A researcher is standing on the shoulders of giants and selects a research question. Which one will she pick? How invested is she to find an answer? How does knowledge evolve? Can we improve on that evolution? [pdf], [slides], [video (earlier version)], [twttr], [matlab]
You have a deadline to solve a problem. When should you use whatever you have available, when should you think about new things? How often should you switch between approaches? [WP],[slides], [twttr]
Coordination on standards is hard if firms have private information on the quality of their innovations. A firm can persuade a competitor to join the SSO by credibly threatening to release information about its own quality. Vaporware, Newsleakage, and Beta versions are potential business strategies to exercise the threat. [pdf], [twttr]
Groups in an organization compete about the who and the how. A third party can partially influence the who and and cares about the how. Whom should it support?
An agent decides whether to approve a project based on his information, only a part of which is verifiable in court. Is more precise (un)verifiable information always better? [pdf],[slides],[twttr],[blog]
Suppose some private information is relevant in a law suit only: How should we design ADR to settle outside the court?
[WP], [twttr], [matlab]
If a borrower is in financial distress, he has better information whether this due to a (shorter) dry spell or because his investment is fundamentally rotten. That information is valuable to banks who have to decide whether to roll-over credit or to foreclose. Bankruptcy laws affect banks decisions and thus prices in the credit market.
A single veto can make a proposed mechanism void and enforce the play of a default game instead. When public vetoes are signals, is the threat to retaliate through information release enough to deter the deviator? [pdf]
Arbitration problems boil down to information design problems. The arbitrator always has to solve the information design problem, once she has done that, designing the arbitration problem is mechanical. [pdf]
How would an agent decide on the order of proposing projects to a principal? An accepted proposal forces the agent to work on it, once rejected it is hard to convince the principal to take up the project again. Is it wise to propose the agent-preferred project early on? Should she wait to signal that this truly is a good project?
