Web commerce and information societies

摘要

Civilizations are defined by the commercial systems that enable the creation of the physical and intellectual structures of a society. This paper contends that the creation of an "information society" depends upon ubiquitous electronic commerce, and that the lack of widespread, low transaction cost, electronic commerce has prevented the development of a true information society. The paper proposes that the advent of electronic commerce conducted over the World Wide Web, and particularly the adoption of such "Web Commerce" by businesses for procurement, marketing, telework, fee-based distance learning, and sales, is the missing catalyst in the development of an information society. The paper examines "smart community," "smart city," and "information economy" projects in the light of Web Commerce. The paper concludes with suggestions about how smart community projects might be better tailored to accelerate the development of an information economy and of its counterpart, the information society.