Basics of Electronic Commerce
- Class Summary
This class introduces a basic foundation of the environment supporting electronic transactions, including providing a definition of what the internet is in terms of technology, policy, and economics. The internet provides a new means to use existing and new electronic communications technology taking advantage of the public switched telephone system and enhancing it with packet switching technology for the flow of data. The internet provides a new means to permit accessibility of information by distributing ownership, controls, and operation of the networks that form the internet through their interconnections. Lastly, the internet provides a new economy by permitting the disaggregation of product value and openning markets to providers limiting their operations to single or selected value-add market segments. - Class Slides
Secondary Sources
- Michael Rappa, Business Models on the Web, (2002).
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 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. - Andrew Mitchell, Electronic Commerce, Mel. L.Sch., Legal Studies Research Paper No. 353 (2007).
In this article, electronic commerce is conceived of as conducting or facilitating business via electronic communications networks and computer systems. This includes buying and selling online, electronic funds transfer, business communications (including by telephone, facsimile and internal data networks), and using computers to access business information resources. The WTO has recognized that commercial transactions can be broken into three stages: (1) advertising and searching, (2) ordering and payment, and (3) delivery. Common conceptions of electronic commerce involve business-to-consumer or business-to-business interaction at one or more of these three stages. Generally speaking, however, electronic commerce also encompasses activities that do not fit neatly into any one of these categories, such as electronic logistics tracking and business process outsourcing. - Douglas Morrisson, The Statute Of Frauds Online: Can A Computer Sign A Contract For The Sale Of Goods?, 14 Geo. Mason U.L.Rev. 637 (1992).
Section 1-102 of the Uniform Commercial Code provides that the "underlying purposes and policies" of the Code are to "modernize the law governing commercial transactions" and to "permit the continued expansion of commercial practices through custom, usage and agreement of the parties." Today, commercial transactions routinely involve the use of devices and practices which, needless to say, did not exist when the U.C.C. first was promulgated in 1952 nor when the original Statute of Frauds was enacted by Parliament in 1677.