When Influencers Compete on Social Networks

Abstract

We study an opinion formation game between a Designer and an Adversary. While the Designer creates the network, both these players can influence network nodes (agents) initially, with ties being broken in favor of the Designer. Final opinions of agents are a convex combination of own opinions and the average network peer opinion. The optimal influence strategy shows threshold effects with non-empty equilibrium networks having star type architectures. By contrast, when the tie-breaking rule favors the Adversary, non-empty equilibrium networks are regular networks. The effect of random interactions between network nodes altering the network is also studied.