Abstract
It is quite natural for electronic institutions to follow the structure of their physical counterparts. However, this is not always appropriate or desirable in a virtual setting. We report on the prototyping of an alternative architecture for electronic auctions based around the concept of an interagent and building on the considerable body of work in the distributed algorithms literature to plot a path toward resilient trading frameworks. In particular, we have adapted the classical Leader Election algorithm for resolving bids in a generic auction scheme as well as identifying the factors which differentiate the physical auction protocols in such a way that new auction protocols can be plugged into the scheme by the specification of the relevant (sub-)processes. We have used the process algebra called the π-calculus to specify both the generic scheme and the specific protocols of first-price, second-price, Dutch and English. The bid resolution process has been prototyped in Pict and is now going to be integrated into the FishMarket electronic auction house.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Bushnell, J., Oren, S.: Two dimensional auctions for efficient franchising of public monopolies. Technical Report ERL-93-41, University of California, Berkeley (1993)
Clearwater, S. (ed.): Market-Based Control: A Paradigm for Distributed Resource Allocation. World Scientific Press, Singapore (1995)
Franklin, M., Reiter, M.: The Design and Implementation of a Secure Auction Service. IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering 22(5), 302–312 (1996)
Gagliano, R.A., Fraser, M.D., Schaefer, M.E.: Auction allocation of computing resources. Communications of the ACM 38(6), 88–102 (1995)
Garcia, P., Gimenéz, E., Godo, L., Rodríguez-Aguilar, J.A.: Possibilistic-based design of bidding strategies in electronic auctions. In: The 13th biennial European Conference on Artificial Intelligence, ECAI 1998 (1998)
Huberman, B.A., Clearwater, S.: A multi-agent system for controlling builging environments. In: Proceedings of the First International Conference on Multi-Agent Systems (ICMAS 1995), pp. 171–176. AAAI Press, Menlo Park (1995)
Lamport, L., Shostak, R., Pease, M.: The Byzantine generals problem. ACM Transactions on Programming Languages and Systems 4(3), 382–401 (1982)
Lynch, N.: Distributed Algorithms. Morgan Kaufmann, San Francisco (1996) ISBN 1-55860-348-4
Martín, F.J., Plaza, E., Rodríguez-Aguilar, J.A.: An infrastructure for agent-based systems: An interagent approach. International Journal of Intelligent Systems (1998)
Milner, R.: The Polyadic π-Calculus: a Tutorial. Preprint of Proceedings International Summer School on Logic and Algebra of Specification (1991)
Nestmann, U.: Calculi for mobile processes, available through http://www.cs.auc.dk/mobility/
North, D.: Institutions, Institutional Change and Economics Performance. Cambridge U. P., New York (1990)
Padget, J.A., Bradford, R.J.: A π -calculus model of the spanish fishmarket. In: Noriega, P., Sierra, C. (eds.) AMET 1998 and AMEC 1998. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 1571, pp. 166–188. Springer, Heidelberg (1999)
Pierce, B.C.: Foundational calculi for programming languages. In: Tucker, A.B. (ed.) Handbook of Computer Science and Engineering, ch. 139. CRC Press, Boca Raton (1996)
Pierce, B.C., Turner, D.N.: Pict: A Programming Language Based on the Pi-Calculus. Technical Report 476, Indiana University (March 1997)
Rodríguez, J.A., Martin, F.J., Garcia, P., Noriega, P., Sierra, C.: Towards a formal specification of complex social structures in multi-agent systems. In: Collaboration between Human and Artificial Societies 1997. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 1624, pp. 289–305. Springer, Heidelberg (1999)
Rodríguez, J.A., Noriega, P., Sierra, C., Padget, J.A.: FM96.5 A Java-based Electronic Auction House. In: Second International Conference on The Practical Application of Intelligent Agents and Multi-Agent Technology: PAAM 1997(1997)
Varian, H.R.: Economic mechanism design for computerized agents. In: First USENIX Workshop on Electronic Commerce, USENIX, New York, pp. 13–21 (July 1995)
Ygge, F., Akkermans, H.: Power load management as a computational market. In: Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Multi-Agent Systems, ICMAS 1996 (1996)
Ygge, F., Akkermans, H.: Making a case for multi-agent systems. In: Boman, M., Van de Velde, W. (eds.) MAAMAW 1997. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 1237, pp. 156–176. Springer, Heidelberg (1997)
The FishMarket Project, http://www.iiia.csic.es/Projects/fishmarket
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2000 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Esteva, M., Padget, J. (2000). Auctions without Auctioneers: Distributed Auction Protocols. In: Moukas, A., Ygge, F., Sierra, C. (eds) Agent Mediated Electronic Commerce II. AMEC 1999. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 1788. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/10720026_12
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/10720026_12
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-67773-4
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-44982-9
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive