SICS MarketSpaceAn agent-based market infrastructure

Sverker Janson, Joakim Eriksson, Niclas Finne

Intelligent Systems LaboratorySwedish Institute of Computer Science

sverker, joakime, nfi@sics.se

Agent-based markets

Agents for Internet commerce

• Users, buyers and sellers, describe deals that would interest them

• Agents help find matching interests, negotiate, and close deals

Agents for workflow automation

• Users, individuals and business units, advertise interests in tasks

• Agents help plan, negotiate, and supervise the execution of workflows

Agent-based markets desiderata

• Decentralization– my interests– my software– my computer

• Openness– new participants– new rôles– new concepts– new mechanisms

• Integration– the web

The Electronic Commerce melting pot

marketin

gcomputational economics

informatio

n economics

metadata

web standards

security

payment

negotiation supportevolutionary game theory

matchmaking

auction theory

software agents

distributed object platforms

Scope in terms of commerce model…

Sell something

Identify potential customers

Identify customers’ needs

Inform potential customers

Obtain order

Deliver the thing

Receive payment

Provide customer service

Buy something

Identify potential sellers

Identify own needs

Evaluate alternatives

Place order

Receive the thing

Make payment

Use the thing

THE SICSMARKETSPACEFRAMEWORK

- Information- Interaction

Information - contracts & interests

• The goal of participants in a market is to close deals.

• Basic information unit is the contract, a structured document.

• Interests are sets of possibly interesting contracts.

• Encoded in RDF/XML, KIF, FIPA SL, MIF, …

Contract-3Seller Joakim Eriksson

Buyer Niclas Finne

Goods Refrigerator

Make Electrolux

Price 300 USD

Date Dec 10 1997

WhiteColor

ER3117BModel

signatures

Interests constrain contracts

• Sell something - seller

• Cheaper than 1$ - price range for goods

• Red things - properties of goods

• Pizza within an hour - time range for signing

• These books for sale - alternatives

• CS books for sale - generalization

Interests are symmetrical

John’sinterests

Mary’sinterests

commoninterests

“what” brokeringseller/buyer

“with whom” brokeringseller/buyer

goods/services

buyers/sellers

buyer/seller

broker

Dynamic (indirect) interests

• Trustworthy - ask a BBB

• Environmentally friendly - ask Greenpeace

• What Joe (Jill) likes - ask Joe/Jill

cars Green-peace

cleancars

Contract-3

Seller Joakim Eriksson

Buyer Niclas Finne

Goods Refrigerator

Make Electrolux

Price 200-300 USD

Date Aug 10 1998

WhiteColor

ER3117BModel

Expressiveness of interest language

Contract-3

Seller Joakim Eriksson

Buyer Niclas Finne

Goods

Price 300 USD

Date Aug 10 1998

Refrigerator

Make Electrolux

WhiteColor

ER3117BModel

Refrigerator

Make AEG

WhiteColor

Santo 1702Model

Contract-3

Seller Joakim Eriksson

Buyer Niclas Finne

Goods Kitchenware

Price 300 USD

Date Aug 10 1998

WhiteColor

Trade object

Kitchenware

Refrigerator Dish washer

Ranges AlternativesGeneralization

Market Interest Format (MIF)

def ::=(def name ref

(name type)*)

type ::=integer | float |

atom| string | date| (instance ref)| (interval val val)| (set type)| (list type)| (oneof val*)

expr ::=integer | float || atom | string | date | (set expr*)| (list expr *)| (instance ref

(name expr)*)| (or expr *)| (interval val val)| (subset expr*)

MIF example

(def car ”trade-object”(color (ref ”pantone-color”))...)

(instance ”contract-3”(date (interval 11/12/97 23/12/97))(buyer (instance ”person”

(name ”Sverker Janson”)(agent-address ...)))

(goods (instance ”car”(color (instance ”red”)))))

Operations on interests

• intersection(x, y) z

• empty(x)

• subsumes(x, y)

• types(x) [t1, ..., tn]

• attributes(x) [a1, ..., an]

• attribute(a, x) y

Build YourOwn Car

The ConceptCatalog

candlecandycanecanoecanopy

Services generate interests

Find aNew Home

my job

wife’s job

Global concepts

• http://contracts.com/basic.ont#contract-3

• contract-3 :seller : http://…#personbuyer : http://…#person

price : http://…#amountgoods : http://…#trade-objectdate : date

• Associated information

Concept brokering

Car1

Buyer Conceptbroker

Car1or

Car2

• Car1 and Car2 are independently introduced

How make agents communicate?

Popular approach

• High level speech act based protocols

• Expressive logic based content formats

• Cf. KQML/KIF,FIPA ACL/FIPA SL

TELL p(a)

Market Interaction Language (MIL)

Search & advertise

• ask(A, B, eoi)

• tell(A, B, eoi)

• negotiate(A, B, eoi)

Negotiate & close

• offer(A, B, eoi)

• accept(A, B)

• decline(A, B)

(offer

:from A

:to B

:in-reply-to i

:reply-with j

:language ”MIF 1.0”

:content ”…”

)

Example interaction

• ask(A, D, ”sell me a refrigerator”)

• tell(D, A, ”B and C”)

• negotiate(A, B, ”sell me a refrigerator”)

• negotiate(A, C, ”sell me a refrigerator”)

• offer(B, A, ”Electrolux 3117B for $350”)

• offer(C, A, ”Electrolux 3117B for $300”)

• offer(A, B, ”C sells for $300”)

• offer(B, A, ”Electrolux 3117B for $300”)

• accept(A, B)

• decline(A, C)

The MarketSpace prototype

• Demo: agent-assisted Internet commerce

• SICS JavaBase toolkit :misc formats and protocols (MIL, MIF, KQML, KIF), agent facilities

• Other examples: directories, brokers, auctioneers, interfaces to other services

Integration with the web

service agentuser agent

web browser(2 windows)

http

map

Summary and future work

• Information– Interests = goals of

market participants– Structured documents

& simple description logic

– MIF

• Interaction– Exchange information– Make commitments– MIL

• Integration– Complements &

augments Internet commerce

• Future work– Generalize goals from

deals to deals + protocols

– Plugin protocols