Smart Pricing and Market Formation in Hybrid Networks

Over the past decade, the total demand in the United States for wireless services has approximately doubled annually. This growing demand for wireless services is creating the so‐called “spectrum shortage,” which the United States is starting to address through its National Broadband Plan. The defining characteristic of P2P networking is the equality of network participants. In client‐server models, all communication progresses up and down the network hierarchy. In Napster's P2P model, users would register their available files at one of Napster's servers, where other users were able to search for content. In order to apply P2P as a support mechanism for cellular networks, the system must be commercially viable. Self‐balancing supply/demand (SBSD) protocol is a paradigm for demand‐driven information search and discovery. Hybrid network model regulates load sharing in the hybrid cellular‐P2P network. The chapter presents incentive modeling, flow model and prioritization model.