Internet Research

Knowledge of the Internet Protocol (IP) address is essential for connection establishment in certain classes of synchronous distributed applications such as Internet telephony and videoconferencing systems. A problem of dynamic IP addressing arises when the connection to the Internet is through an Internet Service Provider since the IP address is dynamically allocated only at connection time. This paper proposes and contrast a number of generic methods that can be classified as online and off-line methods for the resolution of dynamic IP addressing. On-line methods, which include the World-Wide-Web, exchange server and dynamic Domain Name System, are only effective when both the caller and recipient are logged onto the Internet. On the other hand, off-line methods, which include electronic mailing and directory service lookup, provide an additional means to allow the caller to leave messages when the recipient is not logged onto the Internet. Of these methods, the dynamic Domain Name ...

The increasing dimension and heterogeneity of global Web systems make harder their management with tools based on the client/server model. The Mobile Agent technology overcomes the limits of traditional approaches and proposes solutions that are suitable for the management of distributed and heterogeneous Internet-based systems. The paper describes the MAMAS environment and its implementation with a Mobile Agent technology. MAMAS has the goals of monitoring the whole system, introducing dynamic corrective actions and modifying system policies at run-time. MAMAS achieves these objectives by answering the guidelines of both security and compliance to standards. The choice of Java as the implementation language has permitted to achieve portability, to exploit the language security features, and to provide Web accessibility. The MAMAS compliance with CORBA ensures interoperability with legacy management platforms. Keywords: Mobile Agents, Network and Systems Management, Security, Interoperability, Web-based accessibility.

this paper we analyze Internet growth based on measurements of which of a dozen common TCP services could be reached at each of over 13,000 sites worldwide, tested four times over the course of 1992. We analyze this data as a function of country, type of institution, and type of service. We also derive mathematical models that can be used to project growth rates for individual countries and the global Internet. Introduction The global TCP/IP Internet is growing at a phenomenal rate. In 1982, its predecessor networks (ARPANET and CSNET) connected approximately 150 computers together. Today, the Internet connects over 12,000 networks and 1.5 million computers. Gateways to a variety of electronic messaging services permit Internet users to communicate with at least 15 million educational, commercial, government, military, and other types of users throughout the worldwide Matrix of computer networks that exchange mail or news. During this same time period, the Interne

This article introduces a way to design geographically distributed virtual prototyping, a new Internet technology, in order to facilitate designer-customer communication in the product development of small electronic devices, such as mobile telephones. First we will present our research in the concept design domain with a set of requirements focusing on communication between the designer and the customer. Second, a technique called 'smart virtual prototyping' will be presented to elaborate on the virtual prototyping techniques to be used over the World Wide Web. Third, we will present the main ideas, architecture and selected software techniques of WebShaman, which is an application built to demonstrate how a distributed virtual prototyping system could support geographically distant designer-customer communication. Finally, we discuss the possible impact of the distributed virtual prototyping approach on the WWW community. Keywords Virtual Prototyping, Internet, World Wide Web, Dist...

this paper we report findings from the analysis of a large data set of user queries to the Excite search engine. Our analysis shows that few users reformulate queries or use relevance feedback. This research contributes to the growing body of studies seeking to describe the dimensions of Web searching. Few studies have investigated the use of query reformulation and relevance feedback options by users of Web search engines. The study of users' interaction with Web search engines is an important and emerging area of research with implications for the development of

Recent growth of the Internet has greatly increased the amount of information that is accessible and the number of resources that are available to users. To exploit this growth, it must be possible for users to find the information and resources they need. Existing techniques for organizing systems have evolved from those used on centralized systems, but these techniques are inadequate for organizing information on a global scale. This article describes Prospero, a distributed file system based on the Virtual System Model. Prospero provides tools to help users organize Internet resources. These tools allow users to construct customized views of available resources, while taking advantage of the structure imposed by others. Prospero provides a framework that can tie together various indexing services producing the fabric upon which resource discovery techniques can be applied.

Heterogeneous project groups today may be expected to use the mechanisms of the Web for sharing of information. Meta-data has been proposed as a mechanism for expressing semantics of information and hence facilitate information retrieval, understanding and use. This paper presents an approach to sharing of information which aims to use a semantic modeling language as the basis for expressing semantics of information and designing meta-data schemes. Functioning in the borderlines between human and computer understandability, the modeling language could be able to express semantics of published Web documents. Reporting on work in progress , the paper presents the overall framework and ideas.

Previous research suggests males and females exhibit different beliefs about and attitudes toward traditional media advertising along with different advertising stimulated consumer behaviors. However, little is known about gender differences in consumer beliefs about Web advertising versus other media, attitude toward Web advertising, or Web advertising associated consumer behavior. Survey results indicate males and females differ significantly on several dimensions with males exhibiting more positive beliefs about Web advertising and more positive attitudes toward Web advertising than females. Additionally, males are more likely than females to purchase from the Web and surf the Web for functional and entertainment reasons, whereas females are more likely to surf the Web for shopping reasons.

Purpose – This paper seeks to review current research on assistive consumer technologies (ACT 1.0) and to discuss a series of research challenges that need to be addressed before the field can move towards tools that are more effective and more readily adopted by consumers (ACT 2.0). Design/methodology/approach – This is a conceptual paper. The perspective, commensurate with the current research and areas of expertise, is that of consumer researchers. Findings – The paper argues that, while substantial advances have been made in the technical design of ACTs – and the algorithms that power recommendation systems, there are substantial barriers to wide‐scale consumer adoption of such tools that need to be addressed. In particular, future ACT designs will need to better integrate current research in human judgment and decision making to improve the ease with which such tools can be used. Originality/value – From the perspective of consumer researchers, the paper highlights a set of key areas of enquiry that have the potential to substantially advance assistive consumer technology research.

Purpose – Existing literature has agreed that during elections party web sites are primarily an information tool. This study seeks to identify to what extent political parties have developed a distinctive role for the Internet as a communications channel. Design/methodology/approach – Research data were based on content analysis of the web sites and e‐newsletters of parties contesting the 2005 UK General Election, and interviews with party e‐campaigners. Findings – Party size determined whether they had an integrated online communication strategy or not. The Internet did provide a discrete role, that of recruiting new members, encouraging donations and mobilising volunteers. Whereas previous research has focused on the web as an election campaign tool, this study found that it was e‐mail, especially pass‐protected e‐newsletters to party members. Originality/value – The traditional view was that parties used their web sites primarily to promote information. This study suggests that they only do so partially. Parties do not use their web sites as part of an integrated communication strategy supporting the messages carried by other channels. In 2005 UK parties began to develop a positive reason for having an online presence, namely as a resource generating tool, particularly in mobilising volunteers. Previous literature had considered whether parties had entered into dialogue; this study further defined this into asymmetrical and symmetrical two‐way communication. The results suggest that it is smaller parties who are more likely to use two‐way symmetrical communication.

Purpose – This study seeks to discover whether the existence of Web 2.0 applications introduced a more interactive approach to British parties and candidates’ use of the Internet during the 2009 European Parliament elections. Design/methodology/approach – Research data were based on content analysis of the web sites of British candidates and parties during the 2009 European Parliament elections. The conceptual framework assesses whether there is evidence of a monologic versus dialogic approach, and normalisation versus equalisation between parties. Findings – The paper finds that parties were not using Web 2.0 as a strategic device. The party list system meant that parties were twice as likely as candidates to use Web 2.0 applications and, overall, there is weak evidence of a third way of ebb and flow. Continuing the experience of previous elections there is evidence of a predominantly monologic approach; however, the debate is no longer simply between normalisation versus equalisation, a more sophisticated approach suggests a third way, where political campaigning has been altered. While the overall levels of interactivity and dialogue are not high, there is some evidence of the development of a Web 1.5 sphere offering more interaction, but within a controlled environment. This study notes that ideology is a factor, where it is the right wing parties which are most likely to adopt interactivity. Originality/value – Previous literature on elections in general, and the European Parliament elections specifically, suggest that in the UK the Internet is primarily used for monologic communication and supporting the normalisation thesis. This study suggests, within an era of Web 2.0, a slight refinement to this interpretation.

Software is the intellectual capital output of the codified knowledge of a programming team. The development cost is high, but the variable cost of sale is substantially lower (negligible) than for hard goods. Unfortunately, there does not exist a valid or reliable measure to value software. The trend has been to align pricing to the activities that buyers realize value from. However, new architectures change the nature of where value is realized and how service becomes part of the equation. There does not exist a perfect generic pricing model. Vendors must understand the value they provide to their customers and create a price structure that aligns pricing with value realization, but more importantly facilitates their business objectives of the product (and service).

This paper surveys the security architecture of the IP multimedia core network subsystem (IMS) of the third generation mobile system which is known in Europe as UMTS. The main features of the security architecture include user specific features protecting the access of the IMS user, such as authentication and key agreement when a user registers and integrity protection of IMS access signalling, but also features for the user, independent protection of SIP signalling in the IMS core network. Authenticated registration is given an in-depth treatment.

The World Wide Web (WWW) has become an extremely popular information service. Large HTTP packets result in network congestion. Proxy cache servers are widely deployed on the Internet to overcome this obstacle. However, the approach yields an undesirable phenomenon – a small set of users misuse proxy servers to mirror the entire contents of Web sites. This behavior wastes network resources, increases WWW servers’ loads, increases users’ waiting time, and violates copyrights. Approaches to designing a proxy server with WWW usage control and to making the proxy server effective on local area networks are proposed to prevent such abnormal WWW access and to prioritize WWW usage. Finally, a system, ProxyBreaker, is implemented to demonstrate the approaches. The implementation reveals that the proposed approaches are effective, such that the abnormal Web access does not reoccur.

Examines the damaging effects that malicious computer abuse, such as hacking and viruses, can have on the development of an information-based society. Computing and telecommunications technologies are a key ingredient in the realization of this society, but are increasingly the targets of criminals and mischief makers. Highlights the apparent escalation in computer-abuse incidents, as illustrated by a number of recent surveys, and examines the effects that these may have on the public perception of technology (and, hence, the smooth transition to the information society). Also presents some broad recommendations regarding what can be done to address the problem. This considers both technical measures to help safeguard systems and revised attitudes to computer abuse, to insure that incidents can be dealt with more effectively.

It is widely assumed - and frequently asserted - that university communication practices are being radically transformed by the introduction of electronic communication. Explores the introduction of Internet access in a single university, the University of Canberra, located in the capital city of Australia. The prime objective was to identify the frequency and type of use that academic staff were making of the Internet during 1995, with supplementary objectives being to record perceptions of users toward the Internet, and barriers to its effective use. The principal finding is not unexpected: academics were making very varied use of the Internet. Some staff were utilizing some facilities on a daily basis; others were yet to begin exploring this new communication medium. A particular surprise was that at the time of this survey the Internet was being used very little for teaching.

This article reports on a study designed to identify the authors of academic library home pages and to investigate the nature of their training and their use of newly-acquired Web design skills. The major finding of the study is that librarians more often than non-librarians are assuming the responsibility for writing home pages for academic libraries in very large public colleges and universities. In addition to professional identity, factors such as length of service to an institution, current job title, and prior education play a role in determining the likelihood that an individual will write the home page for his or her employing library. Learning the skills needed to write a home page requires time for training. Institutional support for training is considered vital and well worth the investment because training is very often disseminated beyond the home page authors. Teaching others Web construction skills is one of the ways library home page authors most frequently apply their newly acquired abilities.

Many Mexican universities are now offering Internet access to their faculty and users. This access is provided by computer services staff who traditionally have been responsible only for the technical aspects of establishing, maintaining, and updating the university computer systems. The computer specialists are finding themselves largely unprepared to assume this new role as information specialists. Examines the newly emerging and evolving roles of these computer specialists.

Reports on the first-ever nationwide quantitative survey of academic staff use of the Internet. After briefly noting reasons for adopting a mailed-out survey, the article discusses some of the results obtained. These include daily use of e-mail, access to the Internet via remote dial-in services and technical support provided to academics. More than one-third of respondents seem in need of more training in Net use and time limitations and lack of training are typical barriers to effective use. The study concludes with opportunities for further research at both national and international levels and discusses possible implications for university administrators. The full report of the study is published as Academics Online (Auslib Press, Adelaide, 1998). The research team also included Edna Sharpe of the Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service.

Wireless Internet via mobile devices (WIMD) is leading the world into another spectrum of communications and means of conducting day-to-day business and life activities. Full bloom of wireless Internet services depends on user acceptance, as well as technology improvement. This paper develops a technology acceptance model for wireless Internet via mobile devices (TAM for wireless Internet), a conceptual framework to explain the factors influencing user acceptance of WIMD. By revising the technology acceptance model (TAM) to represent some unique features of the wireless system under study, TAM for wireless Internet proposes that constructs such as individual differences, technology complexity, facilitating conditions, social influences, and wireless trust environment determine user-perceived short and long-term usefulness, and ease of using WIMD. These, in turn, determine user intention and willingness to adopt WIMD. Twelve propositions are developed to promote and facilitate future empirical research relating to WIMD.

Purpose This study aims at contributing to the discussion related to what causes Canadian small and medium‐size enterprises (SMEs) to be reticent about accepting internet and e‐business technologies (IEBT) in their operations. The research also seeks to gain an understanding of the relative importance of each of the selected factors in the research setting. Design/methodology/approach A survey was conducted in the Atlantic region of Canada. Questionnaires were mailed to key SMEs' informants. Data analysis was performed using the partial least squares (PLS) approach. A research framework based on the technology‐organization‐environment (TOE) frameworks was used to guide the research effort. Such contingent factors as perceived benefits, management commitment/support, organizational IT competence, external pressure, information systems (IS) vendor support, and availability of financial support, were used to develop relevant hypotheses. Findings The study's findings indicated that perceived benefits, management commitment/support, and external pressure are significant predictors of IEBT acceptance in the sampled SMEs; the results did not show that organizational IT competence, IS vendor support, and availability of financial support positively influence IEBT acceptance in the sampled SMEs. Practical implications Policy makers, industry leaders, and small business operators wishing to understand some of the reasons why certain SMEs in the country lag in the adoption of IEBT and related technologies can benefit from the information provided in this study. The study also alerted the attention of local IS vendors and financial institutions to what can be done to strengthen IS adoption in Canadian small businesses. Originality/value A handful of previous research in Canada has researched IEBT adoption; however, some of these studies are dated. A such, this current investigation of IEBT acceptance in a less endowed part of the country is timely and welcoming; it also serves to complement other prior studies in the country and elsewhere. A scan of the extant literature indicates that no previous study in the country has modeled some of the factors (e.g. the availability of financial support) as were used herein. The inclusion of such a factor enriches insight in this area of study.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to determine the factors that influence the intention to use and actual usage of a G2B system such as electronic procurement system (EPS) by various ministries in the Government of Malaysia. Design/methodology/approach The research uses an extension of DeLone and McLean's model of IS success by including trust, facilitating conditions, and web design quality. The model is tested using an empirical approach. A questionnaire was designed and responses from 358 users from various ministries were collected and analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM). Findings The findings of the study indicate that: perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, assurance of service by service providers, responsiveness of service providers, facilitating conditions, web design (service quality) are strongly linked to intention to use EPS; and intention to use is strongly linked to actual usage behavior. Practical implications Typically, governments of developing countries spend millions of dollars to implement e‐government systems. The investments can be considered useful only if the usage rate is high. The study can help ICT decision makers in government to recognize the critical factors that are responsible for the success of a G2B system like EPS. Originality/value The model used in the study is one of the few models designed to determine factors influencing intention to use and actual usage behavior in a G2B system in a fast‐developing country like Malaysia.

Purpose The increasing number of M‐internet subscribers and the fast growing revenue proves the great potential of M‐internet as well as the enormous business opportunity in Korea. The success in this business is dependent on understanding the concerns of customers and identifying the factors that promote the use of M‐internet. Thus, this paper aims to examine the human motivations underlying individual behavioral intention to use M‐internet in Korea. Design/methodology/approach Employs TAM (technology acceptance model) as the base model and develops a more comprehensive version of TAM to better reflect M‐internet context. The model employs perceived playfulness, contents quality, system quality, internet experience and perceived price level, in addition to perceived usefulness and ease of use. Investigates the causal relationships among the constructs used in this revised TAM and identifies the direct and indirect causal role of the constructs in developing the intention to use M‐internet. Findings Finds that attitude toward M‐internet is the most significant factor in predicting the behavioral intention to use M‐internet. Also identifies the positive role of the perceived playfulness and the negative role of perceived price level in developing the attitude as well as the intention. The positive causal relationships of “perceived contents quality – perceived usefulness”, “perceived system quality– perceived usefulness” and “internet experience–perceived ease of use” were also witnessed. Practical implications Considering the explosive growth of the M‐internet market, well‐established business strategy in M‐internet will deliver great success to the mobile operators. Thus, understanding comprehensive causal relationship among the constructs used in this revised TAM would help managers to better implement the strategic ramifications in promoting M‐internet. Originality/value Develops a more comprehensive version of TAM to better reflect M‐internet context in Korea, adding five new constructs and identifies the role of the construct in promoting the use of M‐internet.

Purpose Building upon studies of social psychology and information system literature, this study aims to propose and empirically test a research model that incorporates interpersonal motives (sociability and status) and hedonic motive (perceived enjoyment), and the three processes of social influence: compliance, identification and internalisation, to explain one's intention to use social network (SN) web sites. Design/methodology/approach The data were obtained from an online survey of 274 SN web site users. Structural equation modelling analysis was used to validate the proposed model. Findings The results indicate that social influence affects intention directly through the compliance process. Social influence, when exerted through the identification and internalization processes, affects intention indirectly via the two interpersonal motives (sociability and status) and perceived enjoyment. The two interpersonal motives affect intention indirectly via perceived enjoyment. Research limitations/implications This study advances theory by examining how the social influence processes affect one's behavioural intention via the interpersonal and hedonic motives. Practical implications These findings help online SNs to devise strategies to attract and retain users. Originality/value This study provides evidence that social influence processes are also operative in one's adoption of information technology in non‐work settings. It also shows that people have two interpersonal motives in mind when they develop an online relationship with others.

As the use of Web-based learning technologies to supplement college classroom instruction has increased, a key issue for faculty members is how to entice their students to accept these technologies. Research suggests that student experience with the technologies may influence their acceptance. The technology acceptance model was used as a framework to study the effect of student experience with Web-based learning technologies on their acceptance of those technologies. Analysis showed that experience with the technology positively influenced perceived ease of use. Perceptions of ease of use and usefulness positively influenced attitudes towards the technology. Attitude positively influenced intention to use, and intention positively influenced usage. Results suggest that as student experience with a technology increases, they perceive it to be easier to use and more useful, and therefore, are more likely to use it. When introducing the technology, instructors should emphasize how easy the technology is to use and how useful it is in improving grades.

Purpose – To analyse the web acceptance and usage between goal-directed users and experiential users, incorporating intrinsic motives to improve the particular and explanatory TAM (technology acceptance model) value – traditionally related to extrinsic motives. Design/methodology/approach – A survey instrument was used to gather data to test the relationships shown in the research model. Data were collected from a sample of online questionnaires filled out by subscribers located in three discussion-mailing lists – administered by RedIris – about different topics (e.g. experimental sciences, social sciences and humanities). A structural equation modeling (SEM), specifically partial least squares (PLS), is proposed to assess the relationships between the constructs together with the predictive power of the research model. Findings – The empirical development suggests that there is scope for further extension of TAM to adapt to the web-based usage and its profitable consequences. The article may help to further the empirical research and to clarify and examine a web acceptance and usage model. In general, experiential and goal-directed behaviours moderate the key relationships in the model. Experiential and goal-directed users do not weigh extrinsic and intrinsic motives in the same way when on the web. Goal-directed users are more driven by instrumental factors and focused on their decision-making process while experiential users are more motivated by process.. Research limitations/implications – First, constructs of enjoyment and concentration are used to define flow. However, because of the flow definition's conceptual-vagueness, operationalising the flow construct has been questioned in the previous empirical works. Second, the cross-sectional study is also an important limitation. Since the users' perception and intention can change over time, it is important to measure these quantities at several points of time. Third, the sample sizes are relatively small. Fourth, the model needs to be tested with more objective measures to compare possible divergences. Finally, the model clearly does not include all the relevant variables. Practical implications – The results could be used to explain and to improve the experiential and goal-directed users' experience of being and to return to the web. Originality/value – The value of this study is to reveal the moderating influences of browsing-modes on relationship between flow and TAM-beliefs on the web, and, also, how the flow impacts the attitude and intention to use web between experiential and goal-directed users.

Purpose This study is based on the interactivity and perceived similarity between blog readers and the others, and incorporates the concepts from customer experiential value. This paper aims to examine emotional experiences that internet users gain while reading blogs, that is, assesses the attitude of blog readers through their subjective experiences within the communication process. Design/methodology/approach An empirical survey is used to test the hypotheses. The sample is 349 users who browse blogs frequently. Data are analysed using structural equation modelling (SEM) to understand the cause and effect of the entire model and to determine the goodness of fit of the conceptual model. Findings Empirical results demonstrate that: interpersonal interaction enhances browsers, aesthetic experiences as well as playfulness; machine interaction generates high aesthetics value which comprises visual and entertainment effects, service excellence, and CROI; perceived similarity by readers positively influences the four components of customer experiential value; and a positive correlation exists between user attitudes toward reading blogs and their experiential value in aesthetics, playfulness, and service excellence. Practical implications The findings will help bloggers understand the factors key to success and allocate the appropriate resources to operate a blog and achieve success. Originality/value The value of this study is to establish the importance of customer experiential value theory. Previous research on customer experiential value primarily focuses on analysing consumer shopping behaviours and mostly on the utilitarian value of products. This research focuses on inner pleasure gained through reading blogs, such as aesthetic experiences and emotional reactions.

Purpose Provide a secure solution for web services (WS). A new interoperable and distributed access control for WS is presented. Design/methodology/approach Based on the separation of the access control (AC) and authorization function. Findings Mechanisms presented allow seamless integration of external authorization entities in the AC system. The Semantic Policy Language (SPL) developed facilitates specification of policies and semantic policy validation. SPL specifications are modular and can be composed without ambiguity. Also addressed was the problem of the association of policies to resources (WS or their operations) in a dynamic, flexible and automated way. Research limitations/implications The ACProxy component is currently under development. Ongoing work is focused on achieving a richer “use control” for some types of WS. Practical implications Administrators of WS can specify AC policies and validate them to find syntactic and semantic errors. Components for automated validation of policies at different levels are included. This ensures that the AC policies produce the desired effects, facilitating the creation and maintenance of policies. It also provides mechanisms for the use of interoperable authorizations. Originality/value A practical system that provides a secure solution to AC for WS. To the best of one's knowledge, no other system provides mechanisms for semantic validation of policies based on external authorization entities. Likewise, the mechanisms for interoperability of external authorization entities are also novel. The system provides content‐based access control and a secure, decentralized and dynamic solution for authorization that facilitates the management of complex systems and enhances the overall security of the AC.

2010 Henry H. Perritt, Jr This article is an abridgement and adaption of an article published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Technology, which grew out of a paper on the relationship among tort law, First Amendment rights, and common carrier concepts, prepared with support from the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Substantial analytical contributions were made by Timothy K. Bryant, Kenneth R. Liebman, John J. Morgan, and David R. Overstreet, Villanova University School of Law, Classes of 1992 and 1993. Many of the ideas considered herein emerged from a series of informal discussions conducted during the Spring and Summer of 1991 among Mitchell Kapor, Jerry Berman, David R. Johnson, David Farber, Mark Rottenberg, Ronald Plesser, John Podesta, and the author. This article has been republished as part of Internet Research's commemorative 20th anniversary issue. It was originally published in Electronic Networking (later renamed Internet Research), Vol. 2 No. 2, 1992.

Examines the relationship between accessibility to information technology and research publications among users of agricultural libraries in Nigeria. A self-constructed questionnaire, which had a reliability coefficient of 0.90, was used to collect data. A total of 150 questionnaires were distributed and a response rate of 78.7 per cent was obtained. Data were analyzed using the Pearson product moment correlation coefficient and the student t-test. Results showed that there was no significant association between accessibility and research publications. The finding is discussed in the context of information technology benefits in developing countries generally. Suggestions are proffered on how to improve the benefits of IT access.

Considers the problem of improving the performance of Web access by proposing a reconstruction of the internal link structure of a Web site in order to match the quality of the pages (measured in terms of their link importance in the Web space – global ranking) with the popularity of the pages (measured in terms of their importance recognized by Web users – local metrics). Provides a set of simple algorithms for local reorganization of a Web site, which results in improving users’ access to quality pages in an easy and quick way.

Nomadicity is a new challenge for computing and communication technologies. Modern cellular telephone systems extend the usability of portable personal computers enormously. A nomadic user can be given ubiquitous access to remote information stores and computing services. However, the behaviour of wireless links creates severe inconveniences within the traditional data communication paradigm. In this paper we give an overview of the problems related to wireless mobility. We also present a new software architecture for mastering the problems and discuss a new paradigm for designing mobile distributed applications. The key idea in the architecture is to place a mediator, a distributed intelligent agent, between the mobile node and the wireline network.

Explores how the spread of connectivity and the introduction of new standards is driving the emergence of entirely new value constructs that deliver to multiple stakeholders. Examines the new economics of network growth and the associated “economics of increasing returns”. Looks at the dynamic trajectory of this function from the perspective of new business development at the various stages of the trajectory, and derives management implications for each stage in terms of appropriate competitive and market strategies, organizational structure and management practices. Applies the resulting framework to discuss specific implications for the business start-up of Access Point, Philips’ new multimedia, voice technology-based information and on-line services venture that has at its core a disruptive technology.

Multicasting is a necessity for a broadband metro-area-network. Discusses the security problems with current multicast protocols. To make the multicast delivery infrastructure more secure and reliable, a stateful multicast access control mechanism, based on MAPE, is proposed. This mechanism expands the current forwarding procedure of a layer 2 switch so that stateful multicast access control can be carried out at the very edge of the metro area network. The architecture of MAPE is discussed in detail, as well as the states maintained and messages exchanged. Further explains that the scheme is flexible and scalable.

The importance of global connectivity for Third World producers has recently come under intense academic scrutiny in the value chain literature in development studies. However, global value chain analysis seldom mentions the importance of the Internet in facilitating and enhancing the access of Third World manufacturers to developed country markets. This paper attempts to bridge this gap in the literature by exploring the link between Internet connectivity and access to global markets, and uses the South African wood furniture sector as a case study. E-commerce technologies are becoming increasingly important for South African wood furniture producers as they are integrated into global value chains and exposed to the demands of more sophisticated markets. Failure to adopt e-commerce technologies on the part of wood furniture producers could lead to them becoming increasingly marginalized from the international markets that they wish to supply. The paper articulates a number of policy recommendations to promote greater diffusion of e-commerce technologies in the wood furniture sector.

This article examines the changing role of community network associations or “freenets” in providing Internet access by examining the case of the Calgary Community Network Association (CCNA) located in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. The changing role of the CCNA is examined against the backdrop of the withdrawal of states from the telecommunications field, the priorities of the Canadian government, and the role of the private sector. Community networks may ultimately focus on persons who do not have computers, while advertising supported services may attract those with computers who may not wish or cannot afford to pay a commercial Internet Service Provider (ISP).

With the worldwide growth of open telecommunication networks and in particular the Internet, the privacy and security concerns of people using these networks have increased. On the one hand, users are concerned about their privacy, and desire to anonymously access the network. On the other hand, some organizations are concerned about how this anonymous access might be abused. This paper intends to bridge these conflicting interests, and proposes a solution for revocable anonymous access to the Internet. Moreover, the paper presents some legal background and motivation for such a solution. However, the paper also indicates some difficulties and disadvantages of the proposed solution, and suggests the need for further debate on the issue of online anonymity.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present a proposal for the Hierarchy of Effects – a model that has been widely applied in the study of persuasion in traditional communications media – to evaluate Website effectiveness. In particular, this contribution seeks to consider a more complete model in order to evaluate the responses of the individuals to the Websites, incorporating new variables to the traditional sequence; and to study the moderating effect of the specific characteristics of the audience – the individual user's motivations in terms of Internet access in the basic structure of this model. Design/methodology/approach – The multi-equations methodology is used to test the sequence of responses that produce the visit to an experimental Website: the perceived informative value and the perceived entertainment value of a Website, the attitude toward the Website, the attitude toward the brand and the intention to buy the brand for two different individual groups: the “information seekers” and “entertainment seekers”. Findings – The results reveal two well differentiated positive models of behavior in the online context. Practical implications – In their Website strategies, the organizations should not neglect those aspects which may arouse emotional reactions in the Internet users, but they should pay more attention to generated informative value to obtain more favorable users' responses. Originality/value – Previous studies had not tested empirically the moderating effects of the users' motivations in terms of Internet access (search for information versus entertainment) over this original and more complete structure of individuals' responses to the Website.

The mobile software agent paradigm provides a generic, customisable foundation for the development of high performance distriubuted applications. An efficient, general-purpose access control mechanism is required to support the development of a wide range of applications. This is achievable if the design of the access control system is based on the principles of simplicity, programmability (customisation) and reusability. However, existing mobile agent architectures either neglect this issue, or offer centralised schemes that do not support adaptive access control on a per-agent basis and do not address the issues of secure knowledge sharing and reusing. In this paper a simple, distributed access control architecture is presented, based on the concept of distributed, active authorisation entities (lock cells), any combination of which can be referenced by an agent to provide input and/or output access control. It is demonstrated how these lock cells can be used to implement security domains and how they can be combined to create composite lock cells.

Purpose This paper seeks to investigate how the concept of a trust level is used in the access control policy of a web services provider in conjunction with the attributes of users. Design/methodology/approach A literature review is presented to provide background to the progressive role that trust plays in access control architectures. The web services access control architecture is defined. Findings The architecture of an access control service of a web service provider consists of three components, namely an authorisation interface, an authorisation manager, and a trust manager. Access control and trust policies are selectively published according to the trust levels of web services requestors. A prototype highlights the incorporation of a trust level in the access control policy as a viable solution to the problem of web services access control, where decisions of an autonomous nature need to be made, based on information and evidence. Research limitations/implications The WSACT architecture addresses the selective publication of policies. The implementation of sophisticated policy‐processing points at each web service endpoint, to automatically negotiate about policies, is an important element needed to complement the architecture. Practical implications The WSACT access control architecture illustrates how access control decisions can be made autonomously by including a trust level of web services requestors in an access control policy. Originality/value The WSACT architecture incorporates the trust levels of web services requestors and the attributes of users into one model. This allows web services providers to grant advanced access to the users of trusted web services requestors, in contrast with the limited access that is given to users who make requests through web services requestors with whom a minimal level of trust has been established.

The Grid is widely seen as the next generation Internet. Aims to share dynamic collections of individuals, institutions and resources by providing consistent, easy and inexpensive access to high-end computational capabilities. Studies Grid security and specifically users' access control. It has been proved that the viability of these heterogeneous environments is highly dependent on their security design. Solutions trying to address all aspects of security were proposed by most existing Grid projects and collaborations; however the results were not always satisfactory. Reviews some of the most widely-accepted security solutions, and collects the most efficient. Emphasizes access control procedures and the solutions addressing authentication and authorization issues. Identifies the most successful security schemes implemented and illustrates their effectiveness. Collects these mechanisms to form the backbone of a security mechanism, addressing authentication and authorization Grid-specific problems. The proposed schemes can constitute the backbone of an effective Grid security architecture.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to determine if the homepage of a web site is representative of the whole site with respect to accessibility. Design/methodology/approach – The paper presents an intraclass correlation (ICC) between homepage web accessibility barrier (WAB) scores and the WAB scores of web site levels 1 through 3 for 33 popular web sites. Findings – The paper finds that the homepage is not sufficient to detect the accessibility of the web site. ICC of the homepage and average of levels 1‐3 is 0.250 (p=0.062) and ICC of levels 1, 2, and 3 is 0.784 (p<0.0001). Evaluating the homepage and first‐level pages gives more accurate results of entire site accessibility. Originality/value – This is first study correlating homepage accessibility with web site accessibility.

Purpose Using Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, higher education web sites were retrospectively analyzed to study the effects that technological advances in web design have had on accessibility for persons with disabilities. Design/methodology/approach A convenience sample of higher education web sites was studied for years 1997‐2002. The homepage and pages 1‐level down were evaluated. Web accessibility barrier (WAB) and complexity scores were calculated. Repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to determine trends in the data and Pearson's correlation ( r ) was computed to evaluate the relationship between accessibility and complexity. Findings Higher education web sites become progressively inaccessible as complexity increases. Research limitations/implications The WAB score is a proxy of web accessibility. While the WAB score can give an indication of the accessibility of a web site, it cannot differentiate between barriers posing minimal limitations and those posing absolute inaccessibility. A future study is planned to have users with disabilities examine web sites with differing WAB scores to correlate how well the WAB score is gauging accessibility of web sites from the perspective of the user. Practical implications Findings from studies such as this can lead to improved guidelines, policies, and overall awareness of web accessibility for persons with disabilities. Originality/value There are limited studies that have taken a longitudinal look at the accessibility of web sites and explored the reasons for the trend of decreasing accessibility.

Previous studies have identified significant disparity in the levels of Internet access availability in different countries, particularly in developing nations. This paper presents the findings of an investigation into Internet connectivity and usage in different countries, in an attempt to determine the extent of Internet access, and whether the availability of such technology is considered to be beneficial. This research considers indicators such as available technology infrastructure and access costs, in order to identify the varying limitations that may be faced in different countries across continents. In addition, the opinions of individuals were sought regarding their typical access methods and level of Internet access, typical services utilised, and the general impact Internet has had upon their activities. A Web-based questionnaire was used to elicit comments from 152 respondents from 19 countries, yielding preliminary statistical data to enable the assessment of Internet usage in different countries.

The Internet is increasingly being used as a potential library substitute for a wide variety of business information tasks. However, little comparative research exists on the impact of such uses on task performance. This study examined performance differences (perceived, actual, and temporal) for a strategic business information acquisition experimental task when subjects used a library or the Internet. It was found that task performance decreased and time to completion increased when using the Internet as compared to the library. This paradox of performance enhancement expectations and actual outsomes when using the Internet may be temporal or idiosyncratic, or it may signal that our assumptions about traditional and electronic repositories are invalid. In any case, it is imperative that research on task performance continues to be done in order to ascertain the viability of this repository for information tasks. Implications of these findings and avenues of future research are discussed.

Purpose – This paper aims to report a QA system that can answer how‐type questions based on confirmed knowledge acquired from mails, posted to a mailing list. It aims to propose a method of detecting incorrect information in mails posted to a mailing list (ML) by using mails that ML participants submitted for correcting incorrect information in previous mails. Design/methodology/approach – The paper discusses a problem of acquiring knowledge from natural language documents, then proposes a method to give these mails three kinds of confirmation labels, positive, negative, and other, depending on their credibility. Findings – The paper shows a QA system based on the confirmed knowledge. It finds mail questions that are similar to the user's question and gives answers and their confirmation labels to the user. By using the confirmation labels, the user can easily choose the information that can solve his or her problem. Originality/value – The study describes a method of detecting incorrect information in mails posted to a mailing list and acquiring confirmed knowledge from them.

Examines demographic variables (gender, age, educational level) and motivation variables (perceived ease of use, perceived enjoyment, perceived usefulness) associated with Internet usage activities (defined in terms of messaging, browsing, downloading and purchasing). A total of 1,370 usable responses were obtained using a Web page survey. Results showed that males are more likely to engage in downloading and purchasing activities while females are more likely to engage in messaging activities. Younger users engage in messaging and downloading activities to a greater extent than older users. Perceived usefulness is associated with the four activities, while perceived ease of use and perceived enjoyment are associated with messaging, browsing and downloading activities.

Illustrates some of the challenges that electronic commerce practitioners and researchers face. A theoretical framework for Web users’ behaviour is developed. Research themes or questions concerning relationships between cross-national differences, demographics, perceived threats and Web use; assessment of on-line information for different categories of product; influence of people’s technology resistance on attitudes toward, and behaviours regarding, online shopping; and how these factors affect people’s attempt to externalize costs (e.g. transaction costs) are outlined. The article analyses different decisional contexts for Web shopping, comparing commodity products to products that require engineering support; while the hype is generally on the first, customized and specialty products may be more attractive from a business perspective. Internet commerce of technical products, in the context of corporate purchasing, has been largely ignored. After reviewing the existing literature, the article concludes by presenting future research challenges and practical implications for organizations willing to take advantage of the opportunities the Web offers.

Purpose – The paper aims to report on the future of mobile computing and R&D activities in the state of Bremen. Design/methodology/approach – The Mobile Research Center in Bremen, Germany, provides results from interdisciplinary scientific research for the creation of economic value by partners from industry. Findings – The paper finds that, through the MRC and its partners, a national and international brand is being developed with respect to excellent research and to the transfer of research in the area of mobile solutions. Originality/value – This paper outlines technology and research activities in Bremen, which promotes itself as the mobile city, a trademark standing for innovation and supporting in innovative ways the necessary structural changes in the economy. It will be of interest to those in the field of R&D.

Application Development for the Distributed Enterprise (ADDE) is a methodological set that supports design of distributed business processes and ICT systems. ADDE provides a guide, a repository and supporting software tools, an underlying meta-model, based on UML, that may be used in developing further software tools, or adapting existing tools to work with the ADDE repository. The main principles that have driven the authors’ approach to distributed system design are presented. These principles are the focus on distribution issues, the separation of organisational and technical issues, the emphasis on the design process as a decision process, the notion of technological services and the method independence of the guidance. Following this, the guidance on the definition and planning of the application development will be introduced. A presentation of the guidance on distributed application design, as well as the concepts of macro and micro decisions follows. Finally, the future work of the ADDE project will be outlined.