Saturday, April 10, 2004

First mover advantage vs "Burn the ship" strategies

I offered my rationale and strategy for voting: "... Before you vote for a particular party, let your friends (and enemies, if you have some) know that you will. Make sure you reveal your preference...".

Aria Novianto, on the other hand, offers a "first mover advantage" theory: "...In the bargaining game first mover has a huge advantage. Especially in short (one) period game. First, you set your terms, what you really want out of the candidates. Offer your support to your first choice candidates, their only options being to accept or reject your terms. If it's still early in the game, they know you have the option to offer it to others.... know this is too simplistic, but in general first mover has an upper hand....".

It appears, we are looking at voter's behavior from different perspectives. Aria limits other peoples' options, make them accept his terms, because that's the better choice they have left with. Mine is, to limit my options, in order to increase my commitment, while trying to persuade others. The latter follows "burn the ship" strategy of General Tariq bin Ziyad in the war of Gibraltar.

No comments: