Preface

The emerging wireless communications and mobile computing have been merging with the Internet, and this phenomenon has made possible the introduction of electronic commerce to a new business application and research subject: mobile electronic commerce or mobile commerce (m-commerce).

Although m-commerce can be generally considered to be an extension of electronic commerce, it has a number of unique characteristics and inherent complexities, as it embraces many emerging technologies. This book seeks to address and explore these unique issues associated with the phenomenon, in order to provide a better understanding regarding the current situation, its growing trend, practice, and further studying guidelines in this emerging area.

It is not feasible for a single author to write a book of this type and cover all of the important aspects of this rapidly emerging area, within a required time frame, and yet maintain a degree of depth and width. One of the better approaches is to invite related experts around the world to contribute their knowledge.

Therefore, we identified some of the key topics in this area and invited a wide range of professionals across the globe to contribute a chapter in their areas of expertise. Experts in various related disciplines from different parts of the world responded to this project enthusiastically. We gave adequate time for completing the project, spending months preparing and consulting with the publishers, authors, and reviewers, in order to avoid a hasty approach and to yield qualified outcomes.

The success of this book is largely due to the collective efforts of the wonderful team consisting of the authors and other reviewers. The inclusion of the authors in the blind review process improved the quality of the book and also served as an incentive to each author to strengthen his or her write-up. Although the editor initially received many proposals and manuscripts, the stringent quality control measures taken permitted us ultimately to include only 10 chapters, contributed by experts in different parts of the world: Canada, Finland, Portugal, Singapore, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The team not only includes experts from Information and Communications Technology (ICT) areas, like Faculty of Computer Science, Information Systems, Telecommunication Networks, and Software Engineering and Information Technology, but also includes professionals from Business and Management fields, such as colleges of business administration, faculties of management, graduate schools of management, and other kinds of business schools. Some chapters are outcomes of joined forces with both ICT and business experts, presenting cross perspectives and knowledge.

Readership

The primary readers of this book are professionals, researchers, executives, graduate and postgraduate students in ICT and business areas, as well as others with strong interest in wireless communications and m-commerce. Readers will find that this book is a rich, informative introduction for obtaining an overall understanding of wireless communications and m-commerce.

This is mainly because this book consists of qualified study outcomes from multiple disciplines. These rich research findings, holistic perspectives, suggestions, descriptions, conclusions, recommendations, arguments, and references presented by these authors will assist readers in pursuing further studies in many particular aspects.