We analyze the role of consumer expectations in a Hotelling model of price competition when products exhibit network effects. Expectations can be strong (stubborn), weak (price-sensitive) or partially stubborn (a mix of weak and strong). As a rule, the price-sensitivity of demand declines when...

This paper examines four alternative product strategies available to an innovating firm in markets with network effects: single-product monopoly, technology licensing, product-line extension, and a combination of licensing and product-line extension. We address three questions. First, what...

In recent years, the issue of copyright protection for intellectual properties such as computer software, music CDs, and videos has become increasingly important. It is often claimed that illegal copying of intellectual property costs companies billions of dollars in lost revenues and reduces...

Professional football clubs earn most of their revenues from four sources: sale of broadcasting rights, matchday revenues, merchandising, and sponsorship. The relative importance of these sources differs among clubs and leagues. Economists often argue that the ability of professional football...

This paper uses a typology of industries to summarize and contrast the challenges involved with industry formation and to examine why specific industries were formed in some countries before other ones. The formation of most new industries depends on the introduction of products that provide a...

The paper investigates whether positive network effects may have existed between large-scale commercial farmers and small-scale communal farmers prior to the recent land redistribution in Zimbabwe. A difference-in-difference approach is used where measurement is carried out using several data...

This paper investigates the determinants of bilateral immigrant ows to 19 OECD countries between 1998 and 2007 from both advanced and developing origin countries. We pay particular attention to dynamics by including both the lagged migrant ow and the migrant stock to capture partial adjustment...

Areeda and Turner (1975) were the first to argue that a price below marginal costs should be considered a sign of predation. Recognizing that marginal cost data were typically unavailable, the authors concluded that a price below average variable cost should be presumed unlawful. This socalled...

Overcoming a technological lock-in by means of governmental intervention may be welfare enhancing, even if the implemented technology will be replaced by a better one at a certain time in the future. This holds, if the environmental externality of the implemented technology is small relative to...

The Google Books Search initiative, and the possible anticompetitive effects implied by the approval of the Settlement Agreement (SA) are worldwide debated issues. The scarce and embryonic literature on the topic, as well as the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice, adopted a...