2.1 The Internet: Hype or Hope? | Internet-Enabled Business Intelligence


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	Internet-Enabled Business Intelligence By William A. Giovinazzo
	Table of Contents

	Chapter 2. Evolution to e-Enterprise

2.1 The Internet: Hype or Hope?

The Internet is the catalyst for a tectonic shift in industrialized societies throughout the world. The metaphor, while appropriate for the magnitude of the shift, breaks down when it comes to the speed in which these changes have taken place. Tectonic shifts are rather slow in human terms. The Internet, however, has revolutionized the worlds of entertainment, communications, and business at an astonishing pace. The Internet has transformed the exchange of information. The entire world has been caught within this net, taking it to yada, yada, yada . Are you as sick of the same old Internet hype as I am?

It seems that everything you read lately about the Internet fluctuates between two camps. The first camp, the "it serves those start-up rich kids right" camp, portrays the dotcom mania as all a hoax and the burst of the Internet bubble as well deserved. Now that it is thankfully over and we have all wised up, we can get back to real work. The second camp is the "ever faithful." As soon as we pull out of this slump, things will get back to normal and we can all be rich again.

Let's try to attack this from a different angle and possibly avoid both the derision and the hype. In the 2000 presidential election, Vice President Al Gore suffered a fair amount of ridicule after he supposedly claimed to have invented the Internet. While the media may have exaggerated his remarks, we cannot deny that the man is a visionary who did have more than a little part to play in bringing about the Internet age. In his book, The Digital Economy , Don Tapscott quotes Al Gore as saying "Guttenberg's invention, which so empowered Jefferson and his colleagues in their fight for democracy, seems to pale before the rise of electronic communications and innovations, from the telegraph, to the television, to the microprocessor and the emergence of a new computerized worldan information age." ^[2] Guttenberg pales before the Internet? What causes so much hoopla about a network of computers? Do you really think the ability to email Aunt Lorraine pictures of your trip to Hawaii can compare with the Guttenberg press, the most important invention of this past millennium ?

^[2] Tapscott, Don, The Digital Economy , McGraw Hill, 1996.

Perhaps comparing the Internet to Guttenberg's press is not all that great a stretch. In Victor Hugo's Notre Dame de Paris there is a scene in which Jacques Coictier visits Dom Claude Frollo. There is a discussion between the men, during which Dom Claude opens the window of his cell and points to the massive Notre Dame. "The archdeacon contemplated the gigantic cathedral for a time in silence, then he sighed and stretched out his right hand towards the printed book lying open on his table and his left hand towards Notre Dame, and looked sadly from the book to the church : 'Alas,' he said, 'this will kill that.'" He continues "Alas and alack, small things overcome great ones! A tooth triumphs over a body. The Nile rat kills the crocodile, the swordfish kills the whale , the book will kill the building."

The same thing is happening with the Internet today. Rather than attempt to explain Dom Claude's thoughts, allow me to provide Hugo's own explanation:

As we see it, this thought has two facets. Firstly it was the thought of a priest. It was the alarm felt by the priesthood before a new agent: the printing press. It was the terror and bewilderment felt by a man of the sanctuary before the luminous press of Guttenberg. It was the pulpit and the manuscript, the spoken and the written word, taking fright at the printed word; something like the stupor felt by a sparrow were it to see the angel legion unfold its six million wings. It was the cry of the prophet who already hears the restless surge of an emancipated mankind, who can see that future time when intelligence will undermine faith, opinion dethrone belief and the world shake off Rome. The prognosis of a philosopher who sees the human mind, volatilized by the press, evaporate from the theocratic receptacle. The terror of a soldier examining the bronze battering-ram and saying: "The tower will give way." It meant that one power was going to succeed another power. It meant : the press will kill the church. ^[3]

^[3] Hugo, Victor, Notre Dame de Paris .

Hugo was partially correct. Although the press did not destroy the church, it certainly had a role in transforming it. Prior to Guttenberg, the church was the center of society. The center of many a town was the cathedral. The clergy were not just men of God but men who were the keepers of knowledge. The western world was orthodox because the church controlled what was said and what was written. Then came Guttenberg and messed everything up. The press allowed the free expression of ideas, bypassing church censors. While the powers that existed tried to suppress this form of speech, it survived and transformed the world. Direct access to the Bible allowed the populace to define Christianity for themselves , giving rise to Protestant reforms . Even democracy owes a debt to Guttenberg in that the printed word gave rise to the age of enlightenment, empowering men like Jefferson.

Let's jump ahead in history to Edison. Reportedly, he once said that movies would eliminate the need for books. After all, why invest all that time reading when you can catch the same thing in a movie? The answer is simple: You can't. Despite his brilliance, Edison was wrong. Books and movies are distinctly different. Books communicate ideas that cannot be expressed on film. The same is also true of films ; they present things that cannot be expressed in books. A culturally rich society requires both.

So what does this have to do with the Internet? Just as movies did not eliminate books, the Internet will not eliminate the structures of the industrial age. Each delivers something that the other cannot. As we said earlier, Hugo was partially correct. The press did not destroy or bring down the church; it transformed it. Similarly, the Internet will not destroy, but transform, the structures of the past. This should sound familiar. We are simply restating what we discussed in Chapter 1: The Internet is part of a solution. In a solution, each of the ingredients is transformed by the other.

Like the Guttenberg press, the Internet transforms the structures of the past by providing a conduit for the free and open exchange of ideas. Just as Guttenberg could not be suppressed, neither can the Internet. It is global; no single power can suppress the thoughts expressed on it. The Internet also provides a voice. Freedom of speech means nothing if you have no voice, if you cannot be heard. The Internet provides this voice. Anyone can set up a Web site anywhere and be instantly heard anywhere in the world. As you can see, it is an extraordinarily powerful tool for the communication of ideas. Freedom of speech and voice were tremendous tools in the emancipation of humanity. While it is obvious that we can easily fill the remaining chapters with the sociological implications of the Internet, that is not what we are here to discuss.

Just as these changes have affected the social and political worlds, they have also affected the business world. The ability to easily communicate globally has had enormous impact on the marketplace . When a competitor's offering is only a mouse-click away, customers can easily price shop or change suppliers when dissatisfied with a service. Manufacturers of new, innovative products now have immediate access to global markets. For these and other reasons, the information age has changed the business world.

At the dawn of the American industrial revolution, Eli Whitney transformed the manufacturing process. The story is actually quite fascinating. Whitney received contracts from the government for the manufacture of rifles in a time of war, but did not actually deliver on that contract until well after the war was over. It wasn't that he was slacking in his obligation. He was perfecting a process, a process that created products with interchangeable parts . The trigger mechanism of one rifle fit the stock of another. This enabled production to move from artisans to mass production. It gave birth to the American industrial revolution. During the ensuing industrial age, companies succeeded by capturing economies of scale and scope.

The industrial age view of technology was to employ it in the automation of an existing manual process. The vestiges of this thinking are with us to this day. How often do systems designers simply automate a manual process rather than explore the use of these systems in new and more efficient ways? In moving from the industrial age to the information age, businesses no longer derive sustainable competitive advantage by injecting new technology into physical assets. Doing things the same old way with new technology just doesn't cut it. Today organizations need to do more than manage their assets and liabilities well. Organizations must find new ways to differentiate themselves. They must look to some of the following areas:

Introduce products and services that fulfill the desires of targeted customers;
Deliver products and services with short lead times and at low cost;
Develop long- term relationships with customers that retain customer loyalty; and
Develop employee skills to improve the ability of the organization to achieve the previous objectives.

Well, I guess I wasn't able to avoid the hype, and I am guilty of being one of the ever faithful . The world is caught up in the Internet, and it is changing everything. Perhaps, just perhaps, Gore was correct. Maybe future historians will one day look back and see the dawning of the Internet and the information age as having a greater significance than Guttenberg's press. I don't know. I still have a hard time swallowing that one.


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