Related papers: Sampling and Representation Complexity of Revenue …
Rejection Sampling is a fundamental Monte-Carlo method. It is used to sample from distributions admitting a probability density function which can be evaluated exactly at any given point, albeit at a high computational cost. However,…
We provide a computationally efficient black-box reduction from mechanism design to algorithm design in very general settings. Specifically, we give an approximation-preserving reduction from truthfully maximizing \emph{any} objective under…
Motivated by stochastic optimization, we introduce the problem of learning from samples of contextual value distributions. A contextual value distribution can be understood as a family of real-valued distributions, where each sample…
The intuition that profit is optimized by maximizing marginal revenue is a guiding principle in microeconomics. In the classical auction theory for agents with linear utility and single-dimensional preferences, Bulow and Roberts (1989) show…
We introduce a new sample complexity measure, which we refer to as split-sample growth rate. For any hypothesis $H$ and for any sample $S$ of size $m$, the split-sample growth rate $\hat{\tau}_H(m)$ counts how many different hypotheses can…
We consider the problem of hypothesis testing for discrete distributions. In the standard model, where we have sample access to an underlying distribution $p$, extensive research has established optimal bounds for uniformity testing,…
We consider a monopoly seller who optimally auctions a single object to a single potential buyer, with a known distribution of valuations. We show that a tight lower bound on the seller's expected revenue is $1/e$ times the geometric…
In a sequential auction with multiple bidding agents, it is highly challenging to determine the ordering of the items to sell in order to maximize the revenue due to the fact that the autonomy and private information of the agents heavily…
We initiate a systematic investigation of distribution testing in the framework of algorithmic replicability. Specifically, given independent samples from a collection of probability distributions, the goal is to characterize the sample…
The assortment problem in revenue management is the problem of deciding which subset of products to offer to consumers in order to maximise revenue. A simple and natural strategy is to select the best assortment out of all those that are…
We define the Streaming Communication model that combines the main aspects of communication complexity and streaming. We consider two agents that want to compute some function that depends on inputs that are distributed to each agent. The…
We study the design and approximation of optimal crowdsourcing contests. Crowdsourcing contests can be modeled as all-pay auctions because entrants must exert effort up-front to enter. Unlike all-pay auctions where a usual design objective…
We study mechanisms for selling a single item when buyers have private costs for participating in the mechanism. An agent's participation cost can also be interpreted as an outside option value that she must forego to participate. This…
Many circumstances of practical importance have performance or success metrics which exist implicitly---in the eye of the beholder, so to speak. Tuning aspects of such problems requires working without defined metrics and only considering…
Optimization problems are ubiquitous in our societies and are present in almost every segment of the economy. Most of these optimization problems are NP-hard and computationally demanding, often requiring approximate solutions for…
We introduce several new estimation methods that leverage shape constraints in auction models to estimate various objects of interest, including the distribution of a bidder's valuations, the bidder's ex ante expected surplus, and the…
We provide a reduction from revenue maximization to welfare maximization in multi-dimensional Bayesian auctions with arbitrary (possibly combinatorial) feasibility constraints and independent bidders with arbitrary (possibly combinatorial)…
Recently the influence maximization problem has received much attention for its applications on viral marketing and product promotions. However, such influence maximization problems have not taken into account the monetary effect on the…
Scalable real-time assortment optimization has become essential in e-commerce operations due to the need for personalization and the availability of a large variety of items. While this can be done when there are simplistic assortment…
We develop extensions to auction theory results that are useful in real life scenarios. 1. Since valuations are generally positive we first develop approximations using the log-normal distribution. This would be useful for many finance…