AbsoluteLinkCarryingCapacity

Networks will organize themselves into PowerLaw distributions of links as long as the probability of a node n receiving the next link is somehow proportional to the number of links that n already has.

But power-laws distributions of links will be disrupted if there is an absolute link carrying capacity. In other words, if once a node attains a certain threshold of links, it's probability of having the next starts to decrease. For example, airports attract routes because the more popular a hub is, the more valuable it is to go there. But airports have a finite capacity and it gets harder to increase it. (More difficult / expensive to schedule all the flights not to collide etc. More protests from local residents. )

This page for other observed limits which will presumably work against power-law build ups.

• maybe LinearCommentAccretion

See also :

• ScaleAndStructureOfSocialGroups