Agent-Mediated Interaction. From Auctions to Negotiation and Argumentation

Most approaches to modelling agent interactions tend to focus just on the mechanism: the protocol and language usedfor the interaction, andforget the context where that interaction takes place. We holdthat although the complexity of the problem to be solvedis associatedto the complexity of the mechanism, modelling the mechanism alone is insufficient. We argue that an appropriate representation of the context and pragmatics associatedto the interaction, as well as a practical way of enforcing the acceptedin teraction conventions are essential for the design of successful MAS applications. The concept of Electronic Institution is presentedb oth as a way to reconcile mechanisms with their corresponding pragmatic and contextual aspects, and away of extending familiar notions of mediation to MAS.