Asynchronous Best-Reply Dynamics

  • Noam Nisan ,
  • Michael Schapira ,
  • Aviv Zohar

WINE '08: Proceedings of the 4th International Workshop on Internet and Network Economics |

Published by Springer-Verlag

Publication

In many real-world settings (e.g., interdomain routing in the Internet) strategic agents are instructed to follow best-reply dynamics in asynchronous environments. In such settings players learn of each other’s actions via update messages that can be delayed or even lost. In particular, several players might update their actions simultaneously, or make choices based on outdated information. In this paper we analyze the convergence of best- (and better-) reply dynamics in asynchronous environments. We provide sufficient conditions, and necessary conditions for convergence in such settings, and also study the convergence-rate of these natural dynamics.