Networks, Crowds, and Markets

Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago and winner of the 2007 Nobel Prize in Economics 'In my three decades plus of teaching, I cannot recall an urge to teach a new undergraduate course like the one I felt upon leafing through this wonderful introduction to everything that is new and important and intellectually challenging in our world.' Christos Papadimitriou, C. Lester Hogan Professor of EECS, University of California, Berkeley 'The elegant explanations in this book allow readers to rapidly gain a deep understanding of how networks work. Without resorting to either advanced math or even a bit of hand-waving, Easley and Kleinberg take us through the essential concepts and intriguing real-world applications.' Lada Adamic, University of Michigan 'This important and inspiring book must not be missing from the computer scientist's bookshelf in the 21st century ...' Dr Jochen L. Leidner 'Far from being a terse, technical analysis, this is an elegant and engaging examination of the subject.' Times Higher Education 'Networks, Crowds, and Markets offers students an excellent opportunity to relate enduring conceptual material, taught in numerous traditional courses, to their fast-paced and ever changing world. Typically, textbooks have not often done so. This work serves, therefore, not only as motivation for students to appreciate the beauty of the abstract, but also as a model for what textbooks might become in the near future. ... Individual instructors will bring their own interests to this lively, well-written text with interesting graphic support and then tailor it to make a course that they are comfortable teaching and one that really comes alive for students.' Mathematical Reviews 'This text offers an integrated, but not superficial, introduction to ... new mathematical concepts and their application across a range of social problems ... an ideal text for introductory classes. It also holds great promise for people with a strong background in another field who wish to understand some of the key questions addressed by the social sciences.' H. Van Dyke Parunak, reviews.com 'This very interesting and detailed book manages to expose the wide-ranging applications of graph and network theory in a variety of areas such as game theory, auctions, web searches, horse-betting, voting, crowd behavior, trade markets and the spread of diseases. Throughout the book all necessary mathematical background is outlined in an easy to understand way, including the most interesting and curious aspects of the theory such as the Braess paradox, prisoner's dilemma and Arrow's impossibility theorem. The book concludes with a useful index and a detailed bibliography.' Zentralblatt MATH 'Easley, an economist, and Kleinberg, a computer scientist, accomplish the difficult task of making the subject available to students from basically any field without being superficial. Their text was designed as transdisciplinary from the start and will be specifically interesting to physics students who pursue an interdisciplinary career geared toward the social science and econophysics.' Physics Today