What constitutes adoption of the Web: A methodological problem in assessing adoption of the World Wide Web for electronic commerce

This paper reports on methodological developments in a project to assess th e adoption of the Web by publishers of business information. The total proj ect looks at the extent of adoption among the general population of busines s publishers, characterizes adopters and non-adopters, analyzes the rate of adoption among adopters, and surveys the nature of adoption. This paper ad dresses a methodological task associated with characterizing the nature of adoption. As innovation studies have shown, adopters of an innovation tend to make an innovation their own, that is, they modify it to suit their purp oses. Preliminary research indicated considerable variations in the use of the Web by business publishers and the need, therefore, to develop a typolo gy that would characterize the nature of use that constituted acceptance of the knowledge on a relative basis. This paper describes the approach used on a sample of 20 business publishers to identify five clusters of publishe rs ranging from traditionalist to innovator. Variables included in developi ng the clusters included factors such as source of revenue, relationship to former publications, extent of tailoring.