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By Elliot Anshelevich, Anirban Dasgupta, Éva Tardos, Tom Wexler.

Theory of Computing 4 (2008), 77–109; published 4 August 2008; DOI 10.4086/toc.2008.v004a004. Abstract: strategic connection game and approximate equilibria. Primary author biographies and identified portraits: toc.cs.uchicago.edu/articles/v004a004/about.html .

By Elliot Anshelevich, Anirban Dasgupta, Jon Kleinberg, Éva Tardos, Tom Wexler, Tim Roughgarden.

Author-hosted manuscript dated 17 June 2004. Introduction defines the cost ratio for the best Nash equilibrium and explains the stable-recommendation interpretation.

Tom Wexler works on approximation algorithms, game theory and networks. The author information accompanying Near-Optimal Network Design with Selfish Agents by Elliot Anshelevich and others identifies these research interests and his association with Denison University. It also verifies that this is the coauthor of the strategic network-design work.^[ref]

A simple shared-cost example illustrates the kind of incentive question involved. Suppose each of two users can buy a private link costing four or use a common link costing six, split equally if both use it. Both choosing the common link is stable and costs six overall. Both choosing private links is also stable: switching alone to the common link would cost six rather than four. The latter arrangement costs eight despite having no profitable unilateral move.

The contrast motivates separate analysis of the best and worst Nash equilibria. Network-design work asks how cost-allocation rules and algorithms can find efficient stable outcomes, rather than assuming every stable outcome is socially cheapest.^[ref]