Specifications

This empirical research series, 1966-now, investigated internet users’ behavior and the growth of e-commerce in Taiwan. Some new ideas of methodological issues for internet users’ surveys have been initiated and employed. The major perspectives we provide are the followings:

Profiling

To depict the profiles of internet users, its characteristics of ‘cybercitizen’ and its implication for globalization.

Forecast

To forecast internet activities in Taiwan, and to reveal the reality of e-commerce and its growth trend.

Strategies

To propose e-commerce strategies on market planning and public policies for private or governmental sectors.3.

Methodology

To initiate new ideas of methodological issues for internet users’ surveys and also contribute to the scientific .philosophy in behavioral research.

Four strategies were examined including: market scale and trends, sales volume and trends, best seller and potential products, and barriers to e-commerce.
This research series is the first and only work to conduct internet users and e-commerce research on a random sampling base in Taiwan.

Dot-Com Crisis Alert

There were many studies that reported a much more optimistic vision than ours. Our experience suggests keeping a more careful forecast. Based on the research series, Sean TX Wu announced an alert to e-commerce industry at the ‘International Conference on Communication Technology’ in December, 1999. The basic message of this conference was, ‘Invest in e-commerce now, before it is too late’. Wu was the only one to step on the brake. In March 2000, 4 months after our alert, the ‘dot-com disaster’ really happened.
The alert was based on the use of a tool we developed to assist in forecasting growth with the General Adoption Model. This tool is the Ambiance Expectation Thermometer, a measure based on content analysis of media coverage.
The visual growth of e-commerce is shown at the top of this page. The comparison of the Active Adoption Model data and the Ambiance Expectation Thermometer  is shown here.

Digital Divide

Evidence has also shown another angle in which to consider the ‘Digital Divide’. Psychological and cognitive factors might be a better approach than demographic variables to analyze the cause.
The findings were also compared with relevant results in the USA to provide cross-cultural perspectives. Furthermore, the author found there were various results in different studies. The statistics were even not convergent in different release versions of the same survey conductor. The different survey methods and interpretation might have produced this conflict. Thus, core methodological issues were selected and discussed in order to initiate integrated points of view.

Silver Jay

According to the Chinese Mythology, jays are the builder to bridge the Silver River (Milk Way) for the Altair and Vega. Internet is today's Silver Jay to make the imagination come true.