I found a very interesting paper by Fredrik Liljeros, et all titled “Sexual networks: implications for the transmission of sexually transmitted infections” It explains how many epidemiological models which use ordinary differential equation (ODE) to model the spread of sexually transmitted diseases ignore many important details to be able to analytically derive results from these […]

http://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/09/how-the-low-fat-low-fact-cascade-just-keeps-rolling-along/
http://www.mnp.nl/images/EEM%20paper%20WJ_revised_tcm61-31259.pdf
In class we listed various examples of information cascades and also debated whether the herd mentality was a mainly irrational blind-leading-the-blind consequence or whether it was based more on the unavoidable ‘binary mathematics’ behind informational cascades.
As irresistible it is to ascribe much significance to the mathematics behind informational cascades, one must also consider the difference […]

A study published earlier this year in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by Antonio Rangel of the California Institute of Technology indicates that humans have evolved subconscious mechanisms relating to information cascades.  Dr. Rangel conducted a study in which a group of volunteers was asked to drink and rate the taste of […]

Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PageRank
 
I find the page rank system that we discussed in class to be overly simple. Yes it works for the application of simple networks that we are looking for, but I really didn’t understand how that could be used on such a large scale. The Wikipedia page that I found on this algorithm really […]

In class last week we focused on keyword-search based advertisement auctions used by search engines such as Google, Yahoo!, and Microsoft. While the majority of the revenue of these companies is received through this type of advertisement, all of the big players in the industry are looking for ways to monetize e-mail and social […]

After reading about information cascades in the text, I searched recent articles written about this herd mentality, and came across several that attribute the recent housing bubble to this phenomenon. In an article appearing in the New York Times, Robert Shiller, an economist at Yale University, attributes the unawareness of the looming bubble to herd […]

In class we touched on the topic of how web pages get indexed and how search-engines keep track of the new pages. There were various sections on Crawling, Searching the Web and Ranking the Web-Pages. However, it was not quite covered how the most popular search-engine nowadays does it. Hence, I thought it would be […]

The equilibrium-based analysis of traffic routing that we studied earlier in the semester (in connection with Braess’ Paradox) assumes that the traffic delay functions are known in advance by all drivers. Drivers are assumed to be taking the same trip day after day, to experiment with alternative routes, and to develop an instinct about […]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/09/science/09tier.html?_r=2&em&ex=1192248000&en=9f36687fe8aef756&ei=5087%0A&oref=slogin&oref=slogin
In yesterday’s lecture, we began discussing information cascades. The above referenced New York Times article highlights a very interesting cascade whose effect can still be seen prevalent today. In his article, John Tierney discusses the book “Good Calories, Bad Calories” by Gary Taubes. In the book, Taubes describes an inaccurate cascade about heart disease […]

http://www.utalkmarketing.com/pages/Article.aspx?ArticleID=4789&Title=Recession_fears_impact_on_online_ad_spend
“Recession fears impact on online ad spend”
Despite the fact that U.S. economy is gradually falling into recession, market research specialists still estimate that advertisers will spend an increase of 23% over 2007’s spending online, which is equivalent to $25.8 billion. And there are several key factors behind this phenomenon, including better understanding of the audience, […]