article

Comparing economic incentives in peer-to-peer networks

Authors:

Panayotis Antoniadis,

Costas Courcoubetis,

Robin MasonAuthors Info & Claims

Computer Networks: The International Journal of Computer and Telecommunications Networking, Volume 46, Issue 1

Pages 133 - 146

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.comnet.2004.03.021

Published: 16 September 2004 Publication History

Abstract

Users who join a peer-to-peer network have, in general, suboptimal incentives to contribute to the network, because of the externalities that exist between them. The result is an inefficient network where the overall levels of contribution are less than would be the case if each peer acted in the interests of the entire network of peers. Incentives provided in the form of prices or contribution rules that require no money transfers can play an important role in reducing these inefficiency effects. The problem in designing such incentive schemes is information: Designing an optimal incentive scheme requires complete knowledge of the types and preferences of the individual peers and their identities. In this paper we discuss the above issues in terms of a simple but representative example by introducing the basic economic concepts and models. We then investigate the practical issue of designing several simpler incentive schemes requiring less information and compare their efficiency loss to the optimal. We show using numerical analysis that these schemes converge to a fixed proportion of the full information optimal as the number of peers in the network becomes large. This result means that it is not necessary to collect large amounts of information, or to undertake complicated calculations, in order to implement the correct incentives in a large peer-to-peer network.

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Digital Library

Cited By

Gao SCourcoubetis CDuan LMelodia TEkici EAbouzeid AChen M(2020)Distributed double auctions for large-scale device-to-device resource tradingProceedings of the Twenty-First International Symposium on Theory, Algorithmic Foundations, and Protocol Design for Mobile Networks and Mobile Computing10.1145/3397166.3409145(281-290)Online publication date: 11-Oct-2020
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3397166.3409145
Li YCourcoubetis CDuan LWeber R(2018)Optimal pricing for a peer-to-peer sharing platform under network externalitiesProceedings of the 13th Workshop on Economics of Networks, Systems and Computation10.1145/3230654.3230660(1-6)Online publication date: 18-Jun-2018
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3230654.3230660
Li SSun W(2016)A mechanism for resource pricing and fairness in peer-to-peer networksElectronic Commerce Research10.1007/s10660-016-9211-116:4(425-451)Online publication date: 1-Dec-2016
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/s10660-016-9211-1
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Index Terms

Comparing economic incentives in peer-to-peer networks
1. Networks
  1. Network services
    1. Network management
2. Software and its engineering
  1. Software organization and properties
    1. Software system structures
      1. Distributed systems organizing principles
        Organizing principles for web applications

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Published In

cover image Computer Networks: The International Journal of Computer and Telecommunications Networking

Computer Networks: The International Journal of Computer and Telecommunications Networking Volume 46, Issue 1

Special issue: Internet economics: Pricing and policies

16 September 2004

142 pages

ISSN:1389-1286

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Publisher

Elsevier North-Holland, Inc.

United States

Publication History

Published: 16 September 2004

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Cited By

Gao SCourcoubetis CDuan LMelodia TEkici EAbouzeid AChen M(2020)Distributed double auctions for large-scale device-to-device resource tradingProceedings of the Twenty-First International Symposium on Theory, Algorithmic Foundations, and Protocol Design for Mobile Networks and Mobile Computing10.1145/3397166.3409145(281-290)Online publication date: 11-Oct-2020
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3397166.3409145
Li YCourcoubetis CDuan LWeber R(2018)Optimal pricing for a peer-to-peer sharing platform under network externalitiesProceedings of the 13th Workshop on Economics of Networks, Systems and Computation10.1145/3230654.3230660(1-6)Online publication date: 18-Jun-2018
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3230654.3230660
Li SSun W(2016)A mechanism for resource pricing and fairness in peer-to-peer networksElectronic Commerce Research10.1007/s10660-016-9211-116:4(425-451)Online publication date: 1-Dec-2016
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/s10660-016-9211-1
Vakili GKhorsandi S(2012)Coordination of cooperation policies in a peer-to-peer system using swarm-based RLJournal of Network and Computer Applications10.1016/j.jnca.2011.11.00435:2(713-722)Online publication date: 1-Mar-2012
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1016/j.jnca.2011.11.004
Jaho EKoukoutsidis IStavrakakis IJaho I(2012)Cooperative content replication in networks with autonomous nodesComputer Communications10.1016/j.comcom.2011.12.00635:5(637-647)Online publication date: 1-Mar-2012
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1016/j.comcom.2011.12.006
Toka LMichiardi P(2011)Analysis of user-driven peer selection in peer-to-peer backup and storage systemsTelecommunications Systems10.1007/s11235-010-9301-747:1-2(49-63)Online publication date: 1-Jun-2011
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/s11235-010-9301-7
Hu CChang YChen DChen Y(2010)Simple peer selection strategies for fast and fair peer-to-peer file sharingProceedings of the 12th international conference on Advanced communication technology10.5555/1831508.1831554(208-213)Online publication date: 7-Feb-2010
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.5555/1831508.1831554
Vakili GPapaioannou TKhorsandi SDahlin MVojnovic M(2010)A decision-analytic approach for P2P cooperation policy settingProceedings of the 2010 Workshop on Economics of Networks, Systems, and Computation10.1145/1879082.1879089(1-4)Online publication date: 3-Oct-2010
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/1879082.1879089
Park Jvan der Schaar MDahlin MVojnovic M(2010)Content pricing in peer-to-peer networksProceedings of the 2010 Workshop on Economics of Networks, Systems, and Computation10.1145/1879082.1879086(1-6)Online publication date: 3-Oct-2010
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/1879082.1879086
Toka LMichiardi P(2009)Uncoordinated peer selection in P2P backup and storage applicationsProceedings of the 28th IEEE international conference on Computer Communications Workshops10.5555/1719850.1719862(67-72)Online publication date: 19-Apr-2009
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.5555/1719850.1719862
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