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Set I
Q.1. What are the developments that have contributed to the
emergence of the internet as an electronic commerce infrastructure?
Answer: The role of the Internet in the evolution of e-commerce has been so
crucial that the history of e-commerce will remain incomplete without the
inclusion of the history of the Internet.
Using the Internet, you can communicate with other people throughout the world
by means of e-mail, read online versions of newspapers, magazines, academic
journals, and books, join discussion groups on almost any conceivable topic,
participate in games and simulations, and obtain free computer software. In
recent years, the Internet has allowed commercial enterprises to connect with
one another and with customers. Today, all kinds of businesses provide
information about their products and services on the Internet. Many of Business
use internet to market or sell their product or services. The part of internet is
known as WWW or World Wide Web or simply web, which is a subset of
computers on the internet which are connected to each other in a specific way
that makes those computers and their contents easily accessible to each other.
The most important thing about the Web is that it includes an easy-to-use
standard interface. This interface makes it possible for people who are not
computer experts to use the World Wide Web to access a variety of Internet
resources.
In the early 1960s, the US Department of Defense became very much concerned
about the possible effects of a nuclear attack on its computing facilities. The
Defense Department realized the need for powerful computers for coordination
and control. The powerful computers of that time were all large mainframe
computers. So the Defense Department began examining ways to connect these
computers to each other and also to weapon installations that were distributed
all over the world. The Defense Department agency, charged with this task, hired
many of the best communications technology researchers and funded research
at leading universities and institutes to explore the task of creating a worldwide
network that could remain operational even if parts of the network were
destroyed by enemy military action or sabotage. These researchers worked to
devise ways to build networks that could operate independently-that is, networks
that would not require a central computer to control network operations.
The world’s telephone companies were the early models for networked
computers, because early networks of computers used leased telephone
company lines for their connections. Telephone company systems of that time
established a single connection between sender and receiver for each telephone
call, and that connection carried all the data along a single path. When a
company wanted to connect computers it owned at two different locations, it
placed a telephone call to establish the connection and then connected one
computer to each end of that single connection.
The Defence Department was concerned about the inherent risk of this single-
channel method for connecting computers. So its researchers developed a
different method of sending information through multiple channels. In this
method, files and messages are broken into packets and labeled electronically
with codes about their origin and destination. The packets travel from computer
to computer along the network until they reach their destination. The destination
computer collects the packets and reassembles the original data from the pieces
in each packet. Each computer that an individual packet encounters on its trip
through the network determines the best way to move the packet forward to its
destination.
In 1969, these Defense Department researchers used this network model to
connect four computers-one each at the University of California at Los Angeles,
SRI International, the University of California at Santa Barbara, and the
University of Utah. During the subsequent years, many researchers in the
academic community connected to this network and contributed to technological
developments that increased the speed and efficiency with which the network
operated. At the same time, researchers at other universities were creating their
own networks using similar technologies.
The upshot was the Internet Protocol (IP), which enabled any number of
computer networks to link up and act as one-and eventually it was given the
name, the Internet. This meant that the communication network among the
computers was not dependent on any single computer to operate, and so could
not be shut down by destroying one or even several of the computers.
Although the goals of the Defense Department network were still to control
weapons systems and transfer research files, other uses of this vast network
began to appear in the early 1970s. In 1972, a researcher wrote a program that
could send and receive messages over the network. Thus was born the e-mail
which came to be widely used very quickly. The number of network users in the
military and education research communities continued to grow. Many of these
new participants used the networking technology to transfer files and access
remote computers. The network software included two tools for performing these
tasks. File Transfer Protocol (FTP) enabled users to transfer files between
computers, and Telnet let users log on to their computer accounts from remote
sites. Both FTP and Telnet are still widely used on the Internet for file transfers
and remote logins, even though more advanced techniques are now available
that allow multimedia transmissions such as real-time audio and video clips.
The first e-mail mailing lists also appeared on these networks. In 1979, a group
of students and programmers at the Duke University and the University of North
Carolina started Usenet, an abbreviation for Users News Network. Usenet allows
anyone who connects to the network to read and post articles on a variety of
subjects. The Defense Department’s networking software became more widely
used as academic and research institutes realized the benefits of having a
common communications network. The explosion of personal computer use
during that time also helped more people become comfortable with computing.
In the late 1980s, these independent academic and research networks merged
into one infra-structure-the Internet that links today hundreds and thousands of
networks to one another.
Literally, the transport routes for e-commerce applications are boundless. The
distribution of information has become a competitive market with a combination
of offense and defense. Playing on the defense are telephone companies and
cable television companies, providers that have enjoyed monopoly positions for
decades. Now, however, their enormous investments in wiring and equipment
have become vulnerable to new competition.
Playing offense are computer companies that offer new hardware capabilities
and software programs with the potential to define new markets. The computer
companies are banking on public networks such as the Internet, which is
expanding at an astounding pace. Another emerging threat will be wireless
communications known as personal communications services, a form of walk
around telephony that bypasses the traditional telecommunications companies
and uses wireless communications.
Each highway route provider faces a different but no less daunting set of
challenges:
Supplier Management
Inventory Management
Distribution Management
Channel Management
Payment Management
Financial Management
Sales Force Productivity
Simplicity: Avoid clutter on web pages. If the business has a lot of information
to convey, organize it well and spread it out over multiple pages. Unlike printed
advertisements, web site hosting costs are so low and competitive that the
number of pages is typically not a significant cost factor. Do not go overboard,
however, and place so little information on each page that the user must click to
advance to the next page after reading only three or four sentences. A guideline
is to use about 60 characters per line. Also, avoid long pages that require a lot of
scrolling. Again, organizing the material well can preclude excessive scrolling
from being necessary.
Use the Space Wisely: Do not ramble on; make each statement count. Just
because web space is relatively cheap does not mean that visitors want to weed
through hoards of verbose commentaries and other non value-added information
to find the items desired.
Create a Reason to Return: Once a visitor comes to the site, give them a
reason to return. Suggest they bookmark the site – it works! Some suggestions
for items that may cause the visitor to return:
Tables and Fonts: Tables are useful for providing structure to text that will not
be lost due to the size of the visitor’s screen and the size of the viewing window,
which is affected by the viewer’s web browser. Whenever possible, avoid using
all uppercase letters as they are more difficult for the eye to follow. Further, the
use of fancy fonts may look good on the web designer’s screen, but the fonts
displayed to visitors are limited to those that are available on their own
computer. The Times and Helvetica fonts are good fonts for readability on web
sites. As mentioned earlier, try to keep line lengths less than 60 characters per
line.
Graphics: Graphics can enhance a web site when used properly. Attempt to use
images that are no larger than 70k or the load time may annoy visitors.
Fortunately, many image software packages allow the user to view the image in
different storage sizes and indicate the approximate load time for each size. The
larger the image, the better the image, but a slightly less vivid image that loads
faster may payoff in terms of retaining visitors. If picture clarity is important, for
example for inventory items, allow the user to choose to view a bigger, clearer
picture by clicking on the smaller picture.
Colors and Contrast: Most web site designers agree that dark text on light
backgrounds works best. The key is to have enough contrast between the text
and the background. Some colors work together and some do not; a traditional
color wheel is useful for choosing contrasting colors.