Abstract

. Our overall goal is to characterize and understand the dynamic behavior of information economies: very large open economies of automated information agents that are likely to come into existence on the Internet. Here we model a simple information-filtering economy in which broker agents sell selected articles to a subscribed set of consumers. Analysis and simulation of this model reveal the existence of both desirable and undesirable phenomena, and give some insight into their nature and the conditions under which they occur. In particular, efficient selforganization of the broker population into specialized niches can occur when communication and processing costs are neither too high nor too low, but endless price wars can undermine this desirable state of affairs. 1 Introduction Today, we are witnessing the first steps in the evolution of the Internet towards an open, free-market information economy of automated agents buying and selling a rich variety of information goods and ser...

Citations