The goal of this chapter is to analyze the incentive issues that arise in multi-hop ad hoc networks when their nodes are potentially mobile devices controlled by independent self-interested end-users. The author decomposes the problem into its economic and technological dimensions according to which he categorizes the numerous proposed solutions. He then analyzes certain drawbacks of the economics oriented approach and argues for the need to go beyond the rationality assumption. This is to exploit a variety of powerful more intrinsic, social, human motivations for encouraging participation and resource sharing in ad hoc networks. Existing successful online communities provide a good starting point for designing social software that can provide cross-layer social incentives for resource sharing. In this chapter, the author motivates this novel but challenging approach and provides some insights toward coming closer to its ambitious objective.
A Reliable Broadcast Protocol in Vehicular Ad Hoc Networks