Algorithmic Consumers

Michal Gal and Niva Elkin-Koren

Harvard Journal of Law and Technology

Gal, Michal and Elkin-Koren, Niva, Algorithmic Consumers (August 8, 2016). Harvard Journal of Law and Technology, Vol. 30, 2017, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2876201

Abstract

The next generation of e-commerce will be conducted by digital agents, based on algorithms that will not only make purchase recommendations, but will also predict what we want, make purchase decisions, negotiate and execute the transaction for the consumers, and even automatically form coalitions of buyers to enjoy better terms, thereby replacing human decision-making. Algorithmic consumers have the potential to change dramatically the way we conduct business, raising new conceptual and regulatory challenges.

This game-changing technological development has significant implications for regulation, which should be adjusted to a reality of consumers making their purchase decisions via algorithms. Despite this challenge, scholarship addressing commercial algorithms focused primarily on the use of algorithms by suppliers. This article seeks to fill this void. We first explore the technological advances which are shaping algorithmic consumers, and analyze how these advances affect the competitive dynamic in the market. Then we analyze the implications of such technological advances on regulation, identifying three main challenges.

Keywords: artificial intelligence, algorithms, regulation, antitrust