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Getting the Most Out of Information Systems

Table of Contents

• About the Author

• Acknowledgments

• Dedication

• Preface

• Chapter 1: Setting the Stage: Technology and the Modern Enterprise

  • Tech’s Tectonic Shift: Radically Changing Business Landscapes
  • It’s Your Revolution
  • Geek Up—Tech Is Everywhere and You’ll Need It to Thrive
  • The Pages Ahead

• Chapter 2: Strategy and Technology: Concepts and Frameworks for Understanding What Separates Winners from Losers

  • Introduction
  • Powerful Resources
  • Barriers to Entry, Technology, and Timing
  • Key Framework: The Five Forces of Industry Competitive Advantage

• Chapter 3: Zara: Fast Fashion from Savvy Systems

  • Introduction
  • Don’t Guess, Gather Data
  • Moving Forward

• Chapter 4: Netflix in Two Acts: The Making of an E-commerce Giant and the Uncertain Future of Atoms to Bits

  • Introduction
  • Act I: Netflix Leverages Tech and Timing to Create Killer Assets in DVD-by-Mail
  • Act II: Netflix and the Shift from Mailing Atoms to Streaming Bits

• Chapter 5: Moore’s Law: Fast, Cheap Computing and What It Means for the Manager

  • Introduction
  • The Death of Moore’s Law?
  • Bringing Brains Together: Supercomputing and Grid Computing
  • E-waste: The Dark Side of Moore’s Law

• Chapter 6: Understanding Network Effects

  • Introduction
  • Where’s All That Value Come From?
  • One-Sided or Two-Sided Markets?
  • How Are These Markets Different?
  • Competing When Network Effects Matter

• Chapter 7: Social Media, Peer Production, and Web 2.0

  • Introduction
  • Blogs
  • Wikis
  • Social Networks
  • Twitter and the Rise of Microblogging
  • Other Key Web 2.0 Terms and Concepts
  • Prediction Markets and the Wisdom of Crowds
  • Crowdsourcing
  • Get SMART: The Social Media Awareness and Response Team

• Chapter 8: Facebook: Building a Business from the Social Graph

  • Introduction
  • Does Facebook Want to Eat Your Firm’s Lunch? Enveloping Markets across the Internet
  • The Social Graph
  • Facebook Feeds—Ebola for Data Flows
  • Facebook as a Platform
  • Advertising and Social Networks: A Work in Progress
  • Privacy Peril, Beacon, and the TOS Debacle: What Facebook’s Failures Can Teach Managers about Technology Planning and Deployment
  • One Graph to Rule Them All: Facebook Reaches across the Web with Open Graph
  • Is Facebook Worth It?

• Chapter 9: Understanding Software: A Primer for Managers

  • Introduction
  • Operating Systems
  • Application Software
  • Distributed Computing
  • Writing Software
  • Understanding Technology beyond the Price Tag: Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) and the Cost of Tech Failure

• Chapter 10: Software in Flux: Partly Cloudy and Sometimes Free

  • Introduction
  • Open Source
  • Why Open Source?
  • Examples of Open Source Software
  • Why Give It Away? The Business of Open Source
  • Cloud Computing: Hype or Hope?
  • The Software Cloud: Why Buy When You Can Rent?
  • SaaS: Not without Risks
  • The Hardware Cloud: Utility Computing and Its Cousins
  • Clouds and Tech Industry Impact
  • Virtualization: Software That Makes One Computer Act Like Many
  • Make, Buy, or Rent

• Chapter 11: The Data Asset: Databases, Business Intelligence, and Competitive Advantage

  • Introduction
  • Data, Information, and Knowledge
  • Where Does Data Come From?
  • Data Rich, Information Poor
  • Data Warehouses and Data Marts
  • The Business Intelligence Toolkit
  • Data Asset in Action: Technology and the Rise of Wal-Mart
  • Data Asset in Action: Caesars’ Solid Gold CRM for the Service Sector

• Chapter 12: A Manager’s Guide to the Internet and Telecommunications

  • Introduction
  • Internet 101: Understanding How the Internet Works
  • Getting Where You’re Going
  • Last Mile: Faster Speed, Broader Access

• Chapter 13: Information Security: Barbarians at the Gateway (and Just About Everywhere Else)

  • Introduction
  • Why Is This Happening? Who Is Doing It? And What’s Their Motivation?
  • Where Are Vulnerabilities? Understanding the Weaknesses
  • Taking Action

• Chapter 14: Google in Three Parts: Search, Online Advertising, and Beyond

  • Introduction
  • Understanding Search
  • Understanding the Increase in Online Ad Spending
  • Search Advertising
  • Ad Networks—Distribution beyond Search
  • More Ad Formats and Payment Schemes
  • Customer Profiling and Behavioral Targeting
  • Profiling and Privacy
  • Search Engines, Ad Networks, and Fraud
  • The Battle Unfolds