In online labor markets (OLMs), it is well known that platforms often enable bidders to list their skills to help employers assess their capability of completing a certain task. Given the wide range of projects in OLMs platforms, should bidders list more skills to match as many projects as...

Most previous studies in price dispersion literature consider only the dispersion of post price. We build a model combining price dispersion with the associated sales, incorporating the dynamic update of online reputation in an Internet market. We identify buyer informativeness, which measures...

This paper proposes a theoretical framework to understand how reviews for professional services, such as those provided by physicians or lawyers, differ from reviews for traditional products. Professional services have certain unique features compared to traditional products such as: (1)...

This article studies the inclusion of sponsored results in recommendations, observed in many information gatekeepers including Internet search engines, travel experts, credit raters, radio deejays, and movie critics, which are an essential entry point for many information search and decision...

Under what circumstances will a seller be better of selling his inventory sequentially, rather than selling them all in a single auction? If buyers come sequentially, there is an obvious reason to sell items sequentially. However, we show that even (1) when all buyers are present at the...

The practice of sponsored search advertising - where advertisers pay a fee to appear alongside particularWeb search results - is now one of the largest and fastest growing source of revenue for Web search engines. We model and compare several mechanisms for allocating sponsored slots, including...

Search engines commonly use “sponsored linksâ€, where certain advertisers’ links are promoted to be placed above others in return for monetary payment. It is natural to assume that all providers value a higher ranked placement more than lower ranked ones. Then how should the...

This paper designs an optimal mechanism for selling a set of commonly ranked objects. Although buyers rank these objects in the same order, the rates at which their valuations change for a less-preferred object might be different. Four stylized cases are identified according to this difference:...

We examine how the system of “federalism, Chinese style” functions in the context of land allocation. China’s land laws give provision of land a central role in local officials’ growth promotion strategies. Requisitions of farmland by local authorities have engendered significant rural...