MARKETNG
462: Electronic Commerce
Syllabus
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Table of Contents
Welcome
to Electronic Commerce. This is one of the most exciting
and dynamic areas in business and society today. Our task
in this class is to jointly investigate how electronic commerce
will change current as well as new businesses.
Objectives
The
course has four objectives. They are:
1.
To investigate the strategic implications of e-commerce
with emphasis on existing companies
2. To navigate the broad range of positioning strategies
available within the e-commerce landscape
3. To develop the ability to quickly and effectively research
Internet companies and strategies
4. To learn to distinguish between temporary tremors and
seismic shifts in the unstable e-commerce landscape
Required
Reading Materials:
-
Place
to Space by Peter Weill and Michael R. Vitale, HBS Press
2001.
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Course
packet containing cases and notes
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Grading
Criteria
25%
-- Course participation grade
50% -- Two individual 2-page essays and critiques
25% -- A group presentation (oral, written or audio-PowerPoint)
Course
Participation:
Learning
in this class will be continuous and interactive; your participation
will include both written and oral components. You are expected
to write to the discussion board for each class. You have
a number of options that can complement your the oral participation
requirements for each class session:
-
A thread on the session discussion board will mark each
question. Answer one of the study questions, making sure
that you do not repeat responses already on the discussion
board.
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A
response to a posting or an essay by one of your classmates
as long as it relates to the topic of that particular
class session.
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A
written postscript on a case or a comment on the class
discussion. This would be posted on the discussion board
and would be most appropriate after the session, but before
the following one.
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A
web search summarizing the status of a particular business
in a case (summarizing what happened in the real world).
Your summary should be posted on the Case Update section
of the session discussion board.
Generally,
these written contributions will be individually done. However,
if you wish you may turn in a more elaborate response that
you have worked on with your group. For example, suppose
your group discussed a central issue to a case, a written
summary of that discussion could be submitted by the group
and that will satisfy the requirement for each member of
the group.
Essays:
Essays
provide a way for you to bring your ideas to your classmates.
They are to be submitted and will be returned electronically.
Post your essay directly in the discussion folder Final
Essays so your classmates can have access to it. The model
of an essay is a memo you might send to your boss. It should
be short, focused, and lead to a change in action or thinking.
It can be about a case, or an issue raised in the class
or our text. A good essay has the following characteristics:
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Under
1000 words, exclusive of tables or graphs (total file
size <500KB)
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It
should focus on one well-defended idea
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Your
fellow students should find it interesting
-
It
should build on the ideas of the course. An essay can
be a response to another student's essay, or to a theme
discussed earlier in the course
-
Each
essay should show evidence of online or journal research,
by citing the publication source or the URL of the information
You
can find examples of essays from past classes in the folder
titled Example Essays. These illustrate the characteristics
of essays for this class. I have included a range of quality
in the essays shown. You may choose the topic and when you
write your essays; however, your first essay must be submitted
before the 6th session on February 7 and your second one
before the last session on February 28th.
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Essay
evaluations:
For
the 9th session, February 18, you will be assigned to read
5 essays by your classmates. Your job for that session involves
writing comments about each essay indicating (1) what you
like about the essay (2) what can be improved and (3) extensions
or elaborations on the essays. These signed comments will
be short (about 200 words) per essay and will be sent by
e-mail directly to the author, with a copy to me.
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Group
project/pitch:
A
pitch involves a presentation to the class by a group of
five or fewer individuals. It can be presented in one of
three ways:
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Orally
during the residency period. This is encouraged, but groups
will need to work very hard before class begins to craft
an acceptable presentation. I will grade your PowerPoint
slides.
-
As
a written document (less than 5000 words, exclusive of
attachments)
-
As
a PowerPoint presentation with a corresponding real audio
file. (total run time of under 20 minutes)
The project will be shared with your classmates on the
Folder Group Projects.
Like
an essay, a pitch/project leaves the class with a clear
set of conclusions and recommendations. Often, it will be
about one of the cases in the course packet, or about a
related company or industry. If it is about a current case,
it is due to me before the session on that case. It is important
that the team present from a clearly articulated point of
view, for example from the perspective of Priceline's hotel
reservation group.
Group
members evaluate each other's performance in preparing the
pitch. The form, titled Peer evaluation form, is available
in the announcements folder. Each group member must turn
in these reviews before the pitch is graded. The group project
is due before session 11, Monday, February 25.
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Web
searches:
To
remain current in the volatile world of e-commerce you need
to be a fluid user of web-searches and standard databases.
The URL's should be commonly referenced in your essays or
projects. In addition, at the end of each case we will use
web searches to update the business to the present.
A
good place to start is at Fuqua's electronic library. A
special page has been set up for this class at http://www.lib.duke.edu/fsb/ecomm.htm.
For some databases, you will need to register for a password.
Passwords are usually provided to you within 24 hours of
your request (Monday - Friday). First go to DowJones Interactive,
which has a good search engine for current publications.
Business and Industry Data base will provide trade journals,
and both Gartner and PROMPT have useful current summary
articles. You should also should become proficient at searching
directly from the Web, either directly from the search engine
of your choice (my favorite is Google.com).
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The
use of case updates:
Because
change is so rapid, we will spend time at the end of each
case discussing what has happened. The discussion board
for each case will contain a thread titled Case update.
You are welcome to browse that part of the board and comment
on it. When we discuss the case, you may not use what you
know happened after the case to buttress your points about
what they should have done at the time of the case. We will
act in discussions as if we are making decisions at the
time of the case. At the end of each case discussion, we
will reserve some time or space to discuss what happened
and lessons that can be drawn.
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