Don't look where the light is

Citation

Schwartz, D.G. (2005), "Don't look where the light is", Internet Research, Vol. 15 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/intr.2005.17215aaa.001

Don't look where the light is

We have all heard tell of the man who drops his car keys at night and searches frantically for them under the light of a streetlamp. When he explains to a concerned passerby what the problem is, she asks him where he dropped the keys. “Over there.” says the man, pointing down the road. “Then why are you looking for them over here!?” exclaims the passerby. “Because,” says the man, “this is where the light is.”

Good research is often characterized by the ability to investigate a counterintuitive aspect of a problem when everyone else is looking at more intuitive aspects – searching in the dark because that’s where you may find something useful and interesting, not under the streetlamp just because that’s where you can better see things.

A case in point is Joia and Sanz in “The hidden value of sporadic customers in e-retailing: an empirical investigation”. Much e-commerce research attempts to illuminate ways to increase customer retention through sophisticated CRM or personalization. Here, instead of investigating how e-commerce can lock-in and bring back repeat customers, they are looking the other way – when might it be more beneficial for a company to strategically cater to those customers who have never visited before and will probably never visit again!

Sánchez-Franco and Roldán in “Web acceptance and usage mode: a comparison between goal-directed and experiential web users” present us with an in-depth study of flow characteristics distinguishing between experiental users and goal-directed users. Among their key findings is evidence of the influence of flow on goal-directed users – something traditionally associated with experiential users. Once again, a prime example of not looking under the streetlamp.

Bridging the gap between of organizational and individual web usage we have an article by Jansen, Jansen and Spink. “Using the web to look for work: implications for online job seeking and recruiting” begins by studying how individual users act in conducting online search for employment, and uses those results to develop a series of guidelines that organizations can use in maximizing the effectiveness of their online recruiting activities.

The next three papers in this issue of Internet Research all have a strong organizational focus. Starting with Brock and Zhou in “Organizational use of the internet: scale development and validation” we are treated to a comprehensive theoretical study developing grounded, reliable and valid measures for organizational internet use (OIU). Their OIU construct should prove to be strong basis for future research.

Kim and Leem, in “Security of the internet-based instant messenger: risks and safeguards”, address an area of growing concern within organizations. Instant messaging is following in the footsteps of e-mail to become an organizational communications tool that cannot be disregarded. We need concerted research and development efforts to address the security concerns of IM so that it takes its rightful place in the of computer-mediated communications arsenal of every networked organization.

Finally in this issue is Yagüe, Maña and Lopez with “A metadata-based access control model for web services”. If web services are to be at the heart of next generation organizational computing architectures, we need effective ways to handle security policy design and implementation. In addition to presenting one such system based on metadata, the authors provide a welcome introduction to the issues and challenges being faced today in securing web services environments.

As we open Volume 15 of Internet Research we mark 15 years of innovative research that distinguishes itself by searching away from the lamplight. Research that breaks new ground by considering unexplored hypotheses, counterintuitive claims, and unconventional perspectives. Getting this research to you, dear reader, is made possible by the efforts of three groups – our contributors; our international editorial board; and our publication team at Emerald. I thank you all for your ongoing efforts and encourage our potential authors to keep looking where there may be no light and illuminate us with your fascinating research insights.

David G. Schwartz