The internet and American Business

Citation

Liu, L.G. (2009), "The internet and American Business", Online Information Review, Vol. 33 No. 1, pp. 212-213. https://doi.org/10.1108/14684520910944517

This book is about the development of the internet and its impact on American industries and businesses. It consists of 17 chapters. The first is an introduction and the last a conclusion by the editors. Most contributors either teach or work in academic institutions.

Chapter 2 describes the development of the internet before it was massively applied to business. It looks at the history of the internet, the people involved in the design and implementation of the internet and the key technical developments. Chapter 3 discusses the market structure for internet access with a focus on pricing, operations, and geographic coverage. Chapter 4 covers protocols with relation to the two internet technologies namely, e‐mail and the web and how these internet tools are applied to commercial sectors. Chapter 5 describes web search engines and portals. It discusses the issues related to electronic publishing using the web, web directories, web search, advertising on the web, Google, and major competitors in the web search business. Chapter six discusses the history of computing and software with a focus on the notion of Software as a Service (SaaS). It examines issues related to corporate mainframe and software products, the computer time‐sharing industry, application service providers, the demand for software, and web applications. Chapter 7 covers the impact of the internet on the retail sector. Chapter 8 talks about the emergence and decline of dot.com companies. Chapter 9 describes the impact of the internet on the media industry including print media, broadcast media, newspaper, television, and the emergence of online media. Chapter 10 looks at the impact of the internet on various nonmedia industries including travel, real estate, PC manufacturing, and information technology service industries. Chapter 11 describes the impact of the internet on the health care industry and higher education sector, arguing that while users are willing to use some internet tools, they are reluctant to use other ones. Chapter 12 examines how the internet has been applied to various industries and business operations. Chapter 13 talks about the impact of the internet on community‐based businesses and services, including converted service, brokerage services, social networking services, and community networking services. Chapter 14 covers the impact of the internet on the music business, including the use of internet technology for marketing, distributing, and sharing music. Chapter 15 deals with the internet and the pornography business and looks at the growth and profitability of the industry, the industry structure, and some major players in the industry. Chapter 16 examines the role of the internet in community building, addressing issues related to games and their community, social networking, wikipedia and its registered users.

Overall the book is descriptive in nature. Chapters describe how the internet itself was developed and how it has been gradually applied to various industries and businesses in the past 15 years or so. The most useful part of its coverage is the application of the internet specifically in business, since the description of the development of the internet in general can be easily found in the existing literature. For example, the history of the internet has already been written by the original internet creators (see A Brief History of the internet by Barry M. Leiner et al.). The coverage of businesses highlights some important business areas that are obviously affected by the internet – including retail, media, travel, real estate, PC manufacturing, information technology, heath care, higher education, music, etc. The book also touches on the role of the internet in forming various social and community networks.

The book was not written for quantitative researchers, since neither the coverage of the development of the internet nor the coverage of the internet applications in businesses presents empirical research in terms of hypothesis testing and the use of quantitative research methodologies. It is probably most suitable for tertiary students and those who want to have a general idea about the impact of the internet on businesses and industries, since it is informative and provides a general coverage of the topic.