Conference Week 8

Reflections of Week 8

Almost everything you want you can obtain over the Internet. E-Business is now a competive market. It has become easier to establish a business via the Internet. The problem is what is your customer base? Are you providing the right service? Is your product comparable to other products sold over the Internet. This week we looked at those type of questions. How products sell using the electronic business. We also looked at the question about should state taxes be applied to Internet transactions. I would think that they should because electronic business is like any other business, the owner has to pay taxes so should the consumer. The taxes should be based on the State. If the person lives in a state that has no taxes, they should not pay. Otherwise, each business transaction should include sales taxes based on the state. If the customer is international, the taxes should be calculated based on those type of taxes. The customer should know up front that the taxes will be included in the cost.

The most challenging part of week 8 was the mini project. We were asked to come up with an e-business venture that does not already exists. I spent all week thinking, looking to see what is already out there, and asking coworkers, family and friends if they could come up with something. No help for the weary. Finally, at the last minute, I remembered how I would like to persue a project that would keep our examiners working on applications instead of spending time on teaching our customers how to apply for certificates of protection for new varities of plants. The examiners had expressed that most of our funding is based on the number of applications that we receive and process to completion. If they are spending most of their time training, our mission and scope has changed. In addition, we do not receive enough money to cover the cost of time and materials for training. In addition, it is not fair to the customers who have applications pending in the office for their stuff to be placed on hold while the staff goes off somewhere to train other customers. With that in mind, I thought about e-training. This training will allow the examiners to examine applications while our customers are learning how to submit an acceptable application to the office. If properly implemented, this training will save the customer time and money because the application will probably be processed quicker and other associated fees would not occur. That was my e-business venture. It took me a whole week to think about that.