The Internet population is constantly growing. In our western society it’s hard to imagine a day without using the Internet. Trying to give a definition to this widely used term is a lot more difficult than assumed on the first glance. My personal definition would be: the Internet is a world-size network of interlinked electronic devices, forming an array of digital information. One of the biggest advantages of the Internet is the easy accessible and manageable information of any kind, available 24 hours and 7 days per week.
Everything was different only around 60 years ago, when computers have just been introduced to the public. It is considered to be a milestone in human history and the start of the so-called Informational Age. However, it was still not cost efficient to transfer the information until the computers were interlinked. This changes when the web was formed in 1990s. Nowadays, web can be defined as:
“(The) Web can be considered to be a massive information system with interconnected databases and remote applications providing various services.” (H.P. Alesso, 2006 p. xvii)
Modern Internet is as much a collection of communities, as it is a collection of technologies and its success is largely determined by satisfying the needs of the communities and pushing technological progress further. As a result, the Internet grew above its research routes and now is including both – broad user community and increased commercial activity. Development of the commercial products, implementing the Internet technology turned Internet almost to a “commodity” service, and transformed into a mean of supporting online commercial services. It is important to point out that the popularization of the Internet among users was accelerated by rapid adoption of browsers and the WWW technology, allowing easier access to the information online. (B.M. Leiner, 2012)
The evolution of the ways of getting information caused a rapid decline of the information costs. Moreover, it made it possible for an ordinary user to have control over the consumer products’ information and ability to create their own content. Nowadays, it makes Internet to be a natural marketplace and a sufficient part of the economics.
“Internet is emerging both as an extremely useful tool for business planning and also as a part of a company’s marketing mix. As a planning tool, the Internet search and resource sites can aid any discipline by opening a high-speed gateway to the wealth of information. In addition, the Net is a vehicle for marketing research.” (J. Strauss, 1999 p. preface)
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