IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/amu/wpaper/2009-10.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Game Mining: How to Make Money from those about to Play a Game

Author

Listed:
  • James W. Bono
  • David H. Wolpert

Abstract

It is known that a player in a noncooperative game can benefit by publicly re- stricting their possible moves before start of play. We show that, more generally, a player may benefit by publicly committing to pay an external party an amount that is contingent on the game's outcome. We explore what happens when external parties (who we call game miners) discover this fact and seek to profit from it by entering an outcome-contingent contract with the players. We analyze various bargaining games between miners and players for determining such an outcome- contingent contract. We establish restrictions on the strategic settings in which a game miner can profit, and bounds on the game miner's profit given various structured bargaining games. These bargaining games include playing the players against one another, as well as allowing the players to pay the miner(s) for exclu- sivity and first-mover advantage. We also establish that when all players can enter contracts with miners, to guarantee the existence of equilibria it is necessary to assume that players can randomize over the contracts they make.

Suggested Citation

  • James W. Bono & David H. Wolpert, 2009. "Game Mining: How to Make Money from those about to Play a Game," Working Papers 2009-10, American University, Department of Economics.
  • Handle: RePEc:amu:wpaper:2009-10
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1e9tAe4H5vPi5iwnCpXtDF4sA85UzCUw9
    File Function: First version, 2009
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hamilton, Jonathan H. & Slutsky, Steven M., 1990. "Endogenous timing in duopoly games: Stackelberg or cournot equilibria," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 2(1), pages 29-46, March.
    2. Romano, Richard & Yildirim, Huseyin, 2005. "On the endogeneity of Cournot-Nash and Stackelberg equilibria: games of accumulation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 120(1), pages 73-107, January.
    3. Matthew O. Jackson & Simon Wilkie, 2005. "Endogenous Games and Mechanisms: Side Payments Among Players," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 72(2), pages 543-566.
    4. van Damme, Eric & Hurkens, Sjaak, 1996. "Commitment Robust Equilibria and Endogenous Timing," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 15(2), pages 290-311, August.
    5. Kalai, Ehud & Smorodinsky, Meir, 1975. "Other Solutions to Nash's Bargaining Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 43(3), pages 513-518, May.
    6. Fershtman, Chaim & Judd, Kenneth L & Kalai, Ehud, 1991. "Observable Contracts: Strategic Delegation and Cooperation," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 32(3), pages 551-559, August.
    7. Nash, John, 1950. "The Bargaining Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 18(2), pages 155-162, April.
    8. Renou, Ludovic, 2009. "Commitment games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 488-505, May.
    9. Adam Tauman Kalai & Ehud Kalai & Dov Samet, 2007. "Voluntary Commitments Lead to Efficiency," Discussion Papers 1444, Northwestern University, Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science.
    10. R. H. Coase, 2013. "The Problem of Social Cost," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 56(4), pages 837-877.
    11. Michael L. Katz, 1991. "Game-Playing Agents: Unobservable Contracts as Precommitments," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 22(3), pages 307-328, Autumn.
    12. Sobel, Joel, 1981. "Distortion of Utilities and the Bargaining Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(3), pages 597-619, May.
    13. Fershtman, Chaim, 1985. "Managerial incentives as a strategic variable in duopolistic environment," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 3(2), pages 245-253, June.
    14. Vickers, John, 1985. "Delegation and the Theory of the Firm," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 95(380a), pages 138-147, Supplemen.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. James W. Bono & David H. Wolpert, 2014. "Game Mining: How to Make Money from those about to Play a Game," Advances in Austrian Economics, in: Entangled Political Economy, volume 18, pages 179-211, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    2. Dutta, Rohan & Ishii, Ryosuke, 2016. "Dynamic commitment games, efficiency and coordination," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 163(C), pages 699-727.
    3. Rohan Dutta & Ryosuke Ishii, 2013. "Coordinating by Not Committing : Efficiency as the Unique Outcome," Cahiers de recherche 10-2013, Centre interuniversitaire de recherche en économie quantitative, CIREQ.
    4. Kamijo, Yoshio & Tomaru, Yoshihiro, 2014. "The endogenous objective function of a partially privatized firm: A Nash bargaining approach," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 39(C), pages 101-109.
    5. Walter A Cont, 2001. "Essays on Contract Design: Delegation and Agency Problems, and Monitoring Under Collusion," Levine's Working Paper Archive 625018000000000122, David K. Levine.
    6. Renou, Ludovic, 2009. "Commitment games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 488-505, May.
    7. Segendorff, Bjorn, 1998. "Delegation and Threat in Bargaining," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 266-283, May.
    8. Koji Ishibashi, 2010. "Effects Of Asymmetric Information Within A Firm On Oligopolistic Market Outcomes," The Japanese Economic Review, Japanese Economic Association, vol. 61(4), pages 488-506, December.
    9. Koji Ishibashi, 2001. "Strategic delegation under quality competition," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 73(1), pages 25-56, February.
    10. Bade, Sophie & Haeringer, Guillaume & Renou, Ludovic, 2009. "Bilateral commitment," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 144(4), pages 1817-1831, July.
    11. Bhaskar, V., 2009. "Games played in a contracting environment," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 67(2), pages 389-398, November.
    12. Michael Kopel & Clemens Löffler, 2008. "Commitment, first-mover-, and second-mover advantage," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 94(2), pages 143-166, July.
    13. Hongbin Cai & Walter Cont, 2004. "Agency Problems and Commitment in Delegated Bargaining," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(4), pages 703-729, December.
    14. Gerratana Emanuele & Koçkesen Levent, 2012. "Strategic Effects of Renegotiation-Proof Contracts," The B.E. Journal of Theoretical Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 12(1), pages 1-49, July.
    15. Emanuele Gerratana & Levent Koçkesen, 2015. "Commitment without reputation: renegotiation-proof contracts under asymmetric information," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 19(3), pages 173-209, September.
    16. Yasuhiko Nakamura & Tomohiro Inoue, 2009. "Endogenous timing in a mixed duopoly: price competition with managerial delegation," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(5), pages 325-333.
    17. Emanuele Gerratana & Levent Kockesen, 2012. "Renegotiation-Proof Third-Party Contracts under Asymmetric Information," Koç University-TUSIAD Economic Research Forum Working Papers 1208, Koc University-TUSIAD Economic Research Forum.
    18. Esther Gal‐Or, 1997. "Multiprincipal Agency Relationships as Implied by Product Market Competition," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 6(1), pages 235-256, June.
    19. Paolo Balduzzi, 2004. "Delegation Games with Full Commitment," Working Papers 70, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics, revised Apr 2004.
    20. Michel Cavagnac, 2005. "Strategic managerial incentives under adverse selection," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(8), pages 499-512.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:amu:wpaper:2009-10. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Thomas Meal (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.american.edu/cas/economics/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.