Consumer Online in the Age of the Net

摘要

A retrospective for consumer online these days can easily edge over into a requiem. Consumer online is by no means dead, but it is in the throes of its greatest changes ever, with no guarantees on the outcome. The transformations have already begun. The latest major innovation in consumer online—CompuServe's super-simplified WOW! service—looks and works unlike any predecessor. If WOW! and a few other drawing board projects are harbingers, the fifteen-year-old identity of the consumer online service is being altered beyond recognition. But, then, transformation is better than extinction. The Internet is the latest and most profound force affecting the evolution of consumer online. Of course, the Internet is reshaping communications, transactions, and information in every sphere. Consumer online, however, is getting hit the hardest, because of all the media, it is the closest to the Internet. For other media, the question is how to adapt in the Internet Age. For consumer online, the question is how to survive.