Computing Reviews is pleased to announce the release of its new Hot Topic, "Game Theory and the Design of Electronic Markets." Hot Topics are a series of essays on emergent areas of computer science, and can only be read in the online version of Computing Reviews. Read the Hot Topic.

Written by Amy Greenwald of Brown University, this Hot Topic essay looks at e-commerce through the lens of game theory. Electronic markets, such as auctions, are dependent on multiple agents to achieve an outcome, and game theory studies how multiple agents make decisions. By applying game-theoretic principles to online financial transactions, the Hot Topic highlights both the shortcomings and possibilities of current electronic auctions, focusing specifically on eBay's and Amazon's consumer auctions, and Yahoo!'s and Google's sponsored search auctions.

"Considering the popularity of online auctions and the revenue they generate, finding better ways of matching buyers with sellers will be vital to customers and auction sites," says Mary-Lynn Bragg, Computing Reviews' Community Ambassador. In the Hot Topic essay, Greenwald points to the Trading Agent Competition as a way to evaluate the strategies and designs of future electronic markets.

Hot Topics include links to related web pages, articles, and books, and are updated on a regular basis. Computing Reviews is a collaboration between Reviews.com and the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), and can be read daily at www.reviews.com. For more information, please contact Annette Cords at annette@reviews.com or 212-691-8844 x15.