Electronic and Mobile Commerce

The End

The course is coming to the end... We're going to have the examination soon on 4th of May. Hereby, I would also like to end this blog :) This blog really has been a new experience for me.

I would like to thanks Prof. Gilbert for all he had taught. More, Thanks to my group members, Albert and Aditya Yodha. Guys, you're the best! :) Lastly, thanks to all of you who have read this :) All the best for our exam!

Me,
Erlin.D

posted by Unknown @ 5:47 AM 0 comments

Week 9: Usecase

Time flies! It's week 9 now. Today's session is started with presentation of Infrastructure Design for a Regional Food Safety Initiative in Southeast Asia (AFSI in short). It was our assignment during the recess. Several groups were asked to present. Our group got the ‘honour’ to be the first one to present... ^^; After us, follow is a group deriving the life cycle for the animal, other defining the technology behind it, and one group even defining how the system will actually works by using a use-case diagram :D.. It’s quite related with our topic today, which is most regarding the use-case too.

I will be talking about use-case, but not from the same perspective as what we learn in the E-commerce. Yes, I myself am studying use-case in one of my core subject: Software Engineering. It’s proven to be very useful as a visual representation of the interaction between a proposed system and entities in its environment, when we’re doing the requirement analysis in our very first step of software development. Use case can be easily understood by booth programmer and customer, lead to better communication between them.

To better understand what is actually a use case, and how it is going to work, it would be much more straightforward to give an example:

A simplified example of a use case diagram, which illustrates daily interactions with and the functionality of a proposed ATM system, is shown below:


The customer, shown as a stick figure, can check account balance or withdraw cash. Viewed another way, these are the functions provided by the ATM system bounded by the rectangle. Either transaction, checking of balance or cash withdrawal, is subjected to validation of the customer’s PIN. The system can also manage the situation when a cash withdrawal request exceeds the customer’s account balance. Before we go into details of the precise meaning of each notation used, it can be seen that a use case diagram is more intuitive than a long paragraph of text describing the same system. The objective of use case diagrams is therefore to enable a proposed system to be visualized by both the developer and the client in order to better understand and refine its requirements.

With reference to this, I will explain some of the notations used in use case diagrams. We are adhering to the standard Unified Modeling Language (UML) as defined by the Open Methods Group (OMG).

A use case diagram comprises up to 6 different symbols. These are denoted as actor, use case, system boundary, association, generalization, and stereotype.

An actor is represented by a stick figure. It is a role played by an entity that is external to the proposed system and interacts with it. The role is located below the stick figure. An entity may not necessarily be a person. It could be another system. An entity may play more than one role in its

A use case is represented by an ellipse containing the name of the use case. It represents a unit of functionality to be provided by the proposed system that is of direct benefit to an actor. Each unit of functionality may comprise several actions.

The system boundary is represented by a box drawn around the use cases to be provided by the proposed system. It represents the system context in relation to external entities (actors) interacting with the system. The system boundary therefore excludes all actors.

An association is represented by a solid line and represents the relationship between an actor and a use case. An association may be unadorned or adorned with multiplicities. An unadorned solid line is known as a communication in Rational Rose (CASE tool).

A generalization representation can not be used to link up unrelated actors. For example, staff in unrelated departments or students in different faculties. Generalization also can not be used to represent the components of an actor. For example, the different sub-systems of a data management system or the different components of a sensor. Finally, generalization can not be used to represent attribute-type information e.g. a student and his/her associated records.

A stereotype, in the context of use case diagrams, is denoted by a labelled dashed line with an open arrowhead. The label can be either <> or <>. An <> stereotype from use case A to use case B implies that the action(s) specified by use case B is included in use case A. An <> stereotype from use case B to use case A implies that the action(s) specified by use case B is an extension of the typical behaviour of use case A under certain conditions. The <> stereotype and extended use case A may be annotated with additional information describing the extension.

Alright! We have gone through 6 basic notations found in a use case diagram and their usage. :D.. Overall, that covered all the basic we have to know about use-case. The implementation, as what is pointed out during seminar, will depend on each individuality, and there is nothing strange if there is 10 people in a group with 10 different use-cases, yet referring to the same system specification. It’s more than only black and white :D

posted by Unknown @ 8:04 AM 1 comments

Week 8: Podcasting

Today, We're having quiz. I was late for 15 minutes for the quiz.. since i was coming from North Spine.. :'(.. felt a bit rush at the end..

Later, after the quiz, we're discussing about the mobile phone technology, how it get smaller and smaller.. and eventually reach it limit. We’re talking of how to implement a better lifetime for mobile phone. One idea is to program the mobile phone such that not all application is running all the time. And one more idea is, to find alternative energy for the mobile phone. One suggested using Solar energy. Will it be possible in the future? Let’s see :D

Right after the discussion of Mobile phone, we move on to podcast, the highlight of this week. The first time I hear about it, I thought that it must be some fancy name related to the Apple most popular product, Ipod. However, it’s not the case. the company did contribute both the desire and the technology for this capability. But the podcast word itself isn’t originated from there. Interested? Below is the story of podcast:

"Podcasting" is a portmanteau word coined in 2004 that combined two words: "iPod" and "broadcasting."
While the name was primarily associated with audio subscriptions in 2004, the RSS enclosure syndication technique had been used with video files since 2001, before portable video players were widely available.

Atom, a recently developed web syndication format, supports rich media content by design, as does standard RSS 2.0 based upon XML 1.0 standards. In fact, any file with a URL, including still images and text, can be delivered via a web feed.
Use of "podcast" to describe both audio and video feeds seemed natural to some users, while others preferred to reserve the word for audio and coin new terms for video subscriptions. Other "pod-" derived neologisms include "podcasters" for individuals or organizations offering feeds, and "podcatchers" for special RSS aggregators with the ability to transfer the files to media player software or hardware.

Neither podcasting nor listening to podcasts requires an iPod or other portable player, and no over-the-air broadcasting is required. The name association came about simply because Apple Computer's iPod was the most marketed and the best-selling portable digital audio player when podcasting began, and was used by early practitioners.

However, the use of the "pod" name in 2004 probably played a part in Apple's development of podcasting products and services in 2005, further linking the device and the activity in the news media.

The editors of the New Oxford American Dictionary declared "podcasting" the 2005 word of the year in December, defining the term as "a digital recording of a radio broadcast or similar program, made available on the Internet for downloading to a personal audio player".

From the beginning various writers suggested other names or alternative interpretations of the letters "P-O-D." Technology writer Doc Searls had proposed "Personal Option Digital" in September, 2004. The "Personal On Demand" interpretation was in international circulation as early as October 2004. In July 2005, Microsoft blogger Robert Scoble mentioned that interpretation while countering reports that his company was pushing the word "blogcasting" to avoid mentioning an Apple product. "Blogcasting" also implied content based on, or similar in format to, blogs, which was not always the case.

Another Apple rival in the portable audio and video market, Creative Technology, began using the "Personal On Demand" interpretation, while offering its own "Zencasts.

Other terms have been suggested, but had shortcomings -- "audioblogging," "audio magazines" and "webcasting" could describe other forms of media distribution, and "rsscasting" would be difficult to pronounce.

Podcasting as a medium was first associated with, but never limited to, audio data. As use of RSS enclosures for video spread in 2005, podcasting of video data was called, among other things, "video blogging", "video podcasting", "vlogging", "vodcasting", or "vidcasting".

Subscribing to podcasts allows a user to collect programs from a variety of sources for listening or viewing off-line, whenever and wherever is convenient. In contrast, traditional broadcasting provides only one source at a time, and the time is broadcaster-specified. While podcasts are gaining ground on personal sites and blogs, they are not yet widespread. One easy way to find podcasts is to use the Podcast Directory in iTunes; these automatically-updated podcasts can then be easily synchronised to an iPod for off-line listening.

"Streaming" files from the Internet can remove the specified-time restriction, but still offers only one source at a time, and requires the user to be connected to the Internet while playing the files. The ability to "aggregate" programs from multiple sources is a major part of the attraction of podcast-listening.
Unlike podcasts, streaming also can be used to broadcast live events over the Internet at the moment they occur.

Although streamed programs, like broadcast radio signals, can be recorded or captured by the receiver, their transient nature distinguishes them from podcast episodes, which arrive already in archived form. (This difference may make a podcast legally distinct from a webcast or streamed media file.)

posted by Unknown @ 5:41 AM 0 comments

Week 7 - Architecture, Software and Support

There is no quiz. It is postponed to week 8, after the recess. haha.. I don't know.. Whether i should feel happy or sad.. but surely i cant feel relieve in going through this recess.. haha...

This week, we started with a flash presentation from the last class, then moving forward to the case study of Harley Davidson. The prof suggested us to read and understand the case study in the text book, since most of exam questions are case study based.

Finished with the case study analysis, we continue to the implementation of another case study. It’s about Wireless Infrastructure – how we can implement it for a real life application. In this study case, we would like to apply the technology for greater transparency in the food supply chain in a region, due to the issue of bird flu and any other disease occurring. We’re asked to develop an user interface of the system, which will be used by various type of people: the farmer, the veterinarian, processor, wholesaler, and supermarket. Later, the prof pointed some of group to present the interface. I like the idea of a group which using the GPRS to detect the location of the breeds. But then, we come to the question: is it visible to be implemented? Yes, in the real life, that is not only technology that’s matter. We have to concern about the cost, place, and duration. Will the benefit outcome its cost? That’s what we suppose to learn in this course too. Not only the technological part, but also the $ part.

Further more, after commenting on the preliminary user interface design, each of our group is tasked to develop more, with cost and benefit balancing in mind. Coming soon in the presentation next week after recess :D haha..

For the rest of the session, we’re taught of how to gather information from several resources. Then, we’re introduced to technology that is hot in nowadays. I’m mostly interested with 3G.

3G (or 3-G) is short for third-generation mobile telephone technology. The services associated with 3G provide the ability to transfer both voice data (a telephone call) and non-voice data (such as downloading information, exchanging email, and instant messaging).

In marketing 3G services, video telephony has often been used as the flag-ship killer application for 3G. A certain euphoria was created, which led to huge spectrum-licensing fees in many countries, especially in Europe, where spectrum auctions generated many billions of euros for the respective countries. Since these spectrum licensing fees were collected many years before any income could be expected from 3G business, and since enormous investments are necessary to build the 3G networks, many telecommunication operators got into great financial difficulties, which greatly delayed 3G roll-out in all countries except Japan and Korea, where such spectrum licensing fees were avoided since priority was set on national IT infrastructure development.

The first country which introduced 3G on a large commercial scale was Japan. In 2005 about 40% of subscribers use 3G networks only, and 2G is on the way out in Japan.

If 3G is so popular in Japan, why Singapore, as one of the countries which prioritized severely on national IT infrastructure development, doesn’t lead to the same way? Again, this is due to the cost and government factor, instead of technology. At the end of the session, I really found out a truth: Business and Technology is tightly correlated with each other.

posted by Unknown @ 7:02 AM 0 comments

Week 6 - Flash Presentation

Today session is fun ^^… After a whole week of flash assignment, today we can enjoy the flash from the whole class. I was really impressed by some of the flash presentation… Cant keep my eyes off from the screen from the beginning.. hahaha.. The flash I like most is the Reverse-Auction flash. The flow of the presentation is good and easy to understand, accompanied with a matching song :)

Since we didn’t really have a lecture today (but with a quiz next week) let me talk about the making process of our own flash: Cupid’s Secret

1. The brainstorming started right after we were given the assignment. A lot of ideas were listened and considered. At the first time, there was a confusion, whether we need to make it looked professional, to attract potential investor, or should it look attractive and funny, to attract the audience? Eventually, we manage to come to the deal that it should be the mixture of both.

2. After the finalization of the idea, we still have to justify it with our ability in flash. All of us are beginner, thus we really need to study hard for it, and had to forgo some of our idea, due to the limitation of resource.The making of the flash started 1 week before. We spent a lot of time in the making process (which is absolutely more than 10 hours), and still have to continuously learnt along the way.

3. Selecting songs really not an easy part (special thanks to Albert for it). I tried to get some flash effect tutorial from website. The website referred by Prof (kirupa.com) is really a fun site to learn flash. :) There is one effect that I love most: how to make an object fade and disappear.. We only need to change alpha colour for it.. Such an elegant way for me.. Haha.. but really, once you began flash, u will be addicted to it.

4. The first draft of the flash was finished on Sunday, and then come the editing part. We watched for the flash several times, on different players, and find out that the flash is actually slower in Internet Explorer, while it looks just nice in Flash player ^^;.. We eventually need to edit the whole background music. It just finished right before the lab session. Thanks so much for the good team work :D

Alright, since today is all about flash, let me add some websites that had helped us go through the flash making process… Our credit for:
- Macromedia – for sure, for such a nice software
- Kirupa.com
- http://www.echoecho.com/
- www.w3schools.com/flash
- http://www.flashkit.com/

And Prof.Gilbert, Thanks for giving us the chance to learn flash! :D

posted by Unknown @ 4:55 AM 0 comments

Week 5 - E-Commerce and Mobile Commerce Applications

5th week now, and we began to learn more about the application of E-Commerce. The lesson starts with a good example of telecommunication improvement, and how it affects our way in communicate.

Early days in Singapore, Singtel became a monopoly basic services operator. Only in May 1995, TAS (Telecommunications Authority of Singapore) issued a license to operate mobile voice and paging services to the M1 consortium. And in 1997, Starhub come in. That’s when competition took place. All of the competition is even more challenged by the new technology in voice communication: VoIP, stands for Voice Operator Internet Protocol.

I never heard of VoIP term before, until Prof Gilbert questioned us about that, and then began to tell the story… as the story goes, I found out that I myself actually using it, for more than 2 years now, which is embedded in a software called Skype. I didn’t know that outside there, a lot of other devices are specially made to support it. So curious in VoIP, I browsed through internet about it, and found some interesting information to be shared… ^-^

Internet Voice, also known as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), is a technology that allows you to make telephone calls using a broadband Internet connection instead of a regular (or analog) phone line.

Some services using VoIP may only allow you to call other people using the same service, but others may allow you to call anyone who has a telephone number - including local, long distance, mobile, and international numbers. Also, while some services only work over your computer or a special VoIP phone, other services allow you to use a traditional phone through an adaptor. That is how Prof Gilbert use it!

Completely, there are three different "flavors" of VoIP service in common use today:

ATA - The simplest and most common way is through the use of a device called an ATA (analog telephone adaptor). The ATA allows you to connect a standard phone to your computer or your Internet connection for use with VoIP. The ATA is an analog-to-digital converter. It takes the analog signal from your traditional phone and converts it into digital data for transmission over the Internet. Providers like Vonage and AT&T CallVantage are bundling ATAs free with their service. You simply crack the ATA out of the box, plug the cable from your phone that would normally go in the wall socket into the ATA, and you're ready to make VoIP calls. Some ATAs may ship with additional software that is loaded onto the host computer to configure it; but in any case, it is a very straightforward setup.

IP Phones - These specialized phones look just like normal phones with a handset, cradle and buttons. But instead of having the standard RJ-11 phone connectors, IP phones have an RJ-45 Ethernet connector. IP phones connect directly to your router and have all the hardware and software necessary right onboard to handle the IP call. Soon, Wi-Fi IP phones will be available, allowing subscribing callers to make VoIP calls from any Wi-Fi hot spot.

Computer-to-computer - This is certainly the easiest way to use VoIP. You don't even have to pay for long-distance calls. There are several companies offering free or very low-cost software that you can use for this type of VoIP. All you need is the software, a microphone, speakers, a sound card and an Internet connection, preferably a fast one like you would get through a cable or DSL modem. Except for your normal monthly ISP fee, there is usually no charge for computer-to-computer calls, no matter the distance.

Although I’m not an expert in this technology, I myself have proven that VoIP is really useful for me, in several ways. Here, I would like to introduce you to Skype (or know it better, if you have known it :P)

Skype is a proprietary peer-to-peer Internet telephony (VoIP) network, founded by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis, the creators of KaZaA and competing against established open VoIP protocols. The system has a reputation for working across different types of network connections (including firewalls and NAT) because voice packets are routed by the combined users of the free desktop software application. Skype users can speak to other Skype users for free, call traditional telephone numbers for a fee (SkypeOut), receive calls from traditional phones for a fee (SkypeIn), and receive voicemail messages for a fee.

SkypeOut was recently blocked in some regions of mainland China (notably Shenzhen) by the operator China Telecom for undisclosed reasons, believed to relate to SkypeOut's ability to take lucrative international and long distance business away from the People's Republic of China's state controlled telecoms companies. This is one of the 5 forces analysis by M.Porter - Legal and other barriers which is erected by companies, government regulators, and school systems. But after all, Skype is a very potential product. eBay has acquired the company for $US 2.6 billion in cash and stock, plus an additional 1.5 billion in rewards if goals are met by 2008.

Skype is kept updated to provide a better service (as I typed this blog on 2nd February’06, Skype’s latest version is on 1st February’06) With its new version, we can even do video call! Before it, some of the features I really love to use is its chat interface, with its cute emoticons, its call function, which i usually use to call my sister at China, and its conference function, where I can have call with my sister in China and brother in Australia at the same time! it's so fun.. it's even hard to be implemented in the traditional phone.. now it's real.. and it's free ^^

Besides of the fun VoIP, during the class, we also learnt of the disruptive technology. And since we’re in the education environment, we have to think of what disruptive technology which has really affected the education sector. Well, many of our mind go to internet – as it is almost can’t be separated from us now. It really brings a lot of changes in this sector, but I never thought that there is something even brings more effect to it – a printer. Yes, I just know that.. before printing was available, when someone said he wrote book, he really wrote it. Haha.. As the printer came out, book is a luxury thing no more. It’s improved to e-book now, although it’s not as common as the paper book yet, and not as ‘disruptive’ as paper book. :D

Those disruptive technology changed the behavior of how people acts, which in general, divided into 2 categories: Freedoms (get something new which isn’t available before) and Convenience (do the same thing in the much more easy way)

Before the end of the lesson, once again, we’re reminded of the important of business model. It’s very important to find a business model that suits our business. Virgin’s cell phone is one case where we can learn that business model is absolutely important.

At the end of the meeting, we’re reminded about our project on Flash. Really going to put hand on it now :)

posted by Unknown @ 5:50 AM 0 comments

Project Proposal: Cupid's Secret

by:
Aditya Yodha
Albert Susanto
Erlin Diana

Specialized Outing Planners for Your Loved One
Have no ideas on how and where to celebrate your special days with your loved one? No idea on what special gifts to present to your loved one?
We’ll bring you the most memorable days of your Love Life.

INTRODUCTION

Cupid’s Secret strives to help people who wonder about ways to keep their romance kindling. When their special days are coming, the man or woman in a relationship always search everywhere and everything on how to celebrate them. They generally ponder how to give his/her loved one surprises, how to put up a romantic dinner, where to spend the special day, what kind of ambience, how to make the days more special and eventually how to make him/her love you even more.

Celebrating special days (like Relationship’s Anniversary, Valentine’s Day, White’s Day, Boyfriend’s/Girlfriend’s Birthday) are not simply about dining on the same table in expensive restaurant and present the most exquisite gifts, but they are more than that. Unexpected gifts, feelings, words, ambience, moments, music, scenery, unique presents, favorite foods etc, all play parts in making your special days even more special and ensuring vivid memories in your life. Cupid’s Secrets will solve all their problems and be the answer to their quest of the unforgettable and enjoyable loving days.

THE COMPANY

Cupid’s Secret will mainly operate its business in Singapore as the kick-start, firstly because of our knowledge of the local market and secondly, since our business is primarily conducted through online, Singapore is a good choice as it has a strong IT infrastructure base. With achievement of success in Singapore in the future, we will certainly look up to potential overseas markets to expand our market.

OUR SERVICES

Cupid’s Secret provides a wide range of services, specially designed to help couples celebrating their special days in more special ways. All of the services will be featured on the internet, where customers can conveniently browse to view our services. We will also keep databases of our customers so that we can get to know our customers better in fulfilling their demands.
Our services comprise of:

- Providing scenarios for romantic events
Celebrating special days with your loved ones could have been more special if special attention and time are put into it. Special does not necessary have to be expensive food or expensive gifts. The scenarios and the moments are crucial; therefore we will arrange special things or propose ideas like:
v A nice and simple cozy candlelight dinner at home.
v Hire a car and whisk your partner away to the town side for a romantic break and enjoy the finer things in life. Like: staying in Sentosa or East Coast where couple can hold hands while strolling on the beach, cycling, frissbeeing etc.
v Handpick a select group of accommodation partners to bring together an exclusive range of romantic stay – the ideal way to get away from it all with the one you love.
v Package and wrap chocolates, champagne and flowers - in fact almost anything you require to bring a smile to that special someone’s face.
v Hire a motor to bring your partner for a tour of the romance of wind.
v Gift recommendations and sweet romantic poems on cards.

- Online chats and Photo Uploads
We will also provide private online chatting for couple when they are not meeting up. They can also upload their own photos onto their private folders in our website so that they can view their memorable photos wherever they go, just by simply log on to our website.

- Wish list
Customers can write up their wish list (e.g. the man/woman wishes to have a nice Italian food on Valentine’s Day or the couple wishes to have a day off to the beach) so that we can meet their expectations.

- Couple’s Blogs
With the popularity of blogging nowadays, we hope our customers can be our marketer by sharing their experiences in writing testimonials of the services we provide on the blogs and how they have enjoyed it so much, so as to allow other people to read our distinguished services and to look for our services in the future.

THE MARKET

Cupid’s Secret is not aiming at singles in local area since our main services are not on helping people to get a man or woman to become their partner. Instead, our target market is primarily on working class couples (man or woman) since they are busy with their daily works and do not have time to arrange all these things. Furthermore, they are more willing to spend part of their income for their loved ones.

There has been no competitor existing in Singapore market, therefore we have the first-mover advantage. However, there are companies who might pose some competitive factors to our business like SDU (Social Development Unit), Singapore Match (http://www.sgmatch.com/), Love Byte (http://www.lovebyte.org.sg/) and other wider scope company like http://www.perfectmatch.com/, http://personals.yahoo.com/. Those companies help singles people to look for a partner.

KEY STRENGTHS

The key strengths of our business are mainly in our distinguished services. There is a market niche (working class couples) and we are t here to provide the services. We help them save a lot of time and opportunity costs of preparing all the stuff. In addition to that, Cupid’s Secret also provides services in packages with different range of prices, so that we can cater to couples with different level of income.

posted by Unknown @ 2:19 AM 0 comments

Week 4 - Business Models (extended), Technology, and Behaviour

After browsing through internet for many reference, i found out that business models are perhaps the most discussed and least understood aspect of the web. There is so much talk about how the web changes traditional business models. But there is little clear-cut evidence of exactly what this means.

In our 4th meeting, i gained some clarifications from what the lecturer said. Business model might not be the same year after the year. i.e, amazon.com. If you want to know what business model it applied, you have to specified the month and the year. Dynamics is one of the characteristic of Business model. Another one is the components and linkages, which combine together wih environment points, more or less the same with SWOT analysis. All of them, with the 'change' variable, will decide how well is your performance

In the most basic sense, a business model is the method of doing business by which a company can sustain itself -- that is, generate revenue. The business model spells-out how a company makes money by specifying where it is positioned in the value chain. (for more information about value chain, you can refer to our text book, chapter 1 :D)

Some models are quite simple. A company produces a good or service and sells it to customers. If all goes well, the revenues from sales exceed the cost of operation and the company realizes a profit. Other models can be more intricately woven. Broadcasting is a good example. Radio and later television programming has been broadcasted over the airwaves free to anyone with a receiver for much of the past century. The broadcaster is part of a complex network of distributors, content creators, advertisers (and their agencies), and listeners or viewers. Who makes money and how much is not always clear at the outset. The bottom line depends on many competing factors.

Internet commerce will give rise to new kinds of business models. There are some properties of internet that potentially impact inter- and intra- firm activities, such as:
- Mediating technology - improve flexibility
- Universality - when everybody can reach everybody
- Network externalities - adding new value by adding new network
- Distribution channel - as one way of spreading news
- Time moderator - can reduce the time constrain (eg: one job can be done by several people across country
- Information asymmetry shrinker - in internet, we can search news from everywhere (Eg: ebay)
- Infinite virtual capacity
- Low cost common standard
- Creative destroyer
- Transaction cost reducer

That much is certain. But the web is also likely to reinvent tried-and-true models. Auctions are a perfect example. One of the oldest forms of brokering, auctions have been widely used throughout the world to set prices for such items as agricultural commodities, financial instruments, and unique items like fine art and antiquities. The Web has popularized the auction model and broadened its applicability to a wide array of goods and services.

Business models have been defined and categorized in many different ways. This is one attempt to present a comprehensive and cogent taxonomy of business models observable on the web, which is not the same like what shown in lecture notes. The proposed taxonomy is not meant to be exhaustive or definitive. Internet business models continue to evolve. New and interesting variations can be expected in the future.
The basic categories of 9 business models summarized from an article are:

- Brokerage
Brokers are market-makers: they bring buyers and sellers together and facilitate transactions. Brokers play a frequent role in business-to-business (B2B), business-to-consumer (B2C), or consumer-to-consumer (C2C) markets. Usually a broker charges a fee or commission for each transaction it enables.

- Advertising
The web advertising model is an extension of the traditional media broadcast model. The broadcaster, in this case, a web site, provides content (usually, but not necessarily, for free) and services (like email, IM, blogs) mixed with advertising messages in the form of banner ads. The banner ads may be the major or sole source of revenue for the broadcaster. The broadcaster may be a content creator or a distributor of content created elsewhere. The advertising model works best when the volume of viewer traffic is large or highly specialized.

- Infomediary
Data about consumers and their consumption habits are valuable, especially when that information is carefully analyzed and used to target marketing campaigns. Independently collected data about producers and their products are useful to consumers when considering a purchase. Some firms function as infomediaries (information intermediaries) assisting buyers and/or sellers understand a given market.

- Merchant
Wholesalers and retailers of goods and services. Sales may be made based on list prices or through auction.

- Manufacturer (Direct)
The manufacturer or "direct model", it is predicated on the power of the web to allow a manufacturer (i.e., a company that creates a product or service) to reach buyers directly and thereby compress the distribution channel. The manufacturer model can be based on efficiency, improved customer service, and a better understanding of customer preferences.

- Affiliate
In contrast to the generalized portal, which seeks to drive a high volume of traffic to one site, the affiliate model, provides purchase opportunities wherever people may be surfing. It does this by offering financial incentives (in the form of a percentage of revenue) to affiliated partner sites. The affiliates provide purchase-point click-through to the merchant. It is a pay-for-performance model -- if an affiliate does not generate sales, it represents no cost to the merchant. The affiliate model is inherently well-suited to the web, which explains its popularity. Variations include, banner exchange, pay-per-click, and revenue sharing programs.

- Community
The viability of the community model is based on user loyalty. Users have a high investment in both time and emotion. Revenue can be based on the sale of ancillary products and services or voluntary contributions; or revenue may be tied to contextual advertising and subscriptions for premium services. The Internet is inherently suited to community business models and today this is one of the more fertile areas of development, as seen in rise of social networking.

- Subscription
Users are charged a periodic -- daily, monthly or annual -- fee to subscribe to a service. It is not uncommon for sites to combine free content with "premium" (i.e., subscriber- or member-only) content. Subscription fees are incurred irrespective of actual usage rates. Subscription and advertising models are frequently combined.

- Utility
The utility or "on-demand" model is based on metering usage, or a "pay as you go" approach. Unlike subscriber services, metered services are based on actual usage rates. Traditionally, metering has been used for essential services (e.g., electricity water, long-distance telephone services). Internet service providers (ISPs) in some parts of the world operate as utilities, charging customers for connection minutes, as opposed to the subscriber model common in the U.S.

The models are implemented in a variety of ways. For further example and explanation, you can click on this link. Moreover, a firm may combine several different models as part of its overall Internet business strategy. For example, it is not uncommon for content driven businesses to blend advertising with a subscription model.

Business models have taken on greater importance recently as a form of intellectual property that can be protected with a patent. Indeed, business models (or more broadly speaking, "business methods") have fallen increasingly within the realm of patent law. A number of business method patents relevant to e-commerce have been granted, where amazon.com is noted as one of the biggest holder.

One personal opinion thing that i noted after one month of this course: Amazon kept being a good example through different chapters of this course. Seems like Amazon becomes the best not only because of luck - they should have really put effort in studying the business theory(business trend, web marketing strategies, segmentation, customer relationship, etc) like what we're learning, and find the best business model for themselves. Then who said that theory is useless, and never going to work in real world? :P

posted by Unknown @ 1:12 AM 0 comments