Wednesday 30th
September 1998
NETSCAPE LOSES MARKET DOMINANCE
- IDC
According to a surprising study
released by International Data
Corporation (IDC), Netscape's share of the browser market
has slipped below 50% for the very first time in the face of Microsoft's
unremitting Internet Explorer assault. According to IDC, the company
which once claimed an immense 84% of the browser market at its peak three
years ago has slipped into second place against Microsoft's Internet Explorer
technology, which is also incorporated into AOL's browser. IDC believe that
Netscape lost its majority hold on market share in mid-1998, dropping from
just over 50% of the installed base at the end of 1997 to 41.5% by mid-year.
From December 1997 to July 1998, Microsoft increased its overall market share
for Internet Explorer by almost 5% to 27.5%, while AOL's browser rose slightly
from 16.1% to 16.3%. Other browsers collectively accounted for the remaining
14.7%. IDC commented that Netscape apparently hoped to use the newly released
Communicator 4.6 - which works in combination with its portal site - to generate
revenue, and may have ceded the "browser war" to Microsoft.
Tuesday 29th
September 1998
IT INNOVATION AWARDS CLOSE
TOMORROW
Nomination for the 1998
Australian National Awards
for Excellence Through Information Technology, which recognise genuine
innovation through IT and e-commerce, close tomorrow. The awards, organised
by the Australian Information Industry Association (AIIA) and The
Australian Financial Review, are divided into categories according
to the size of the organisation and project type. So far the AIIA has received
a good response to this year's event with nominations from the transport,
finance, retail and publishing sectors, public sector organisations and
not-for-profit groups. However, organisers have also repeated their call
for more nominees in the three primary categories: Best use of IT in
organisations with budgets or revenues of up to $100 million; best use in
organisations with budgets or revenues exceeding $100 million; and best use
of e-commerce. Finalists will be announced on October 30.
Monday 28th
September 1998
STARR REPORT SETS NEW NET
RECORDS
20 million Americans - almost
12% of the US population - have accessed the Kenneth Starr report since its
release on the Internet, according to a poll conducted in the US by Frank
Lutz polling company. This is the single highest number of people to have
ever used computers to access a single document. The survey showed 15 percent
of American males and 8 percent of females went online to read the document
(the survey of 800 adults had a set margin error of 3.5%). And although the
vast numbers of people trying to access the document had been expected to
create huge traffic problems on the Net last week, the Internet slowed down
but bore the load unexpectedly well. The world's leading news sites also
had record numbers of visitors: CNN reported that its site had broken its
previous traffic record and peaked at 340,000 hits per minute; MSNBC calculated
that it had had over 2 million unique visitors; and America Online reported
a 30 percent increase in traffic. In addition, NetRatings reported that those
accessing the report itself were spending an average of 30 minutes viewing
it, about 30 times the normal one minute that the average user spends looking
at the average page.
Friday 25th
September 1998
POLITICS ON NET HEATS UP
Political pressure on the Internet
has begun to heat up as Australia enters the last week of an otherwise quiet
Federal election campaign. Only eight days after One Nation announced
that an ALP satirical site had been opened on
XOOM - a free home page hosting service in the USA - a vitriolic One Nation
protest site
(OneNationSux)
has appeared next to it on XOOM, along with several mirrors. Author James
Ngyuen, a long-time debating opponent of One Nation webmaster Scott Balson
on the aus.politics newsgroup, is one of more than a dozen anti-One Nation
web sites that have either appeared or been refreshed as the election draws
to a climax, including several which provide RealAudio clips of the controversial
"Backdoor Man" single which is subject to legal action in Australia. The
ALP, meanwhile, have added a
special Election 98 section to their web site which features - amongst other
things - a free giveaway called Howard's End. The
Liberals have also added
a similar Election98 section (though much more subdued), while the
National Party this week unveiled
a new-look corporate web site after being siteless most of the campaign.
The Australian Electoral
Commission, meanwhile, has announced that it will run a virtual tally
room on the Internet on election night.
Thursday 24th
September 1998
NET TAX-FREE PERIOD MAY BE
REDUCED
The US Senate has deferred debate
a bill that would temporarily halt new taxes on Net access and services.
The new Internet Tax Freedom Act, which was passed in June, imposes a three-year
ban on "discriminatory" Internet taxes. However, the bill contains a
controversial clause that "grandfathers" taxes on Net access or online services
that were collected by US states prior to March 1, 1998 - a move that has
led to calls in the USA for the whole matter to be revised. The amended Act
would remove the grandfather clause, but would also reduce the tax-free
moratorium period from three years to two. Groups such as the Internet Tax
Fairness Coalition (which includes Microsoft and America Online) have been
lobbying against the grandfather clause on the grounds that it could let
US states and localities apply old tax codes to the Net; and both the ISP
industry and the lobbying groups have been arguing for a longer taxation
moratorium period rather than a shorter one. Debate on the amended Act has
been deferred so far because Republican and Democrat representatives have
- to date - been unable to reach consensus on both matters.
Wednesday 23rd
September 1998
AUSTRALIAN E-COMMERCE
"IMMATURE"
According to report by the newly-
established Australian E-commerce Business Network (AeBN), Australia's
small and medium enterprises are at risk of being swallowed by aggressive
Net traders from the USA and Europe. The report, which was commissioned by
the Department of Industry, Science and Technology, found that approximately
96% of Australia's estimated 1 million businesses could be classified as
SME's and most were relatively "immature" in their adoption of e-commerce
compared to overseas traders (particularly in the USA). The report also disclosed
that there were substantial differences in the level of IT use amongst SME's
- but that a high level of IT use did not necessarily indicate that a particular
SME was in a good area for electronic trading. In addition, the report also
found that the web e-commerce facilities currently available to Australian
SME's are, at best, limited.
Tuesday 22nd
September 1998
CRIMESTOPPERS TO EXTEND TO
NET
The innovative Australian crime
prevention program
CrimeStoppers is currently
considering a plan to extend its reach to the Internet, allowing Net users
to dob in suspicious web sites. The plan was proposed by the Australian
Internet Industry Association to alleviate public concerns over the
relatively open nature of the Net's content and the unrestricted nature of
e-commerce. Under the plan, regular Net "dob-in" hotlines would run in a
similar manner to the Operation Noah campaigns operated by state police forces
against drugs. If adopted, the first CrimeStopper hotlines are expected to
be in operation by the end of the year. Net users will also be able to tip
of CrimeStoppers via email through their web site, which will display additional
information about the initiative.
Monday 21st
September 1998
MLI DIRECT OPENS ON OUR
MALL
The Australian Internet's largest
online computer retailer MLI Direct
opened on Australian Cybermalls today, becoming our fifteenth commercial
tenant. MLI Direct, which was founded in May 1997, is a pure Internet-based
trading company. They offer customers an extensive database of computing
products with secure online ordering facilities, an Australia-wide Freecall
order number (for customers who prefer to purchase off-line) and many, many
pages of expert advice and technical support. The company's database is updated
on a daily basis with the latest price and product changes, and more than
250 new items are added every week. The company itself is physically located
in Darlinghurst, Sydney but can handle and process orders from anywhere in
Australia or world-wide. As with many of our other tenants, MLI Direct offers
visitors a way to securely purchase goods online at prices that are considerably
cheaper than those offered by traditional storefront retailers because of
the economies of online commerce.
Friday 18th
September 1998
OZEMAIL TRIALS FREEMAIL
SERVICE
Australia's largest ISP OzEmail
have begun to beta-trial a new web-based freemail service called
MyMail. As well as
duplicating all the facilities of popular freemail sites, MyMail will allow
subscribers with existing ISP email accounts to access them from a single
web site. This facility will allow subscribers to centralise all their email
in one site, which could then be accessed from any Net connection - such
as an airport Net kiosk, a handy Internet cafe or an interstate office. MyMail
- which was developed in Australia in conjunction with freemail specialists
Start - is currently restricted to OzEmail subscribers, subscribers in its
regional subsidiaries, and subscribers to Telstra Big Pond. However, the
company hopes to be able to extend the facility to other ISPs if the concept
proves successful. The announcement comes less than
10 days after Microsoft's announcement that it intends to open an
Australian branch of its popular HotMail freemail service on its local
nineMSN site.
Thursday 17th
September 1998
ALP, ONE NATION LAUNCH NET
ATTACKS
The 1998 Australian Federal
election is being fought on all the traditional hustings and - this time
around - a very new one: the Internet. This election, for the first time
in Australian political history, two of the four major parties contesting
the poll have opened battlefronts on the Net. The
ALP is attempting to harvest
voter concern over the proposed full sale of Telstra by asking voters to
enroll in its Save Telstra campaign online. The ALP have also raised speculation
that the Telecommunications Act passed last year by Federal Parliament actually
leaves the doors open for the introduction of timed local calls, and that
this is one of the "secret agendas" of the sale's proponents.
One Nation, meanwhile,
continues to provide an aggressive online presence. Today it unveiled an
ALP lampoon site
at XOOM - a free home page service in the USA. The lampoon site claimed
that Australia's defamation laws made it impossible to host the site
domestically.
Wednesday 16th
September 1998
ASIC TO ALLOW INTERNET
PROSPECTUSES
The
Australian Securities and Investments
Commission (ASIC) announced yesterday that it will allow companies
to raise capital on the Internet following agreements it has reached with
similar regulatory bodies in the USA and UK. Under the new rules, ASIC will
allow electronic prospectuses on the Internet when the product on offer crosses
national boundaries providing issuers include a statement which identifies
the countries where the product is intended to be available. Products chiefly
targeted at domestic consumers would be bound by Australian law - and those
targeted at residents in other jurisdictions would be governed by the laws
covering the principal jurisdiction area. The new policy - which is in accord
with a global ecommerce policy developed by the International Organisation
of Securities Commissions (of which Australia is a member) - will put
an end to situations that saw the ASIC earlier torpedo attempts at capital
raising by AMP and the NSW TAB which were targeted principally at the USA.
The policy will also allow the ASIC to cope with an expected future flood
of electronic prospectuses as the Internet continues to move into the mainstream
of daily life.
Tuesday 15th
September 1998
AUSTRALIA POST OFFERS DIGITAL
CERTIFICATES
Australia
Post have begun issuing digital certificates to Australian organisations
who want to conduction fully secure transactions over the Internet. It claims
its new KeyPOST Server Certificates will provide a reputable method for
organisations to authenticate themselves as bona fide businesses in e-commerce,
and comes hot on the heels of a similar announcement
two weeks ago by accounting firm
KPMG that it also intended to issue digital certificates. The new
KeyPOST certificates will cost $A500. Australia Post will conduct checks
with both Dun and Bradstreet and AUNIC to verify that an applicant either
owns or works for the company applying for the web site certificate - a process
that they expect will take at least a day. KeyPOST products will include
digital signatures for personal use, role-based certificates for organisations,
and certificates for Web servers. The digital signatures could also be used
for digitally signing and encrypting e-mail, a spokesman said.
Monday 14th
September 1998
AUSTRALIAN MANAGERS DEMAND SPEED,
SECURITY
More than 65% of Australian
IT managers intend to spend more than $A500 million on developing strategies
for the Internet by 2000, according to a random survey conducted by
Forrester Research after an address to an annual networking conference
in Queensland. However - despite this - the majority of delegates representing
Australia's top enterprises remain sober about the future of the Net, with
69% believing that the speed of the Internet was "too slow" and only 24 percent
saying it was "just OK". According to Forrester, 41% of IT managers feel
that the biggest impediment to a cohesive Internet strategy is lack of
communication among various departments of their organisations. 23% were
concerned about lack of management support, 13% were concerned about funding,
12% about lack of customer demand and 11% about new technologies and problems
with them. 73% of Australian IT managers also feel that the Net isn't yet
secure enough - compared to 40% of US IT managers who feel the same way in
the USA.
Friday 11th
September 1998
AUSTRALIAN BANKS TO BOOST NET
SPENDING
According to a study by Ernst
& Young, Australian financial institutions will channel most of their
IT budgets into building Internet services over the next three years at the
expense of other forms of IT investment such as branch platforms, telephone
service centres, ATMs and EFTPOS. And within the next 24 months, the report
suggests, Australian financial institutions will be spending the same amount
on the Internet as they spend on IT platforms for their branches. The survey
found that between 1993 and 2000, financial institutions had doubled their
spending on IT, with growth averaging 5 to 7 per cent a year. However growth
in spending in 1998 would be 14 per cent - driven largely by the need to
combat the millennium bug. Even so, the report also found that Australian
banks were lagging behind other countries in developing their IT strategies.
Worldwide, 57 per cent of financial institutions said developing their Internet
resources was their top priority. But in Australia, the figure was 43 per
cent. Further, nearly half of all Australian financial institutions said
the purpose of their ecommerce investment was to reduce costs, while elsewhere
in the world the focus was on increasing revenue and retaining
customers.
Thursday 10th
September 1998
TELSTRA SERVICE STANDARD
DECLINING
Complaints about delays over
new telephone connections in metropolitan areas have almost tripled since
the start of this year, according to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman
(TIO). The TIO reported today that complaints in the June quarter about
long delays in getting new lines installed had risen to 2008, up from just
860 in the March quarter, leading to speculation that a slimmed-down,
partially-privatised Telstra is having significant difficulty meeting its
Customer Service Guarantee standard. According to a Telstra spokesman, the
rise in complaints has simply reflected an "explosion in demand" for connections
in metro areas. He said that the company's own internal complaint-gathering
systems had only shown a 2% rise in complaints on this issue over the period.
However, TIO spokesman John Pinnock said that the TIO was the "office
of last resort" for many disgruntled consumers who were unable to obtain
satisfaction from Telstra, and said that the TIO's own figures tended to
indicate both systemic and management problems within the telecommunications
giant. The Federal Government has proposed privatising more of Telstra if
it is re-elected this year, coupling the sale with legislated minimum service
guarantees for both urban and rural areas.
Wednesday 9th
September 1998
WE BEGIN TO RETURN TO
NORMAL
Australian Cybermalls will begin
to return to normal update schedules shortly after surmounting some minor,
unexpected delays in our move to a new server in Canada. Site counters will
be working as usual by midnight tonight, and secure ordering systems, guestbooks
and classifieds are expected to be operational by Thursday. Our news updates,
which were also delayed over the last 48 hours by the technical glitch, have
also returned to normal. However, our daily
Dr Fun cartoon
will remain offline this week. Doctor Fun cartoonist Dave Farley has elected
to take a temporary but indefinite break from the weekday cartoon to attend
to pressing family matters, and we support his decision. A revised Doctor
Fun site - which will fill in for David during his break - will be unveiled
on Sunday, September 12th. In the meantime, we'd like to thank all our visitors
once again for their patience while we get matters right.
Tuesday 8th
September 1998
HOTMAIL TO OPEN IN
AUSTRALIA
The US colonisation of the
Australian Internet took another step forward today with the announcement
that an Australian version of Microsoft's
HotMail free email service will
be added to the ninMSN site
in an attempt to boost traffic and site revenues. The Australianised HotMail
is part of the company's plan to open localised services in 24 countries
world-wide including Japan, France, Germany and the UK. No timetable for
the rollout of the new local service has yet been decided upon, however.
Meanwhile, search engine Excite! have also announced plans to beef up their
Australian portal in an attempt to regain ground already seized by the Australian
Yahoo! and Alta Vista sites. The portal is to be built as a joint venture
between Excite! and an Australian company using localised content.
Monday 7th September
1998
TELSTRA STARTS ADSL
TRIALS
Following NEC Australia's
announcement in June that they intend
to unveil an ADSL broadband access system in Australia in 1999 which would
provide download speeds of between 6 Mb/sec to 8 Mb/sec over ordinary telephone
lines, it was announced today that Telstra have begun trialing an
ADSL system in 23 exchanges. The new technology, if implemented after the
conclusion of the trial next month, would effectively spell the demise of
both Telstra's ISDN services and its Big Pond Cable Service, both of which
are the only current alternatives available for Australian dial-up users
who need access speeds greater than 56K. Telstra had originally rejected
ADSL when it opted to roll out a national cable network last year. But it
also emerged today that the company also put an end to new cable roll-outs
at the start of the year. A Telstra spokesman, however, said that the company
was simply investigating alternate ways to improve Australian household access
to the information superhighway. "Whether it's done by satellite, cable,
ADSL or ISDN in various parts of the country is immaterial," he said. "The
important issue is how is the best way to get more bandwidth to the home".
Friday 4th September
1998
LIBERAL WEB SITE HACKED BY
ALP
The Australian federal election
campaign which began this week assumed the distinction of becoming the first
Internet-enhanced federal election in Australian history yesterday when the
Liberal Party's web site
was hacked by ALP supporters.
The hacking attack - which linked the Liberal Party's site to hardcore
pornography sites and resulted in its temporary closure - was inspired by
a member of Opposition Leader Kim Beazley's staff, who issued instructions
on how to hack the Liberals' web site to party members. Although the actual
hacking was carried out by "a person or persons" unknown, the staffer was
dismissed today after an internal inquiry. The attack is the second known
attack on an Australian political web site. Early last year the
One Nation web site was
also subjected to a hacking attack, when hackers rewound the site's visitation
counters to zero.
Thursday 3rd
September 1998
WE MOVE TO ONTARIO
Australian Cybermalls officially
moved our server from Boston to Ontario today. Our new hosts offer a dual
OC3 connection to the Internet (310 Mbps) which should ensure faster connections
than our former 45 Mbps T3 connection, as well as additional facilities for
future expansion. 99% of our site is now fully operational in its new home
but interactive portions such as guestbooks, order forms, classifieds,
counters and some domains will be dysfunctional for approximately 48
hours until they're fully ported across to our new server. We apologise in
advance to anybody who's inconvenienced by this.
Wednesday 2nd
September 1998
MULTIMEDIA FESTIVAL WILL DEBUT
ON NET
The opening of the first
MAAP (Multimedia Art Asia Pacific) festival will be netcast live to
the world on Friday 18 September from 6:00pm AEST. The VIP
opening event which will be staged from
MAAP's web site will also be
marked by the launch of an online digital art exhibition called Shoreline:
Particles and Waves, featuring commissioned works by twelve artists from
Australia and the Asia Pacific region. The 9-day MAAP98 - the first multimedia
arts festival of its kind in Australia - will showcase over 15 separate events
including exhibitions, forums and screen media cinema screenings from the
region. MAAP98 will be staged in Brisbane, Australia. The festival will embrace
a range of art forms and practices including interactive multimedia, video,
animation, performance, installation and the Net. According to Festival Director
Kim Machan, MAAP98 will be accessible to everyone via the Internet.
"This is the first year that a Multimedia Arts Festival has ever been staged
in Australia and everyone's worked very hard to make it a success," she said.
"There's some surprising things coming to MAAP and we'd like as many people
to get involved in this as possible - physically on the site, or virtually
through the web"
Tuesday 1st
September 1998
AUSTRALIAN NET DIPS IN
AUGUST
The Australian Internet took
another swing last month according to the search engines we monitor to construct
our monthly Australian Internet Growth Index (AIGI), with most capitals
recording a decline in sites with the exception of Perth and Hobart. The
September 1st figures (with August 1st figures in brackets) are as
follows:
Australian
Internet Growth Index August 1998
(Figures Show Estimated Sites) |
-
Brisbane - 2,675 (2,755)
-
Sydney - 9,262 (10,004)
-
Melbourne - 6,679 (7,066)
-
Adelaide - 2,743 (3,697)
|
-
Perth - 2,921 (2,815)
-
Hobart - 1,192 (1,135)
-
Canberra - 2,250 (2,279)
-
Darwin - 2,425 (2,554)
|
|
During August Australian Cybermalls
hosted 43,604 visitors, slightly down from the 44,702 visitors who
dropped by to see us in July 1998. A mid-month decision to relocate our site
from its former location in Boston to a faster host in Ontario, Canada also
deferred a number of scheduled updates by two weeks.
|
