We study a symmetric independent private values auction model where the revenue-maximizing seller faces a cost cn of attracting n bidders to the auction. If the distribution of valuations possesses an increasing failure rate (IFR), the seller overinvests in attracting bidders compared to the social optimum. Conversely, if the distribution is DFR, the seller underinvests compared to the social o...

Lemma 2. Let c < c' and k < k'. Under the advertising model, if a buyer with cost c' participates in the platform, the buyer with cost c also participates in the platform. If a seller with cost k' participates in the platform, the seller with cost k also participates in the platform. Moreover, if the seller with k' participates in the advertising service, the seller with k also participates in ...

Digital watermarks have previously been proposed for the purposes of copy protection and copy deterrence for multimedia content. In copy deterrence, a content owner (seller) inserts a unique watermark into a copy of the content before it is sold to a buyer. If the buyer sells unauthorized copies of the watermarked content, then these copies can be traced to the unlawful reseller (original buyer...

This paper studies how a seller should design its price schedule when consumers’ preferences are subject to temptation. As in Gul and Pesendorfer (2001), consumers exercise costly self-control to some degree and foresee their impulsive behavior and self-control. Since consumers may pay a premium for an option set that is less tempting, the seller may offer multiple small menus. Building on the ...

Drawing on trust transfer theory and signal theory, we investigate how perceived effectiveness of ecommerce institutional mechanisms (PEEIM) and perceived website quality of the seller (PWQS) moderate the relationships between trust in platform, trust in seller and purchase intention in the context of Consumer to Consumer (C2C) platforms. To test our proposed model, we surveyed 224 buyers of Ta...

Consider a bilateral trading market where there is one potential buyer and one potential seller of an object. The value that the buyer and seller place on the object depends on the product’s quality, . In particular, assume the value to the buyer is vB and the value to the seller is vS : Assume that the quality of the good is uniformly distributed between 0 and 1, U [0; 1]: Tomake the problem i...

Our objective is to determine if a first-price auction or a posted-price market provides a seller with the larger expected revenue when buyers have a common value for the item being sold. An agent-based, posted-price market and an agent-based, first-price common-value auction with a reserve price are developed to compare these selling methods. When the seller cannot impose a reserve price in th...

AbstrAct: Digital watermarking is an emerging technology for combating copyright piracy. In real applications, the transaction between a buyer and a seller is done through a specific watermarking protocol, which enables the seller to successfully identify a traitor from a pirated copy, while preventing the dishonest seller from framing an inno cent buyer. In this paper, we propose a new buyer-s...

Buyer-seller networks where price is determined by an ascending-bid auction are important in many economic examples such as certain real estate markets, radio spectrum sharing, and buyer-supplier networks. However, it may be that some sellers are better off not participating in the auction. We consider what happens if sellers can make a take it or leave it offer to one of their linked buyers be...