of Technology and NBER, Atlanta, GA 30332, USA
We examine the interplay of the three major university actors in technology
transfer from universities to industry: the faculty, the technology
transfer office (TTO), and the central administration. We model the
faculty as an agent of the administration, and the TTO as an agent of
both the faculty and the administration. Empirical tests of the theory
are based on evidence from our survey of 62 US research universities.
We find that the TTOs reported licensing objectives are influenced by
their views of faculty and administration, which supports the assumption
that the TTO is a dual agent. The theory yields predictions for whether
or not faculty disclose inventions and if so, at what stage, which in
turn affects license contract terms. We also examine how the portion
of inventions disclosed at different stages varies with faculty quality.
Quality is found to be inversely related to the share of license income
allotted to faculty.
a University of St. Andrews, St. Andrews and ELSE, University College
London, London, UK
b Université de Nantes, Nantes, France
c University of St. Andrews, St. Andrews, UK
d Inland Revenue, London, UK
In this paper we propose a novel framework to model one of the key links
between universities and industry--the undertaking of applied research.
We postulate that a basic objective of universities is to undertake
fundamental research and that they receive public funding to do so.
Nevertheless, faced with tight budget constraints, universities may
have incentives to allow their staff to devote some of their time to
income-generating activities such as applied research or consultancy.
This opens up two channels by which universities can ease their budget
constraint:
(i)by allowing academics to supplement their income, universities may
be able to hold down academic salaries;
(ii)universities can effectively `tax' the income that academics raise
through applied research or consultancy--for example, through the imposition
of `overhead charges'.
By easing their budget constraint, universities may be able to take
on sufficient extra staff to more than offset the time that existing
staff are spending on non-fundamental research and thus increase the
amount of fundamental research that they can achieve with a given public
budget. We develop a model of this link between universities and firms
and use it to determine the optimal `tax' that universities should impose
on applied-research income. The Compton tax, used at MIT in the 1930s,
is an early example of the use of this instrument.
Author Keywords: University-firm links; Income-generation; Fundamental
and applied research; Compton tax
JEL classification codes: H29; L31; O31
a Department of Economics, University of North Carolina at Greensboro,
Greensboro, NC 27402, USA
b Department of Economics, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH 03755, USA
The paper is an exploratory study of science parks in the United States.
It models the history of science parks as the diffusion of an innovation
that was adopted at a rapid and increasing rate in the early 1980s,
and since then at a decreased rate. It models the growth of a science
park once established, showing significant effects on growth for the
proximity to universities and other resources. The paper also reports
university administrators' perceptions about the impact of their science
parks on the academic missions of their universities. Statistical analyses
show there is a direct relationship between the proximity of the science
park to the university and the probability that the academic curriculum
will shift from basic toward applied research.
Author Keywords: Science parks; Innovation; University/industry relationships
JEL classification codes: I2; L31; O32; R1
a Department of Economics, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 110 8th
Street, 3502 Russell Sage Laboratory, Troy, NY 12180-3590, USA
b Nottingham University Business School, Nottingham NG8 1BB, UK
University science parks are alleged to stimulate technological spillovers.
However, there is virtually no empirical evidence on the impact of these
facilities on research productivity. We begin to fill this gap by examining
whether companies located on university science parks in the United
Kingdom have higher research productivity than observationally equivalent
firms not located on a university science park. The preliminary results
appear to be consistent with this hypothesis and are robust to the use
of alternative econometric procedures to assess relative productivity.
Author Keywords: Science parks; R&D; Productivity; University technology
transfer
JEL classification codes: O32; O33; O38; L31
a School of Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology, 685 Cherry
Street, Atlanta, GA 30332, USA
b Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-1900,
USA
c University of Michigan Business School, University of Michigan, Ann
Arbor, MI 48109-1234, USA
d NBER, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
Sampat B.N., Mowery D.C., Ziedonis A. [2003], "Changes in university
patent quality after the Bayh-Dole act: a re-examination", International
Journal of Industrial Organization, Volume 21, Issue 9 , November
2003, pp 1371-1390
The Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 facilitated the retention by universities
of patent rights resulting from government funded academic research,
thus encouraging university entry into patenting and licensing. Though
the Act is widely recognized to be a major change in federal policy
towards academic research, surprisingly little empirical analysis has
been directed at assessing its impacts on the academy and on university-industry
research relationships. An important exception is the work of Henderson
et al. [Rev. Econ. Stat. 80 (1998) 119-127] which examined the impact
of Bayh-Dole on the quality of university patents, as measured by the
number of times they are cited in subsequent patents. The authors found
that the quality of academic patents declined dramatically after Bayh-Dole,
a finding that has potentially important policy implications. In this
paper, we revisit this influential finding. By using a longer stream
of patent citations data, we show that the results of the Henderson
et al. study reflect changes in the intertemporal distribution of citations
to university patents, rather than a significant change in the total
number of citations these patents eventually receive. This has important
implications not only for the evaluation of Bayh-Dole, but also for
future research using patent citations as economic indicators.
Author Keywords: Bayh-Dole; University patenting; Patent citations
JEL classification codes: O3
a Columbia University, Graduate School of Business, 721 Uris Hall, 3022
Broadway, New York, NY 10027, USA
b Department of Economics, Weatherhead School, Case Western Reserve
University, Room 282, 11119 Bellflower Road, Cleveland, OH 44106, USA
Researchers have generally suggested that new technology firms should
exploit radical technologies with broad scope patents to compete with
established firms, implying that new firms founded to exploit university
inventions will be more likely to survive in all industries if they
possess these attributes. However, the existing empirical evidence indicates
that the effectiveness of these two dimensions of new firm strategy
is contingent on the industry environment, specifically industry concentration.
In this paper, we explain why this industry-specific relationship should
exist and use a unique data set of new technology ventures originating
at Massachusetts Institute of Technology to test our arguments.
Author Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Management of technological innovation
and R&D
University of Bristol, EPIC, Tyndall Avenue, Bristol BS8 1TH, UK
During the past 20 years we have witnessed an increase in joint research
between universities and firms. Nevertheless, this increase, which is
largely attributed to the Bayh-Dole Act, has fallen short of expectations.
This paper examines the conditions under which a firm will find it profitable
to form a Research Joint Venture (RJV) with a university. My results
indicate that firms which work on new-technologies, are more likely
to form such partnerships. The reason is that these firms optimally
choose minimal IP protection (lower profits), in effect sharing their
innovation, so as to benefit from increased knowledge spillovers. Thereby,
the opportunity cost of joining an RJV for firms (and universities)
working on mature technologies is greater, making such partners unlikely
candidates for RJVs.
Author Keywords: Intellectual property; RJV
JEL classification codes: 03; 031; 034
a Melbourne Business School and Intellectual Property Research Institute
of Australia, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia
b Department of Economics and Intellectual Property Research Institute
of Australia, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia
Recent papers have argued that a monopoly firm might be able to maximize
its profit by allowing some customers to steal its product. In particular,
with network externalities, it is claimed that allowing piracy can be
profitable because it increases the user base of the product and raises
the willingness-to-pay of other customers. In this paper we analyze
these claims when the producer can freely choose the degree of piracy
prevention. We consider profit maximizing equilibria and show that allowing
piracy cannot raise profits if the monopoly producer can directly price
discriminate between potential-pirates and other customers. In the absence
of price discrimination, allowing piracy will only maximize profits
when the ability to pirate is inversely related to customer willingness-to-pay.
Even in this situation, there is no profit maximizing equilibrium where
some potential pirates buy while others pirate the product. Thus, even
though potential pirates differ in their ability to illegally gain the
product, the profit maximizing outcome involves either no piracy or
complete piracy.
Author Keywords: Piracy; Network externalities; Intellectual property
JEL classification codes: D21; L11
Department of Economics, University of Siena, Piazza San Francesco 7,
53100, Siena, Italy
In this paper we analyze a duopoly market in which firms are commercial
television broadcasters. Firms can differentiate their programs along
two characteristics: one vertical and one horizontal. We show that the
degree of program differentiation is different if we consider audience
or profit maximization. Moreover, in the latter a `natural oligopoly'
result is obtained.
Author Keywords: Media markets; product differentiation
JEL classification codes: D43; L13; L82
a Department of History and Political Science, University of Bologna,
Bologna, Italy
b Department of Economics, University of Bologna, Strada Maggiore 45,
40125, Bologna, Italy
Measuring the Internet--the size of its infrastructure, how many people
use it, and their prevalent uses--is of obvious interest. However, the
wealth of available quantitative information regarding the Internet
so far has fallen short of satisfying the many needs that it would fulfil.
We set the problem of measuring the Internet into a framework that allows
us to derive insights on the peculiar nature of the Internet as a piece
of infrastructure. After reviewing the current measures available, while
drawing a distinction between the object of measurement, and the types
of institutions involved in it, we provide some indications on what
data should be trusted more, and how better measures of the Internet
could be obtained.
Author Keywords: Internet; Measuring the Internet; Infrastructure; Public
capital
JEL classification codes: C81; C82; H54; O31
a Systems Research Technology-Economy-Environment, ARC Seibersdorf Research,
Seibersdorf, Austria
b Department of City and Regional Development, University of Economics
and Business Administration, Vienna, Austria
Research on innovation systems and innovative milieux has shown that
the innovation process of companies is strongly interrelated with activities
of other firms and organizations. Internet is a new information and
communication technology that is assumed to have a big potential to
change such relationships and networks. An often held expectation is
that the Internet will allow firms to interact with distant partners
more easily and that, as a consequence, innovation networks become independent
from geographical space. A contrasting view argues that local and regional
networks and innovation systems will keep their importance, due to the
fact that tacit knowledge, face-to-face communication and institutional
factors are still of key relevance. Based on a survey of Austrian firms
we are going to investigate how the Internet is changing innovation
networks of companies with respect to new types of partners and the
spatial extension of the network.
Author Keywords: Internet; Innovation system; Network; Face-to-face
communication; Tacit knowledge
JEL classification codes: O31; O32
Columbia Business School, 615 Uris Hall, 3022 Broadway, New York, NY
10027, USA
This article describes how ownership status serves as a natural asymmetrizing
criterion enabling resolution of property conflicts. Two new evolutionary
game models are presented where ownership and trade emerge from anarchy
as evolutionary stable strategies.
Author Keywords: Property rights; Evolutionary games; Trade; Money
a Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Spandauer Straße 1, D-10178,
Berlin, Germany
b Zentrum für Europäische Wirtschaftsforschung GmbH, L71,
D-68161, Mannheim, Germany
We use a stylized model to show that, if transfers to the poor are founded
on a security argument, there is a negative trade-off between law enforcement
expenditures and criminality. In contrast, if transfers are based on
altruism, the correlation between the same variables may appear positive.
We argue that this provides a plausible explanation for the startling
difference between the USA and Europe in crime statistics and law enforcement
expenditures.
Author Keywords: Criminality; Law enforcement; Social system
JEL classification codes: K0; H3