MIS: Assignment 9

Identify an information environment of your choice and write an essay to address the following questions:

• What should be your role within this environment?
• How can the principles of information organization and representation help you in performing this role?
• What are the challenges facing you in performing the role? How will you address these challenges?


The flow of information has changed the way we live in today world. Information is the backbone of every system. Every morning when we read a newspaper having out so much information we came to know the latest happening in the world (of course in details), yeah you are right even the internet .
We can take the example of banking. It is very to transact any amount of money from part of the world to other with help of e-commerce. We can purchase anything online with help of debit and credit cards. This has made our lives more and more simple.
Now days if we want to buy to something and are not getting it nearby store then we can simply search for that thing on internet and then order it on the internet. We will get it delivered at our doorstep with just few clicks of mouse. Similarly if we want to travel around the world we can book airline tickets online and even book rooms for our hotels (of course at competitive rates). People are working on the internet without really having to go outside to their workplace.
Companies can share technologies online. Even the doctors can guide the other doctors while operating on a patient with the help of Information Technology.

A whole new world is coming in our way.

E-Commerce

Electronic commerce, commonly known as (electronic marketing) e-commerce or eCommerce, consists of the buying and selling of products or services over electronic systems such as the Internet and other computer networks. The amount of trade conducted electronically has grown extraordinarily with widespread Internet usage. The use of commerce is conducted in this way, spurring and drawing on innovations in electronic funds transfer, supply chain management, Internet marketing, online transaction processing, electronic data interchange (EDI), inventory management systems, and automated data collection systems. Modern electronic commerce typically uses the World Wide Web at least at some point in the transaction's lifecycle, although it can encompass a wider range of technologies such as e-mail as well.

A large percentage of electronic commerce is conducted entirely electronically for virtual items such as access to premium content on a website, but most electronic commerce involves the transportation of physical items in some way. Online retailers are sometimes known as e-tailers and online retail is sometimes known as e-tail. Almost all big retailers have electronic commerce presence on the World Wide Web.

Electronic commerce that is conducted between businesses is referred to as business-to-business or B2B. B2B can be open to all interested parties (e.g. commodity exchange) or limited to specific, pre-qualified participants (private electronic market). Electronic commerce that is conducted between businesses and consumers, on the other hand, is referred to as business-to-consumer or B2C. This is the type of electronic commerce conducted by companies such as Amazon.com.
Electronic commerce is generally considered to be the sales aspect of e-business. It also consists of the exchange of data to facilitate the financing and payment aspects of the business transactions.
Contemporary electronic commerce involves everything from ordering "digital" content for immediate online consumption, to ordering conventional goods and services, to "meta" services to facilitate other types of electronic commerce.

On the consumer level, electronic commerce is mostly conducted on the World Wide Web. An individual can go online to purchase anything from books or groceries, to expensive items like real estate. Another example would be online banking, i.e. online bill payments, buying stocks, transferring funds from one account to another, and initiating wire payment to another country. All of these activities can be done with a few strokes of the keyboard.
On the institutional level, big corporations and financial institutions use the internet to exchange financial data to facilitate domestic and international business. Data integrity and security are very hot and pressing issues for electronic commerce today.

My role within this environment
Electronic commerce is here to stay. No matter how big the dot-com crisis was or how far the e-entrepreneurs' shares fell in the market, the fact remains that there is still confidence in electronic trading. At least it would appear that investors are confident in e-companies again.
However, not only trust of venture capitalists is of importance -- consumers also have to have faith in on-line business. After all, without consumers there is no e-business. Interacting lawyers, technicians and economists are needed to create a trustworthy electronic commerce environment.
To achieve this environment, thorough and inter-disciplinary research is required and that is exactly what this book is about. Researchers of the project Enabling Electronic Commerce from the Dutch universities of Tilburg and Eindhoven have chosen a number of e-topics to elaborate on trust from their point of view.
This volume makes clear that the various disciplines can and will play a role in developing conditions for trust and thus contribute to a successful electronic market.

How can the principles of information organization and representation help you in performing this role?

The quality of "findability" is the ability of a user to find the information they need, regardless of whether he or she has touched it before, knows exactly where it is, or knows in which repository it resides. To manage unstructured content effectively and efficiently, it must be organized. Structure is needed to address the underlying challenge of managing content.

It helps me to...

Understand my content
The first step in coming to grips with content in any organization is to clarify your business goals. What exactly are they? Why do you need to organize this data? What strategic goal will it achieve? This basic question is often overlooked when starting a project. If there is no legitimate business reason to add metadata or build an enterprise-wide taxonomy or business classification scheme, then doing so is nothing more than a waste of money.

Get it organized. To organize information, we use a sequential process. The steps are as follows: hypothesis, audit, inventory, analyze, clean up and enrich, reorganize, and migrate. Going through each of these steps one at a time will help you achieve your goals quickly and efficiently.

Analysis, cleanup, and enrich. During the inventory you should begin to identify groups of information that belong together, such as invoices, contracts, case files, etc. You should start to capture those attributes in the form of various fields of metadata that can be added to the inventory list. This can be metadata that helps you identify, structure, or administer an object. Every bit of metadata added to an object takes time and money, so its purpose must be extremely well defined and thought through. There is no substitute for a clear metadata strategy.

Reorganize and migrate. This step is where you decide what information is relevant and should be moved into the new environment, grouping together what belongs together and migrating it from the chaotic environment that you’ve been working in to an organized and logical environment.

Establishing virtual personas
An effective means of dealing with the challenge of identifying user groups and understanding their needs is to create virtual “personas”. These are fictitious characters created to represent each of the user types within your organization, distinguished by the way they approach and consume information. These personas should be realistic and bestowed with as much detail as necessary to mimic the needs of the actual user groups.

Don’t get lost in the process
An important caveat: Don’t lose sight of the fact that information is only part of the overall user experience and it’s important not to get lost in organizing data for its own sake. Searching is one way to retrieve information and get access to it. No search engine by itself, however, will provide the perfect solution and meet the needs of all users at the same time without some careful tuning and without considering some of the alternatives and different kinds of search.


What are the challenges facing you in performing the role? How will you address these challenges?

Protecting Online Privacy
As the network technology we utilize becomes more advanced so do the security issues surrounding these technologies. Evolving from the days of "sneaker net" to gigabit ethernet has introduced seemingly infinite risks associated with our public and private networks.
The Web can be a dangerous place for consumers and businesses. One recent report says credit card fraud is now 12 times higher online than in-store, while another report pegs online fraud at four times the old-fashioned kind. No matter how you slice it, that’s a pretty scary statistic.
But we must also realize that the Web is driving double-digit sales growth and that online fraud still accounts for less than 1.2 cents out of every dollar spent online. As IT professionals, do we have a challenge managing Web security? Yes, we do, but it’s manageable.
Ease of use, flexibility and economy need to be built into the way we manage Web commerce risk. Today, the customer is asked to provide several layers of information for authentication: user ID, password, credit card number and possibly other identifying information such as his or her date of birth, address or zip code. If this information checks out with the credit card company and the business, the customer is allowed to complete the transaction.
But the natural corollary to all these layers of authentication is that consumers are wary of the Web. They know that a social security number entered online could wind up in an identity thief’s hands. They know that a phone number or e-mail address given for “questions about your order” could quickly turn into dinnertime sales pitches or junk e-mails flooding their inboxes. And they want it to stop.

Lack of Confidence Costs
Have you ever considered what you’re losing in online business by not managing security better? It’s estimated that electronic commerce would double if people had greater confidence that their privacy was protected on the Web. In fact, the lack of confidence in privacy outpaces all other concerns--including price and ease of use--in inhibiting people from buying on the Web.
Harris Interactive says 70 percent of consumers worry that their online transactions aren’t secure, and 75 percent are concerned that companies will share their personal information with others. Those fears reduced U.S. online purchasing by $15 billion last year, according to the latest consumer research.
The biggest mistake IT professionals make in assessing Web security is focusing on the challenge and not looking at the business opportunity. If you help build online relationships with customers based on trust, they will ask you to add them to your mailing lists, they will want you to recommend products from marketing partners, and they will stick by you forever.

Solution…
Privacy is the number one concern of Internet users; it is also the top reason why non-users still avoid the Internet. Survey after survey indicates mounting concern. While privacy faces threats from both private and government intrusions, the existing motley patchwork of privacy laws and practices fails to provide comprehensive protection. Instead, it causes confusion that fuels a sense of distrust and skepticism, limiting realization of the Internet's potential.
A unique combination of tools -- legal, technical, and self-regulatory -- is being designed to address the privacy concerns of Internet users. Top-priority objectives include setting limits on government access to personal information, ensuring that new information and communication technologies are designed in ways that protect rather than diminish privacy, and developing appropriate federal legislation to set baseline standards for consumer privacy. This guide is intended to educate Internet users about online privacy, and offer practical suggestions and policy recommendations.

Ways to Protect Your Privacy Online
• Learn how to read online privacy policies
• Opt-out and use any other privacy options offered
• Get a separate account for your personal e-mail
• Teach your kids not to give out personal information online without permission
• Be careful when using social networking sites and picture/video sharing sites
• Learn about - and use - the privacy features in your browser
• Make sure that online transactions are secure
• Learn how to spot phishing and other scams
• Reject or delete unnecessary cookies
• Use security software and promptly install security upgrades
• Safeguard important files and communications
• Use anonymizer tools, but cautiously
• Use strong passwords and protect them
• Use common sense

References:
http://www.ebizq.net/topics/ecm/features/1695.html?page=2
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_commerce#Business_applications