When Internet Companies Morph: Understanding Organizational Strategy Changes in the 'New' New Economy (originally published in July 2002)

First Monday ◽  
2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert J. Kauffman ◽  
Tim Miller ◽  
Bin Wang
Keyword(s):  
Process Analysis ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Internet Economy ◽  
Rapid Ascent ◽  
Business Profitability ◽  
Commercial Applications ◽  
Strategy Changes ◽  
Current Emphasis ◽  
Internet Companies

This paper is included in the First Monday Special Issue: Commercial Applications of the Internet, published in July 2006. For author reflections on this paper, visit the Special Issue. The rapid ascent of the Internet economy funneled almost $US90 billion of venture capital money into Internet startups over a period of four years that roughly ended in mid-2000. An equally rapid bust in the cycle that year abruptly shut off funding and thrust remaining Internet companies into an unprecedented frenzy of adaptive strategic and organizational re-focusing behavior. In this article, we relate the findings of our study of this period of hyper-evolution and give a snapshot of the publicly reported "morphing" activities of 125 Internet companies, based on which we propose a profitability-driven typology of Internet firm repositioning behavior. The study provides academic researchers with an overview of industry strategic mutation patterns and provides executives with a process analysis for identifying and evaluating their own strategies in a way that is essential for success in the highly volatile Internet economy. We also offer our predictions on these strategies' efficacy in light of the current emphasis on business profitability and return on investment (ROI).

Reflections on: When Internet companies morph

First Monday ◽  
2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert J. Kauffman ◽  
Tim Miller ◽  
Bin Wang
Keyword(s):  
The Internet ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Commercial Applications ◽  
Internet Companies

This paper is included in the First Monday Special Issue #6: Commercial applications of the Internet, published in July 2006. Special Issue editor Mark A. Fox asked authors to submit additional comments regarding their articles.

Six degrees of reputation: The use and abuse of online review and recommendation systems (originally published in March 2006)

First Monday ◽  
2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shay David ◽  
Trevor Pinch
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Research ◽  
Research Methods ◽  
Qualitative Research Methods ◽  
Online Review ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Product Reviews ◽  
Information Goods ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Quantitative And Qualitative Research ◽  
Commercial Applications

This paper is included in the First Monday Special Issue: Commercial Applications of the Internet, published in July 2006. This paper reports initial findings from a study that used quantitative and qualitative research methods and custom–built software to investigate online economies of reputation and user practices in online product reviews at several leading e–commerce sites (primarily Amazon.com). We explore several cases in which book and CD reviews were copied whole or in part from one item to another and show that hundreds of product reviews on Amazon.com might be copies of one another. We further explain the strategies involved in these suspect product reviews, and the ways in which the collapse of the barriers between authors and readers affect the ways in which these information goods are being produced and exchanged. We report on techniques that are employed by authors, artists, editors, and readers to ensure they promote their agendas while they build their identities as experts. We suggest a framework for discussing the changes of the categories of authorship, creativity, expertise, and reputation that are being re–negotiated in this multi–tier reputation economy.

A Taxonomy of Internet Commerce (originally published in October 1998)

First Monday ◽  
2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Bambury
Keyword(s):  
Real World ◽  
Classification System ◽  
Business Models ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Internet Commerce ◽  
Internet Business ◽  
Commercial Applications

This paper is included in the First Monday Special Issue: Commercial Applications of the Internet, published in July 2006. For author reflections on this paper, visit the Special Issue. This paper attempts to clarify terminology discussing the interface between commerce and the Internet. It is also an empirically derived classification system or taxonomy of existing Internet business models. This taxonomy has two main branches - transplanted real-world business models and native Internet business models. The latter part of the paper discusses the role of business, governments, regulation and ideology in the development of I-Commerce and makes some cautious speculations regarding its future.

Trends emerging more clearly: Business models of news Web Sites

First Monday ◽  
2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fred Schiff
Keyword(s):  
Web Sites ◽  
Business Models ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
News Web Sites ◽  
Commercial Applications

This paper is included in the First Monday Special Issue #6: Commercial applications of the Internet, published in July 2006. Special Issue editor Mark A. Fox asked authors to submit additional comments regarding their articles.

Introduction to special issue #6: Commercial applications of the Internet

First Monday ◽  
2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark A. Fox
Keyword(s):  
The Internet ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Commercial Applications

This paper is included in the First Monday Special Issue #6: Commercial applications of the Internet.

Reflections on: Online grocery shopping

First Monday ◽  
2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark A. Fox
Keyword(s):  
The Internet ◽  
Grocery Shopping ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Commercial Applications

This paper is included in the First Monday Special Issue #6: Commercial applications of the Internet, published in July 2006. Special Issue editor Mark A. Fox asked authors to submit additional comments regarding their articles.

‘Something is rotten in the state of Denmark:’ Why the Internet’s advertising business model is broken

First Monday ◽  
2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Jardine
Keyword(s):  
Business Model ◽  
Mobile Applications ◽  
Economies Of Scale ◽  
Personal Data ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Free Service ◽  
Internet Economy ◽  
Two Factors ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Internet Companies

Large swaths of the Internet economy are based on an advertising business model. Many content platforms, social media sites and mobile applications provide a free service to users in exchange for personal data that, once collected, is sold to advertisers and data brokers to generate corporate revenue. Metcalfe’s Law predicts that corporate revenues should increase exponentially as a company’s number of connections goes up and that costs should increase linearly. The combination of exponentially increasing revenues and linearly increasing costs should generate large profits for ad-based Internet companies. However, the opposite tends to be the case. Many established Internet companies are deeply in the red and only an estimated 0.01 percent of mobile applications will ever earn a profit. This disjunction raises the question: why do so many ad-based Internet companies perform so badly?The answer lies in the interaction of two factors. First, the costs faced by advertising-based Internet companies tend to increase faster than their core resource (i.e., users). Ad-based Internet companies, therefore, do not seem to benefit from economies of scale on the cost side of the equation. The implication is that such companies need a very large number of users in order to reach profitability. Secondly, profitability’s large user base requirement turns out to be extraordinarily rare in the Internet ecosystem because the network tends to structure itself into what are known as power law distributions, where most companies get only a few users (millions maybe) while some get literally billions. This suggests that the advertising model that underwrites so many Internet companies is broken. It works for a few, but not for most.

Pricing, agents, perceived value and the Internet (originally published in June 2001)

First Monday ◽  
2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Phillip G. Bradford ◽  
Herbert E. Brown ◽  
Paula M. Saunders
Keyword(s):  
Perceived Value ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Internet Pricing ◽  
Internet Auctions ◽  
Customer Perceived Value ◽  
Commercial Applications ◽  
And Function ◽  
Use Of Internet ◽  
Role And Function

This paper is included in the First Monday Special Issue: Commercial Applications of the Internet, published in July 2006. The Internet has changed the way people buy things. A pointed difference is the use of Internet auctions and bots. But, are these differences actually changing the role and function of price in the firm's marketing program? Are they possibly changing options for pricing, and perhaps even, the very notion of perceived value? Or in fact, does the new set of Internet pricing mechanisms merely require marketers to do what good marketers have always done, and that is to build customer-perceived value and use price to recapture it? The only difference may be that now, we can do it even better because we have better tools.

Reflections on: Trust management on the World Wide Web

First Monday ◽  
2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rohit Khare ◽  
Adam Rifkin
Keyword(s):  
World Wide Web ◽  
Trust Management ◽  
World Wide ◽  
The Internet ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
The World ◽  
Commercial Applications

This paper is included in the First Monday Special Issue #6: Commercial applications of the Internet, published in July 2006. Special Issue editor Mark A. Fox asked authors to submit additional comments regarding their articles.

Reflections on: A taxonomy of Internet commerce

First Monday ◽  
2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Bambury
Keyword(s):  
The Internet ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Internet Commerce ◽  
Commercial Applications

This paper is included in the First Monday Special Issue #6: Commercial applications of the Internet, published in July 2006. Special Issue editor Mark A. Fox asked authors to submit additional comments regarding their articles.

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