AMET'98

Workshop on Agent Mediated Electronic Trading
Minneapolis/St Paul, USA, May 10, 1998

http://www.iiia.csic.es/amet98

FIRST CALL FOR PAPERS

SCOPE

The Internet is spawning many new markets and Electronic Commerce is changing many market conventions. Not only are old commercial practices being adapted to the new conditions of immediacy brought forth by the global networks, but new products and services, as well as new practices, are beginning to appear. There is already ample evidence that agent-based technologies will be crucial for these developments. However many theoretical, technological, sociological and legal aspects will need to be addressed before such opportunities become a significant reality.

This workshop intends to set the scene for the assessment of the challenges that agent-based electronic commerce faces as well as the opportunities it creates. By focussing on agent mediated interactions we expect to bring together specialists from different disciplines who will contribute theoretical, methodological and application perspectives in the narrowly focused topic that nevertheless involves wide ranging concerns such as: agent architectures, institutionalization, economic-theoretic modelling, legal frameworks, policy guidelines.

Thus, the workshop invites the presentation of current work and proposals for future developments in the following (non-exhaustive) topics:

Agent modeling and agent architectures for Electronic Market Places
Electronic Auctions
Agent-based brokering and trade-mediating services
Virtual trading institutions (Electronic Trust Centers, Electronic Clearing Houses...)
Role of trust and trusted third parties (TTP) in electronic commerce
Ways to detect and prevent deception and fraud in electronic commerce
Network-based tendering and procurement
Agent-based negotiation for electronic commerce
Automated coalition formation
Market-based programming
Trading applications of Mechanism Design and Game-theoretic methods
Agent-based information economies
Trading agents
Accountable interactions
Agent-based contracting

WORKSHOP CONTENT

The full-day workshop will strive towards an informal atmosphere with plenty of interaction among participants. It will be organized around four types of activities:

Paper presentations. Oral presentation of a selected subset of the accepted papers. Selection of these presentations will be based on the papers' likely impact on fruitful discussions.
Demonstrations. Concurrent presentation of relevant prototypes, software developments and products.
Commentaries. The commentary sessions, whose purpose is to focus the panel discussion, will be the responsibility of two program committee members. They will comment on the orally presented papers as well as the other related accepted papers and prototypes.
Panel sessions. Two topics will be selected for in-depth discussions and two groups of panelists will be chosen among the workshop participants. Prior to the workshop, the 'panel animators' will circulate among the panelists a list of questions on the selected topics, thus enabling panelists to prepare debate positions. If time permits, the public will join in the debate.

A post-workshop book containing revised versions of the accepted papers will be published as a volume of the Springer LNAI series in both printed and electronic version. Details about the electronic version of the book will appear in the workshop's web page soon.

REVIEW CRITERIA

The workshop welcomes submissions of original, high quality papers and demonstrations of prototypes and existing products that address issues that are clearly relevant to agent-mediated electronic trading, either from a theoretical or an applied perspective. Papers will be peer reviewed by at least two members of the program committee. Submitted papers should be new work that has not been published elsewhere or is not about to be published elsewhere. Papers that will be or have been submitted to other conferences must state this fact on the title page.

SUBMISSION TYPES AND FORMATS

Paper submissions: will include a full paper and a separate title page with the title, authors (full address), a 300-400 word abstract, and a list of keywords. The length of submitted papers must not exceed 12 pages including all figures, tables, and bibliography.
Demonstration submissions: will include a 5 page description of the software and a two page demonstration plan that highlights: the content of the demonstration, the time needed for the demonstration, and any requirements for presentation.

The use of Latex LLNCS style is strongly recommended. For those not used to LNAI paper preparation detailed typing instructions are available at the workshop's web page.

All papers must be written in English.

SUBMISSION PROCEDURE

Submissions must be send electronically, as a UNIX-printable postscript file. Authors are responsible for assuring that their files are UNIX-printable and for performing the electronic submission on or before January 15th. They must also airmail a single hard copy of the electronic submission that must reach the co-chairs before the 22nd of January.

No submissions by fax or arriving after the deadline will be accepted.

SUBMISSION ADDRESS

AMET'98,
Artificial Intelligence Research Institute, IIIA,
Spanish Scientific Research Council, CSIC,
08193, Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain

IMPORTANT DATES

Deadline for Paper Submission           January 15, 1998
Notification of Acceptance/Rejection     March 1, 1998
Deadline for proceedings version          April 1, 1998
Workshop                                                May 9, 1998
Camera-ready version for LNAI           July 15, 1998

PROGRAM COMMITTEE

Ken Binmore     University College London, UK
Frank Dignum    U. Eindhoven, The Netherlands
Fausto Giunchiglia   IRST, Italy
Nick R. Jennings   Queen Mary and Westfield College, UK
Sarit Kraus    Bar-Ilan U., Israel
Jack Lang    ESI, UK
Pattie Maes    MIT, USA
Joerg Muller    Zuno, UK
Pablo Noriega    IIIA-CSIC, Spain; LANIA, Mexico
Julian Padget    U. Bath, UK
Jeff Rosenschein   ICS, Israel
Tuomas Sandholm   Washington U. USA
Carles Sierra    IIIA-CSIC, Spain
Katia Sycara     Carnegie Mellon U., USA
Walter van de Velde   Riverland, Belgium
Hans Voss    GMD, Germany
Mike Wellman    U. Michigan, USA
Mike Wooldridge   Queen Mary and Westfield College, UK

Co-Chairs

Carles Sierra
Articial Intelligence Research Institute, IIIA, Bellaterra, Barcelona,
Spain.

Pablo Noriega
AI National Laboratory, LANIA, Xalapa, Mexico. (On leave at IIIA.)

For comments or questions contact: amet98@iiia.csic.es

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