15.025 Class Home

15.025 Game Theory for Strategic Advantage (H2)

Spring 2011

Instructors: Yeheskel Bar-Isaac, Alessandro Bonatti, Robert S Gibbons, Roberto Rigobon

TA: Tal Snir

Lecture: MW 10:00-11:30 AM (E51-325)

Information:

Announcements

Worksheet for Wednesday?

The outline called for a worksheet for Wednesday - I think given the extension in the dealine for the take-home exam, there is little to be gained in insisting on asking you to go through a worksheet. Instead I have posted some calculations and examples of "judo strategy" ideas under the worksheet section in stellar. This is a few pages and it would be helpful if you read through it ahead of Wednesday's class. In addition, I have written up some notes on the boss/worker example we went through in today's class - correcting the errors in the slide deck and analyzing also a slightly different version of the game that I think provides some additional insight.

On Wednesday, after you have handed in your take-homes, we'll spend some more time on repeated games - thinking a little more about application than theory as compared to today's class (though I'll breifly review the theory as that will be what will allow us insight on the applications) then we'll move on to discuss judo strategy.

Announced on 02 May 2011 3:12 p.m. by Yeheskel Bar-Isaac

Brainstorming sessions for final projects

Several groups have already been in touch to organize times for short sessions to talk through their idea(s) for the final project. There is no need to meet, but if your group would like to, then emailing in advance to set up a time (M-W) would help avoid disappointment.

Announced on 30 April 2011 3:00 p.m. by Yeheskel Bar-Isaac

Notes for next week

A reminder (as if needed) that the take-home exam will be due. It will be available through stellar from 4am tomorrow morning. As we discussed the deadline has been extended so that it is now due at the start of Wednesday morning's class.

If you have been studying and revising the material, the test should take no more than a couple of hours in "test conditions". However, given that I suspect many are coming at it cold and perhaps being more thorough since it is an open book take-home, I think it is realistic to budget half a day of your time to do it. This is an individual exercise and I expect you to honour that.

A second reminder that the end of the course is approaching and with it the final project. I will be available next week to brain-storm with any group to discuss any idea(s) that you might have. In particular, you may find it useful to frame the project in terms of a "request for help" from whoever the advice is addressed to, and to look over the sample projects that are on stellar. I think regardless of the idea it's useful to think very carefully about the relevant players and their available strategies in the situation that you analyze.

I've posted a couple of "other readings" that may be of interest (i) a fairly techy article on fat cats and puppy dogs (the original article which may be a little hard to read) - we'll have a little more discussion on this next week (ii) a fun article on the history of the Dr Strangelove movie.

Next week we'll start by briefly reviewing and finishing our taxonomy of commitment strategies, move on to discuss repeated games, trust, etc, and then move on to consider "judo strategy".

Have a good few days and good luck with the exam!

Announced on 28 April 2011 10:42 a.m. by Yeheskel Bar-Isaac

We will not discuss the Ryan Air case

Apologies for any confusion. As I mentioned in class, a few of you have told me that you have discussed this case (some of you more than once) before and so it makes little sense to go through it yet again.
Tomorrow we will talk through the dynamic pricing game worksheet that is due.
See you then!

Announced on 24 April 2011 6:29 p.m. by Yeheskel Bar-Isaac

For week of April 25

We'll revise and finish off our discussion of quantity-setting games (so it will be helpful to make sure it's clear) and conduct a similar analysis (even more quickly!) of pricing games and the "Bertrand trap".

We will then discuss ways out of the Bertrand trap (and discuss the worksheet that I handed out in class and is also available on stellar on a Dynamic pricing game), and then moving into Weds we'll get to commitment and a taxonomy of commitment strategies.

I've posted slides (some are intentionally blank as they analyze the dynamic pricing game). As ever, I'll distribute hard copies on Monday.

A reminder that the dynamic pricing game worksheet is to be handed in as a group exercise. There are also a couple of readings for next week as mentioned in the outline (the two by Chevalier).

Also a reminder that I still haven't figured out my way around communicating with you (my current theory is that even though it says it emails the class when I post an announcement it does so only when I send a separate email ... I'll keep experimenting). In any case, I strongly recommend regularly checking on stellar. "New" items are a couple of items on "other stuff" that will relate to our discussion next week but may not make much sense yet (on google and on fat cats), I've added the Excel spreadsheet we talked through in today's class, if you've not looked through them yet - the "Flossie"-thinking examples may be helpful, and as mentioned above there are slides posted for next week.

Wishing you all the very best in the meantime.

Announced on 20 April 2011 2:22 p.m. by Yeheskel Bar-Isaac

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