Electronic commerce, or e-commerce has developed exponentially in the last few years and has left some in the cold. The majority of people think e-commerce is just about buying and selling things over the Internet like through auctioning sites such as E-Bay and U-Bid. However, E-commerce is a broad term describing the electronic exchange of business data between two or more organizations' computers. Some examples might be the electronic job applications, on-line services like America online, and on-line billing that automatically pays specified bills each month so you don’t have to mail a check. E-commerce also includes buying and selling any item over the Internet, electronic banking so you can transfer funds between accounts or stocks, smart cards, and all other methods of conducting business over digital networks. “The primary technological goal of e-commerce is to integrate businesses, government agencies, and contractors into a single community with the ability to communicate with one another across any computer platform.”(Edwards, 1998) Electronic commerce started 130 plus years ago by telegraph technology. This is similar to wiring money though an electronic agency for a small fee. The advent of credit cards as a payment system began the revolution of the automated process of commerce that we are so familiar to today. The introduction of the ATM card in the mid 80’s was one of the most recent improvements to electronic commerce and its capabilities. As the Internet grows in popularity every day, so does electronic commerce. E-business can be anything from purchasing clothes from a department store online to checking your bank statement. All are examples of the many aspects of e-business. There are many forms of e-business similar to this. When comparing traditional business to e-business, one can see that there are some differences amongst the two. The most obvious difference when buying standard goods (...
