Dear Colleagues, (1) Commerce at a distance with shortened transaction-times, was well started about 150 years ago by an invention called the "Telegraph" and the respective world-wide network.
(2) May I recall that the very Credit Card (as handsome substitute for the much older Credit Letter) was originally invented to allow separation of buying and paying. (3) May I again recall that trustworthy merchant-agents as middlemen appear centuries ago to allow for advanced/delayed partial payments. (4) May I finally recall, that countries branded as "unsafe" for e-commerce are normally already branded as "unsafe" for any commerce at a distance or with delayed/advanced payments (I don't know of any exception). Corollary: countries are branded as "unsafe" for commerce normally and mostly not for the lack of laws, regulations, standards, certificates or whatever but for the lack of law-enforcement. I do doubt that a public sector unable or unwilling or not ready to implement unbiased and timely law-enforcement on ordinary subjects will do so with respect to eCommerce, which renders laws, regulations, standards, certificates or whatever for eCommerce simply and plainly "useless". Yours truly, Cornelio On Thursday, September 30, 2004, Sam Lanfranco wrote: > The hallmark of e-commerce is that it involves a transaction that takes > place across time and space, and in the first instance involves a > virtual transaction (the order, the payment, etc.) with the good or > service to follow. This is in contrast to a commerce transaction at a > time and a place, where frequently the produce is examined (book, > appliance) and received or consumed (food, parking) at the time of the > purchase. > > It comes as no surprise that fraud artists try to take advantage of this > temporal and spatial distance to engage in deception. In the past the > same has been done via postal service, telephone service, fax, and any > transactions venue where there is a degree of seperation between the > perpetrator and the intended victim. Scams and fraud can go in both > directions, with either the buyer or the supplier as the victim. For > developing and transition economies, newly emerging on the global > economic stage, the larger victim is the growth of their e-commerce > sectors. > > However, what is different about e-commerce is that the distances can be > greater but the speed of transactions is faster. This has a negative > side, but it also has a positive side. The negative side is that it is > harder for the client (consumer, buyer, etc.) to carry out due diligence > with respect to the integrity of the supplier, and it is harder for the > supplier to prove (or build) a reputation for trust and integrity. Both > factors cause reluctance on the part of potential clients and stiffle > the growth of the e-commerce sector. ..snip... ------------ This DOT-COM Discussion is funded by the dot-ORG USAID Cooperative Agreement, and hosted by GKD. http://www.dot-com-alliance.org provides more information. To post a message, send it to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd For the GKD database, with past messages: http://www.GKDknowledge.org
