Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Concepts
Outline
Introduction
SECURITY
CONTENT
PRESENTATION
CSI 5389 (E-Commerce Technologies)
TRANSACTION
PROCESSING
RECOMMENDER
SYSTEMS
Dr. Thomas Tran
ELECTRONIC
COMMUNITY
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Strategic Issues
Concentration versus Empowerment
The Internet allows direct access from businesses to
consumers and greatly reduces the costs associated with
distribution.
This could lead to a great concentration of suppliers, or to
the opposite: the creation of tens of thousands of small
and medium-sized suppliers.
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Dynamic content:
Generated at the time of the request.
Taken from information sources such as databases.
Used when the content changes frequently or when the
natural storage medium for the information is a database.
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Once the order is final, the buyer can pay for it.
There are several payment methods (e.g., credit cards,
purchase orders, etc.), one of which must be agreed up on
by the buyer and the seller.
The seller must be careful about imposing requirements
on the buyer: If the buyer must have a special software
package to handle payment, the population of buyers
would be much smaller.
Completing this process does not necessarily mean that
funds have been transferred into the sellers bank account:
Some payment instruments extend credit to buyers to
make the actual payment later.
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Internet Is
Different from Other Media
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The Internet Is
Different from Other Media (cont.)
Implications:
Small merchants can reach customers on the Internet
very effectively.
Communication technology combined with databases of
customer information makes it possible to reach
customers as individuals.
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Basic Questions
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One-to-One Marketing
The Internet is an ideal medium for one-to-one marketing
in which a business can tailor the messages to
individual customers based on their known interests,
likes, dislikes, and buying histories.
A Web site can identify customers before they browse a
catalog and then use those identities to customize the
presentation.
The customization can take many forms (e.g., selecting
which items to display, providing targeted special
offers, inserting advertisements of likely interest, etc.).
Even when customers are anonymous, their behavior
may provide some clues that are useful in tailoring a
message.
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International Software
The most important aspect of software for use in
different countries is that the presentation (such as
the user interface) can be adapted to local
conventions.
In many cases, this means translating all the
displayed information into local languages.
The software must be able to display whatever character
set is required.
The software must be capable of using the translated
messages.
The software must be able to handle the local currency.
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International Content
Aside the translation of text, true internationalization of
content requires extensive work. Here are some issues:
References to local geographies, people, and news events do
not translate well.
Humor does not translate well.
Words (particularly product names) may have very different
interpretations in different countries.
Trademarks work differently in different countries.
Colors (used in corporate color schemes and logos) make
different impressions in different cultures.
These issues are well understood by multinational
companies, but represent serious problems for smaller
companies that want a global presence.
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Privacy
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Signatures
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Regulation of Cryptography
Cryptography encompasses encrypting data for privacy,
providing reliable means of verifying identities, recording
digital signatures, and ensuring that there has been no
tampering with messages and documents.
In some cases, the use or sale of cryptographic technology is
regulated. The regulations differ from country to country.
The U.S. used to restrict the export of strong cryptography
in mass-market software. Today, such applications must be
licensed for export.
Regulation of cryptography may affect the security of the
Internet commerce systems.
If the customers system has weak security, then the
overall security of the transaction is also weak.
The lack of uniformity means that it is harder to build
confidence in the security of the global Internet commerce
infrastructure.
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References
G. Winfield Treese and Lawrence C. Stewart.
Designing Systems for Internet Commerce (2nd
edition): Chapters 1 & 2. Addison Wesley.
Dr. Thomas Tran Slides
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