Abstract
We study a version of the minority game in which one agent is allowed to join
the game in a random fashion. It is shown that in the crowded regime, i.e., for
small values of the memory size $m$ of the agents in the population, the agent
performs significantly well if she decides to participate the game randomly
with a probability $q$ {\em and} she records the performance of her strategies
only in the turns that she participates. The information, characterized by a
quantity called the inefficiency, embedded in the agent's strategies
performance turns out to be very different from that of the other agents.
Detailed numerical studies reveal a relationship between the success rate of
the agent and the inefficiency. The relationship can be understood analytically
in terms of the dynamics in which the various possible histories are being
visited as the game proceeds. For a finite fraction of randomly participating
agents up to 60% of the population, it is found that the winning edge of these
agents persists.
