Paul B suggested a definitional approach to electronic commerce which suggests
that it should be conceptually distinguished from Internet commerce, but not
from on-line commerce.
I don't agree.
The problem with identifying on-line commerce and electronic commerce as
equivalents lies in areas such as telephony based commerce, e.g as in
phonebanking, telemarketing, call centres etc. These are electronic commerce
applications and technologies but not on-line in the sense that they do not
involve dialling up or being on-line to a PC or other computer.
Internet commerce is a sub-category of electronic commerce in my book rather
than a separate or equal category.
On-line commerce is, nonetheless a useful term because it embraces and includes
such things as interactive pay tv based applications, as well as your age old
Ausinet and other on-line database, email and file transfer services delivered
across proprietary networks.
Stewart Carter
Electronic Commerce Report
edireport@attmail.com
0411 477 149