22 - Repeated games: cheating, punishment, and outsourcing
In business or personal relationships, promises and threats of good and bad behavior tomorrow may provide good incentives for good behavior today, but, to work, these promises and threats must be credible. In particular, they must come from equilibrium behavior tomorrow, and hence form part of a subgame perfect equilibrium today. We find that the grim strategy forms such an equilibrium provided that we are patient and the game has a high probability of continuing. We discuss what this means for
21 - Repeated games: cooperation vs. the end game
We discuss repeated games, aiming to unpack the intuition that the promise of rewards and the threat of punishment in the future of a relationship can provide incentives for good behavior today. In class, we play prisoners' dilemma twice and three times, but this fails to sustain cooperation. The problem is that, in the last stage, since there is then is future, there is no incentive to cooperate, and hence the incentives unravel from the back. We related this to the real-world problems of a lam
21 - Forwards and Futures
Futures markets were started in Osaka, Japan in the 1600s to create an authoritative and meaningful market price for agricultural products, using standardized contracts. Since then, futures markets have been copied around the world to allow the hedging various future risks, financial and other. In the United States, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and the Chicago Board of Trade have been the most popular futures trading markets. Although futures markets are changing and becoming more electronic,
21W.780 Communicating in Technical Organizations (MIT)
This class offers students an opportunity to experiment with various forms and practices of cellphone communication and, most importantly, to propose and develop a semester-long project using advanced A780 cellphones donated by Motorola along with access to J2ME™ source code for programming cellphone applications. Class size is limited. Students in small collaborative groups will propose, implement and report on a semester-long project.
The Joy of Economics: Making Sense out of Life
My goal is to provide an accessible book that reflects this theme of choice and conveys a sense of the breadth and power of basic economic analysis. It assumes no prior knowledge of economics and can be read and appreciated by anyone. While some parts of the book cover conventional material, others do not. I've ignored many traditional topics and substituted ones that apply economics in unusual and often provocative ways. The chapters are not meant to be definitive, they are meant to raise q
US Patent and Trademark Kids Pages
This site invites kids to learn about inventors and intellectual property -- patents, trademarks, copyrights and trade secrets. Kids can take a patent trivia quiz, read fun facts, and learn how to apply for a patent for their own inventions.
15.628 Patents, Copyrights, and the Law of Intellectual Property (MIT)
This weekly seminar examines key concepts of U.S. intellectual property law, with emphasis on patents and copyrights and a briefer look at trade secrets and trademarks. Current issues relating to information technologies and business methods will be highlighted. The seminar has no prerequisites, and is designed for both graduate students and undergraduates. Half of the seats in the seminar are reserved for students from MIT departments other than Sloan.
6.301 Solid-State Circuits (MIT)
This course covers analog circuit analysis and design, focusing on the tools and methods necessary for the creative design of useful circuits using active devices. The class stresses insight and intuition, applied to the design of transistor circuits and the estimation of their performance. The course concentrates on circuits using the bipolar junction transistor, but the techniques that are studied can be equally applied to circuits using JFETs, MOSFETs, MESFETs, future exotic devices, or even
15.511 Financial Accounting (MIT)
This six-week summer course teaches basic concepts of corporate financial accounting and reporting. This information is widely used in making investment decisions, corporate and managerial performance assessment, and valuation of firms. Students perform economics-based analysis of accounting information from the viewpoint of the users of accounting information (especially senior managers) rather than the preparer (the accountant). This course is restricted to MIT Sloan Fellows in Innovation
6.245 Multivariable Control Systems (MIT)
This course uses computer-aided design methodologies for synthesis of multivariable feedback control systems. Topics covered include: performance and robustness trade-offs; model-based compensators; Q-parameterization; ill-posed optimization problems; dynamic augmentation; linear-quadratic optimization of controllers; H-infinity controller design; Mu-synthesis; model and compensator simplification; and nonlinear effects. The assignments for the course comprise of computer-aided (MATLAB®) des
11.945 Springfield Studio (MIT)
The Springfield Studio is a practicum design course that focuses on the physical, programmatic, and social renewal of an urban community in Springfield, Massachusetts by combining classroom work with an applied class project. The course content covers the areas of physical design/urban design and the related analysis and planning tools used to understand and assess urban conditions from a design and development perspective. Urban design issues are investigated in the context of social
6.895 Theory of Parallel Systems (SMA 5509) (MIT)
6.895 covers theoretical foundations of general-purpose parallel computing systems, from languages to architecture. The focus is on the algorithmic underpinnings of parallel systems. The topics for the class will vary depending on student interest, but will likely include multithreading, synchronization, race detection, load balancing, memory consistency, routing networks, message-routing algorithms, and VLSI layout theory. The class will emphasize randomized algorithms and probabilistic an
21L.451 Introduction to Literary Theory (MIT)
This subject focuses on the ways in which we read, providing an overview of some of the different strategies of reading, comprehending and engaging with literary texts developed in the twentieth century. The course is organized around specific theoretical paradigms. In each case our task will be, first, to work through the selected reading in order to see how it determines or defines the task of literary interpretation; second, to locate the limits of each particular approach; and finally, to tr
21L.703 English Renaissance Drama: Theatre and Society in the Age of Shakespeare (MIT)
Shakespeare "doth bestride the narrow world" of the English Renaissance "like a colossus," leaving his contemporaries "walk under his large legs and peep about" to find themselves in "dishonourable graves." This course aims in part to correct this grave injustice by surveying the extraordinary output of playwrights whose names have largely been eclipsed by their more luminous compatriot: Marlowe, Jonson, Webster, and Ford, among others. Reading Shakespeare as just one of a group of practitioners
Robert Reich: Politics and Principles
Robert Reich has served in three national administrations, most recently as Secretary of Labor under President Bill Clinton. He has authored ten books, including The Work of Nations (which has been translated into 21 languages); Locked in the Cabinet; and The Future of Success. His writings have appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, and The New York Times, as well as scholarly journals. Mr. Reich is cofounder and national editor of The American Prospect. He was most recently defeated
18.901 Introduction to Topology (MIT)
This course introduces topology, covering topics fundamental to modern analysis and geometry. It also deals with subjects like topological spaces and continuous functions, connectedness, compactness, separation axioms, and selected further topics such as function spaces, metrization theorems, embedding theorems and the fundamental group.
24.213 Philosophy of Film (MIT)
This course is a seminar on the philosophical analysis of film art, with an emphasis on the ways in which it creates meaning through techniques that define a formal structure. There is a particular focus on aesthetic problems about appearance and reality, literary and visual effects, communication and alienation through film technology.
15.010 Economic Analysis for Business Decisions (MIT)
15.010 is the Sloan School's core subject in microeconomics, with sections for non-Sloan students labeled 15.011. Our objective is to give you a working knowledge of the analytical tools that bear most directly on the economic decisions firms must regularly make. We will emphasize market structure and industrial performance, including the strategic interaction of firms. We will examine the behavior of individual markets -- and the producers and consumers that sell and buy in those markets -- in
12.091 Trace Element Analysis of Geological, Biological & Environmental Materials by Neutron Activat
This course introduces students to the technique of instrumental neutron activation analysis. This is a non-destructive analytical technique for the determination of elemental abundances at trace levels in a wide variety of geological, biological, environmental and industrial samples.
11.166 Law, Social Movements, and Public Policy: Comparative and International Experience (MIT)
The course introduces theoretical frameworks from legal and social movement theories as applied to court opinions, legislation, treaties, law-related articles, and policy-oriented materials and focuses on the impact of the relationship between courts and grassroots activism on current issues like trade, environmental regulation, and human rights enforcement. Students examine case studies of institutional processes including the World Trade Organization and the World Bank from key countries like
