Introduction to Algorithmic Economics
SS/CS 149
Fall 2013

Outline:

• September 30
  course overview & mechanics
  slides
• October 2
  intro to game theory
• October 7
  introduction to congestion games and best response dynamics
• October 9
  assignment to teaching dates
  best response dynamics converge to approximate Nash equilibria; potential games
• October 14
  HW1 out!
  nonatomic congestion games: equilibrium existence, uniqueness, price of anarchy
• October 16
  guest lecture: Umang Bhaskar
• October 21
  regret minimization, WMA, hedge
• October 23
  student teaching
  computing exact equilibria in symmetric network games; reductions; PLS; computing pure Nash in congestion games is PLS complete
  resources:
  Voecking course notes
  Mansour course notes
  Hoefer lecture notes
  the original paper
• October 25
  HW1 due!
• October 28
  student teaching:
  correlated equilibria, smoothness
  resources:
  smoothness lecture notes
  smoothness paper
  Fiat slides
• October 30
  student teaching:
  zero-sum games, min-max theorem, discuss learning connections, graphical zero-sum games
  resources:
  Mansour notes
  Chekuri notes
  Blum course notes; useful for connections to regret minimization
  Daskalakis-Papadimitriou paper on graphical zero-sum games
  Cai-Daskalakis paper on graphical zero-sum games
  Daskalakis notes: 1, 2, 3, and 4.
• November 4
  wrap up on dynamics and games
• November 6
  introduction to auctions and mechanism design
• November 8
  proposals for reaction papers due
• November 11
  single parameter truthful mechanisms
• November 13
  HW2 out!
  revelation principle, approximation for knapsack auctions
• November 18
  student teaching:
  digital goods auctions, competitive ratio, RSOP
  resources:
  Chapter 13 of AGT book
  Chekuri notes 1 and 2
  Hartline notes
• November 20
  randomized mechanisms, Bayesian setting, revenue-maximizing auctions
• November 24
  HW2 due!
• November 25
  guest lecture: Siddharth Barman
• November 27
  no class; optional workshop for reaction papers
• December 2
  special topics, wrap up
• December 4
  student presentations - no extensions!
• December 6
  reaction papers due