ABSTRACT
In the latter half of the 1990s, the business press hyped electronic commerce, conducting business transactions electronically via the Internet, as the “New Economy.” This hype gave birth to weekly and monthly magazines devoted exclusively to electronic commerce (e-commerce). At that time one such publication, Business 2.0, published issues exceeding 600 pages. Countless articles by new-found “experts” discussed how the Internet would revolutionize the way business was conducted in every industrial sector. Businesses of every type were admonished to “get wired” or risk losing their competitive advantages. Businesses were categorized as “winners” or “losers” on the basis of
Internet presence, and those who did not jump online were dismissively branded as those who “just don’t get it!” (Beer and Hogan 2000).
