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Advancing Computational Biology and Bioinformatics Research Through Open Innovation Competitions

by Blasco, Andrea, Michael G. Endres, Rinat A. Sergeev, Anup Jonchhe, Max Macaluso, Rajiv Narayan, Ted Natoli, Jin H. Paik, Bryan Briney, Chunlei Wu, Andrew I. Su, Aravind Subramanian, and Karim R. Lakhani

Crowdsourcing is a way for many individuals to address a common problem. This paper describes the design and outcomes of three crowdsourcing contests focused on algorithms for 1) clustering antibody sequences, 2) imputing gene expression measurements, and 3) performing fast queries on a particular dataset. Innovation through contests greatly improved the solutions available.

In the Shadows? Informal Enterprise in Non-Democracies

by Kristin Fabbe, Allison Spencer Hartnett, and Steve L. Monroe

With the informal economy representing a third of the GDP in an average Middle East and North African country, why do chronically indebted regimes tolerate such a large and untaxed shadow economy? Among this study’s findings, higher rates of public sector employment correlate with greater permissibility of firm informality.

The Consequences of Invention Secrecy: Evidence from the USPTO Patent Secrecy Program in World War II

by Daniel P. Gross

Information plays a critical role in technological progress, yet many inventors opt for trade secrecy to protect their intellectual property. This paper studies the myriad repercussions of concealing new inventions through the lens of a systematic and sweeping invention secrecy policy implemented by the USPTO during World War II.

Calculators for Women: When Identity Appeals Provoke Backlash

by Tami Kim, Kate Barasz, Leslie John, and Michael Norton

With calculators targeted to women and laundry products aimed at men, examples of identity-based labeling—or “identity appeals”—abound in advertising and marketing. Five studies show when and why such identity appeals backfire. Identity appeals may fail equally whether they evoke negative or just milder stereotypes.

The Impacts of Increasing Search Frictions on Online Shopping Behavior: Evidence from a Field Experiment

by Donald Ngwe, Kris J. Ferreira, and Thales Teixeira

This paper challenges the logic that making it easier for consumers to search across a wide assortment of products is the best strategy for online retailers. Experiments show that adding extra search costs to find discounted items can improve gross margins and sales by increasing the number of items inspected and serving as a self-selecting price discrimination mechanism among customers.

The Revision Bias

by Ximena Garcia-Rada, Leslie John, Ed O’Brien, and Michael I. Norton

Companies often release revised editions of books, director’s cuts of movies, and technological updates, on the assumption that revising products and services leads to better outcomes. Nine studies, however, document the revision bias: the tendency to prefer things that were revised, regardless of whether the revised versions are objectively better than their predecessors.

Strict ID Laws Don’t Stop Voters: Evidence from a U.S. Nationwide Panel, 2008–2016

by Enrico Cantoni and Vincent Pons

Evidence on the consequences of strict ID laws adopted between 2008 and 2016 shows no significant negative effect on registration or turnout overall or for any subgroup defined by age, gender, race, or party affiliation. ID requirements had no significant effect on actual or perceived fraud, either.

Judgment Aggregation in Creative Production: Evidence from the Movie Industry

by Hong Luo, Jeffrey T. Macher, and Michael Wahlen

Selecting early-stage ideas in creative industries is challenging because consumer taste is hard to predict and the quantity to sift through is large. Using The Black List that ranks scripts annually based on nominations from film executives, this study shows that aggregating expert opinions helps reduce quality uncertainty and can influence high-budget production.

Infringing Use as a Path to Legal Consumption: Evidence from a Field Experiment

by Hong Luo and Julie Holland Mortimer

Copyright infringement may result from frictions preventing legal consumption, but also reveals demand. This study quantifies the effects of providing more-suitable options and reducing search costs.

Relative Performance Transparency: Effects on Sustainable Choices

by Ryan W. Buell, Shwetha Mariadassou, and Yanchong Zheng

Encouraging consumers to purchase a more sustainable product or use resources more responsibly is a key challenge for society. This paper discusses experiments involving more than 7,000 participants to shed light on how information and its presentation regarding sustainable performance can be a tool for enhancing sustainable choices in practice.

Diagnostic Bubbles

by Pedro Bordalo, Nicola Gennaioli, Spencer Yongwook Kwon, and Andrei Shleifer

The financial crisis of 2007-2008 revived academic interest in price bubbles but many conceptual questions remain open. This paper generates insights into the structure of asset price bubbles by modeling beliefs from fundamental psychological assumptions, and combining this with standard neoclassical mechanisms, such as learning from prices and speculation.

Gender Stereotypes in Deliberation and Team Decisions

by Katherine B. Coffman, Clio Bryant Flikkema, and Olga Shurchkov

Professional success requires the ability to contribute ideas, and receive credit for them. This paper explores gender differences in how men and women communicate and reward each other in team decision-making problems. We find that women are recognized less often for their contributions in male-typed domains.

The IBM PC

by Carliss Y. Baldwin

The IBM PC was the first computer platform to be open by choice and not because of financial constraints. Initially, this openness kept IBM competitive. But IBM’s control over two strategic bottlenecks— standards embedded in the Basic Input Output System, and system integration and manufacturing of the computer itself—turned out to be weak.

Platform Systems vs. Step Processes—The Value of Options and the Power of Modularity

by Carliss Y. Baldwin

Technology shapes organizations through incentives and rewards. This paper compares the value structure of platform systems and step processes, finding that step processes reward technical integration, unified governance, risk aversion, and the use of direct authority. Platform systems by contrast reward modularity, distributed governance, risk taking, and autonomous decision-making.

Immigrant Networking and Collaboration: Survey Evidence from CIC

by Sari Pekkala Kerr and William R. Kerr

This study compares United States-born and immigrant entrepreneurs’ use of networking opportunities provided by CIC, the former Cambridge Innovation Center. Immigrants clearly take more advantage of networking opportunities at CIC, especially around the exchange of advice. It remains to be seen whether this generates long-term performance advantages for immigrants.

Does Public Ownership and Accountability Increase Diversity? Evidence from IPOs

by Rembrand Koning and John-Paul Ferguson

Going public has no effect on workforce diversity, according to this study comparing changes in firms’ ownership type with longitudinal data on employment. For workforce diversity, the time to make a difference is probably not after an initial public offering but rather in the years just after firm founding.

Stereotypes and Belief Updating

by Katherine B. Coffman, Manuela Collis, and Leena Kulkarni

Increasing evidence demonstrates that stereotyped beliefs drive key economic decisions. This paper shows the significant role of self-stereotyping in predicting beliefs about one’s own ability. Stereotypes do not just affect beliefs about ability when information is scarce. In fact, stereotypes color the way information is incorporated into beliefs, perpetuating initial biases.

Understanding and Overcoming Roadblocks to Environmental Sustainability. Past Roads and Future Prospects

by Ann-Kristin Bergquist, Shawn A. Cole, John Ehrenfeld, Andrew A. King, and Auden Schendler

At a summer 2018 Harvard Business School conference, historians, scholars, and business professionals debated barriers and opportunities for business and environmental sustainability. Although ideas of a future path differed, many participants said sustainability objectives based on voluntary firm action have become diffuse, making progress difficult.

Understanding Different Approaches to Benefit-Based Taxation

by Robert Scherf and Matthew C. Weinzierl

Benefit-based taxation—where taxes align with benefits from state activities—enjoys popular support and an illustrious history, but scholars are confused over how it should work, and confusion breeds neglect. To clear up this confusion and demonstrate its appeal, we provide novel graphical explanations of the main approaches to it and show its general applicability.

Marketplace Scalability and Strategic Use of Platform Investment

by Jin Li, Gary P. Pisano, and Feng Zhu

One well-known feature of marketplace platforms like Airbnb and eBay is their scalability. This paper identifies the strategic trade-off and implications for scalability when a platform provides services to existing and potential sellers that help reduce their fixed costs of running the business. Timing this investment is an important consideration for maximizing marketplace scalability.