1. Introduction
The field of electronic commerce (EC) is growing very rapidly. Even conservative estimates predict 1000% growth within 5-7 years. The electronic commerce field is interdisciplinary but most of the interest is in the areas of information technology, management, and marketing.
Electronic commerce is global, it breaks geographical limitations and it creates challenging opportunities. The field is interdisciplinary, but most of the interest is in the areas of information technology, management, and marketing. The amount of knowledge about electronic commerce is exploding, and therefore there is clear need for a focused publication channel in which researchers and practitioners can exhibit their experiences, this being the rational for the present journal.
2. Current Journal Electronic Markets is a key forum for advancing the understanding and practice of electronic markets and commerce. The journal is a part of the NetAcademy on Business Media - NA(BM) - which is a joint research effort in Business Media. Business Media are Electronic Markets in the sense of open platforms, for example based on the Internet, or inter-organizational systems like Extranets.
Enjoying growing success since 1991, Electronic Markets is the first journal to report on current developments and latest trends, as well as the policies, system concepts, methodologies, impacts, and cultural changes related to the exciting and rapidly evolving new research field of electronic commerce. It is published by the mcm institute for Media and Communications Management at the University of St.Gallen, Switzerland.
The journal intends to embrace a wide and rich array of electronic commerce issues. We would like to focus on "commerce", not just transactions, implying that commerce denotes a larger process including aspects of information seeking and distribution, negotiation, trust, risk-taking, customer relationships, buyers finding sellers, sellers finding customers, after-sale service and support.
Electronic Markets is a multidisciplinary journal whose audience of about 2300 readers worldwide includes scientists, policy- and decision-makers in government, industry and education; managers concerned with the effects of the electronic commerce revolution, organizations and society; and scholars with an interest in the relationship between information technologies, new forms of commerce and social change.
The Website (http://www.electronicmarkets.org) provides full coverage (including all articles of the past 7 years) of the Journal's in-depth reporting on current developments, the latest trends, the impacts, policies, methodologies and cultural changes related to the exciting and rapidly evolving new research field electronic commerce.
