Daniel Brown

I am a Ph.D. student in the Economics Department. My main research interests are in applications of Microeconomic Theory. I have completed fields in Industrial Organization and Theory (Contract and Game Theory). Currently, I am studying a model of 2-sided markets with application to online advertising.

I studied at CAL for my undergrad, where I double majored in Physics and Mathematics. I have also completed a Master's of Science in Economics (Research) from the London School of Economics and Political Science.

1/10/08 Fall semester went by very quickly. I enjoyed developing a research agenda and begining work on my own models. I was also a GSI for Macroeconomics (Econ 100b) which turned out to be a challenging and learning experience. Fortunately, I will have more free time in the Spring to devote to my research and prepare for Orals because I recieved the Graduate Division Academic Progress Award for Spring semester. On a personal note, I had a great time exploring the Southwest on a roadtrip that took me through Flagstaff, Santa Fe, Taos, Colorado Springs, and Eastern Utah. Arches and Canyonlands National Parks were especially gorgeous. Taos had a great vibe, but I am being pushed to live in an earthship. I was able to drive through some incredibly isolated places with amazing landscapes. I look forward to planning my next regional roadtrip in the US.

6/29/07 I'm not sure where to start because I haven't posted anything in awhile, and a lot has been happening. I am staying in Berkeley this summer, working on some research and preparing for field exams. I was recently awarded the Key Technical Challenges Fellowship from Yahoo! which includes a nice stipend and participation in a workshop at Yahoo! Research in August. I also enjoyed working on a paper at the end of the semester on network effects and localization. My model was motivated, in part, by the recent evolution of social utility networks. I am now in the midst of surveying the economics and information science research literature on the topics of networks and social learning. I hope to post a list of papers on this site in the near future. One of my favorite researchers in this area is Matthew Jackson at Stanford. Lately, I've been thinking about blogging and I'm suprised that not as many Berkeley graduate students have their own blogs. Two of my favorite student blogs are by Andrew Keating and Danah Boyd. Perhaps they will give you some inspiration.

2/25/07 The semester is moving along fast now. I am enjoying having more time to think aboout economic problems that interest me. I think its very easy to get caught up fulfilling requirements and doing coursework and forget about spending time to explore your own ideas. Also, my sister, Monica just put up a really nice website.

1/22/07 I haven't posted anything for awhile. I was thinking about making some major updates to this website over winter break, but I haven't get around to it and I didn't want to bother my cousin about it (who was the main designer). I was very busy at the end of fall semester, mainly with grading final exams and fulfilling my Econometrics paper requirement. I used data from Romer's "Federal Reserve Information and the Behavior of Interest Rates" to replicate and extend some of their results. Of all my coursework in the Fall, I think liked my Probability Applications course the best (STAT 204). I am still deciding on classes for this semester, but I will definitely take Game Theory (Kariv), Mechanism Design (Hermalin), and IO (Farrell).

10/22/06 I have been playing a lot of soccer lately on the Cal Men's Club Soccer team. The results so far have been mixed. I think we have a great well-rounded team and we play a nice style, but we sometimes have problems finishing. We tied several teams we should have beaten, but we did have one outstanding game against University of San Diego. They are the first place team in our league and we were the first team to beat them (1-0). We still have a Regional, and National Tournaments before our main season ends in a month. On a sad note, our team is very sorry for the loss of Junior Garcia, who died in a car accident last week. He will be missed.

9/22/06 I finally feel like a real PhD student, now that I am spending most of my time thinking about research and going to seminars rather than taking courses. I am a research assistant in the School of Information, under the guidance of Hal Varian. I am also a Reader for The Economics of Innovation (Scotchmer). After some consideration, I have settled on the following courses: Stat 204, Econ 219A, and Econ 220A.

8/1/06 The summer is going by very fast, especially now since I have been teaching a summer school Macro class (100b) as a GSI. I am looking forward to Fall semester where I should have a more flexible schedule than in the first year which should give me more time to do research. I am also excited about the courses I'm taking: Pyschology and Economics (Rabin), IO (Gilbert), Political Economy (Roland), and Probability Theory (STAT C205A-Pittman).

6/26/06 I have been following the World Cup closely and even though the U.S. is out, I am still very excited about it. I would like to see Germany and England play each other in the semifinals- that could be a legendary match. I think the U.S.'s performance shows, that America doesn't have a world class attacking central midfielder. Landon Donovan was a huge disappointment. He perfectly demonstrates the limitations of the MLS. I hope Clint Dempsey ends up playing in Europe next season.

5/31/06 Summer has finally arrived. This last semester was rough for me and I am glad it is over. I'm on vacation right now, but I will be spending most of the summer in Berkeley and the South Bay.

4/1/06 I finally decided to put up a website. It's been a nice distraction and a semi-productive thing to do over Spring Break. It doesn't have a lot of Economics related content, but I am in my first year of the program, so hopefully this will change soon. Comments are welcome.

Daniel T. Brown
Department of Economics
University of California
Berkeley
549 Evans Hall #3880
Berkeley, CA 94720
dtbrown@
econ.berkeley.edu