Week 6: Tech Guide 4 & Week 7: Chapter 5 & 6

Tech Guide 4: Basics of Telecommunications and Networks

1. A basic telecommunication system consists of three elements:

1. a transmitter that takes information and converts it to a signal;
2. a transmission medium that carries the signal; and,
3. a receiver that receives the signal and converts it back into usable information.

2. Ethernet is a common local area network protocol, ethernet uses twisted-pair wire or coaxial cable.

1. Twisted-pair wire is the most common form of communications wiring and is used for almost all business telephone wiring. It is advantageous because it is inexpensive, widely available and easy to work with. However, it does hold some setbacks such as low bandwidth making it slow, it can be easily tapped and it is subject to interference.
2. Coaxial cable is made of insulated copper wire and is much less susceptible to electrical interference in comparison to twisted-pair wire. It has a higher bandwidth than twisted-pair wire. Coaxial cable can be disadvantageous because it is difficult to work with and is relatively expensive and inflexible.

In contrast, fiber-optic cables are thousands of extremely fine filaments of glass fibers. It has a very high bandwidth, is relatively inexpensive and difficult to tap. The only problem with fiber optic cables is that it is difficult to work with.

3. The main reason for using networks are that it allows organisations to be prepared and flexible to the fluid business conditions. Networks also allow organisations to share hardware, computer applications, and data/information across the organisation. Networks are also imperative in businesses as it allows employees to share a close working-relationship even if they are far apart. Networks are especially an important connection between businesses and their customers.

4. A local area network (LAN) - links two or more devices in a restricted geographical region, so that all the devices in the network can communicate with one another. For example, an organisation’s Intranet.
A wide-area network (WAN) - are networks that cover a large area and normally connect several LANs. An example of WAN could be a company that is domestically covered, such as Telstra.

5. A network protocol are the rules and procedures that control and administrate transmission of data across a network.

6. Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) is the protocol used in the internet.
The TCP has three basic functions, it:

1. Manages the movement of packets between computers by creating a connection between the computers,
2. Orders the transfer of packets, and
3. Acknowledges that the packets have been transferred.

Chapter 5: Network Applications

1. Web 2.0 refers to the live web. Information technologies and applications used by Web 2.0 include blogs, tagging, wikis and podcasting.

Web 2.0 websites typically include some of the following features/techniques-

• Search- The ease of finding information through keyword search.
• Links- Ad-hoc guides to other relevant information.
• Authoring- The ability to create constantly updating content over a platform that is shifted from being the creation of a few to being constantly updated, interlinked work. In wikis, the content is iterative in the sense that users undo and redo each other's work. In blogs, content is cumulative in that posts and comments of individuals are accumulated over time.
• Tags - Categorization of content by creating tags: simple, one-word user-determined descriptions to facilitate searching and avoid rigid, pre-made categories.
• Extensions- Powerful algorithms that leverage the Web as an application platform as well as a document server.
• Signals- The use of RSS technology to rapidly notify users of content changes.

2. Web services are applications, provided via the Internet, that users can select and combine through almost any device whether it be a computer or mobile phone. The function of web services is to permit different systems to communicate with one another without the aid of humans to translate the conversations.

3. Social Networking behind business is revolutionary - it allows businesses to communicate with their employees and consumers. Social sites like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and LinkedIn feed the craving people have to find one another, exchange information, catch up and solve problems.
People into social networking use the word "viral" to describe how quickly networks form and spread.

Chapter 6: E-Business and E-Commerce

Section 6.1
1. Electronic commerce (or e-commerce) refers to the process of selling, buying, transferring and exchanging products, services or information through computer networks, including the Internet.

In addition to what e-commerce involves, e-business also entails customer service, online relationships with business partners and performing electronic transactions.

2. - Business-to-consumer (B2C): the organisations are the sellers and the individuals are the buyers.
- Business-to-business (B2B): both the seller and the buyer are business organisations
- Consumer-to-consumer (C2C): both the seller and the buyer are individuals
- Business-to-Employee (B2E): the organisation provides information and services to its employees.


3. Benefits of E-commerce:

• Benefits to organizations that use this with their business partners:
  - direct marketing,
  - selling,
  - customer services, (call centres)
  - fulfillment,
  - procurement,
  - replenishment and
  - information management.
• Benefits to consumers
• Benefits to society
• Increase sales
• Decreasing costs
• Provide price quotes
• Increase profits
• Expands the size of the market from regional to national or national to international
• Reach a narrow market
• Target market segmentation allows you to focus on a more

Limitations:
> Technical Limitations:

• costs of a technological solution
• some protocols are not standardized around the world
• reliability for certain processes
• insufficient telecommunications bandwidth
• software tools are not fixed but constantly evolving (ie. Netscape 3,4,4.7,4.75 etc.)
• integrating digital and non-digital sales and production information
• access limitations of dial-up, cable, ISDN, wireless
• some vendors require certain software to show features on their pages, which is not common in the
• standard browser used by the majority
• Difficulty in integrating e-Commerce infrastructure with current organizational IT systems

> Non-Technical Limitations:

• privacy issues
• customer expectations unmet
• rules and regulations (ie. Jan 2004 Bill C6 - new privacy law)
• security and privacy
• vulnerability to fraud and other crimes
• lack of trust and user resistance
• fear of payment information being unsecure
• tactile limitations
• legal issues outstanding such as jurisdiction
• legal environment has many new and conflicting laws
• cultural obstacles
• linguistic challenges
• limitations of support services
• financial cost
• sourcing tech support in foreign languages
• lack of critical mass in certain market areas for sellers and buyers
• accessibility outside of urban/suburban and areas effects universality
• higher employee training required to be click and mortar
• people's resistance to change
• people not used to faceless / paperless / non-physical transactions

Section 6.2
1. Spamming Permission Marketing, Viral Marketing:

Spamming: is the abuse of sending unsolicited bulk emails that are unwanted to receivers.

Permission marketing : allows consumers to voluntarily receive emails and advertising online.
Viral marketing: is the effort of 'word-of-mouth' messages sent through online to achieve marketing purposes.

Sources: http://books.google.com.au/books?id=UHA5Je0pZ9EC&pg=PA145&dq=spamming#v=onepage&q=spamming&f=false


Section 6.4
1. Micropayments are transferring very small amounts of money, often in conjunction with the threshold pledge system, in situations where collecting such small amounts of money with the usual payment systems is impractical, or very expensive, in terms of the amount of money being collected.

2. Multichanneling is a process which a company intergrates its offline and online channels.



Section 6.5
1. There are many ethical issues related to e-commerce.
E-commerce presents some threats to privacy (e.g. tracking) and job loss.

2. The major legal issues in EC are fraud on the Internet, domain names, cybersquatting, taxes and other fees, and copyright.