Date: Fri, 11 Aug 2000 10:39:53 -0400 From: "R. A. Hettinga" Subject: DCSB: Hapgood and Johansson; Post-Napster Models for Digital Commerce (and a special announcement!) [Please note the special DCSB 5th Anniversary announcement at the bottom of this message. --RAH] The Digital Commerce Society of Boston Presents Fred Hapgood and Eric Johansson presenting "Post-Napster Business Models for Digital Commerce" Tuesday, September 5th, 2000 12 - 2 PM The Downtown Harvard Club of Boston One Federal Street, Boston, MA The Club's Dress Code is Business Casual Fred Hapgood and Eric Johannson will examine various ideas claiming to represent "online business models for the post- Napster music industry." These include paid admission to interactive online performances, an "official Napster", and systems based on voluntary payments. Attention will be given to how systems based on voluntary payments might work, what kinds of business models make sense in a voluntary payment context, and the implications of voluntary payment structures for other intellectual property issues. Fred Hapgood is a free lance writer specializing in business technology issues and trends. Eric Johansson has over 20 years of high level system and software design experience, with particular emphasis on Internet system design. For the past five years, Eric has headed Internet Guide Services, specializing in the design, configuration, and remediation of complex Internet-based systems. Among others, his clients have included EG&G, BBN, AllMedia Solutions, ZipLink, and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care. He has extensive experience with UNIX systems, Internet server configuration/design, and communication architectures. Prior to founding Internet Guide Service, Eric held senior-level engineering positions with Polaroid Corp., Wang Laboratories, Ziff-Davis, and Computervision. This meeting of the Digital Commerce Society of Boston will be held on Tuesday, September 5th, 2000, from 12pm - 2pm at the Downtown Branch of the Harvard Club of Boston, on One Federal Street. The price for lunch is $35.00. This price includes lunch, room rental, A/V hardware if necessary, and the speakers' lunch. The Harvard Club has relaxed its dress code, which is now "business casual", meaning no sneakers or jeans. Fair warning: since we purchase these luncheons in advance, we will be unable to refund the price of your meal if the Club finds you in violation of what's left of its dress code. We need to receive a company check, or a money order, (or, if we actually know you, a personal check) payable to "The Harvard Club of Boston", by Saturday, September 2nd, or you won't be on the list for lunch. Checks payable to anyone else but The Harvard Club of Boston will have to be sent back. Checks should be sent to Robert Hettinga, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, Massachusetts, 02131. Again, they *must* be made payable to "The Harvard Club of Boston", in the amount of $35.00. Please include your e-mail address so that we can send you a confirmation If anyone has questions, or has a problem with these arrangements (We've had to work with glacial A/P departments more than once, for instance), please let us know via e-mail, and we'll see if we can work something out. Upcoming speakers for DCSB are: October Birthday Cake and Champagne DCSB 5th Anniversary November Zully Ramzan and Nicko van Someren "A Micropayment Shootout" As you can see, :-), we are actively searching for future speakers. If you are in Boston on the first Tuesday of the month, are a principal in digital commerce, and would like to make a presentation to the Society, please send e-mail to the DCSB Program Committee, care of Robert Hettinga, . - -------------------------------- Special Announcement! DCSB Turns Five on October 3rd When we started the Digital Commerce Society of Boston (originally the Boston Society for Digital Commerce, we made the name more, um, instantiable, a couple of months later) at lunch on Tuesday, October 3rd, 1995 it was barely proper to consider actually *selling* anything on the internet at all. In the beginning of 1995, most of us figured that *maybe* a few tens of millions of dollars in transactions would be executed on the internet that year. Of course, we all know what happened: at least $150 million was executed on the net in 1995, billions within a couple of years, and now that amount is approaching trillions of dollars, in the fastest act of economic "exploration", if not absolute economic transformation, in human history. The internet is soon to be the most important sector of the world economy - -- if it isn't already on discounted cash flow alone. :-). The issue of *whether* to do commerce on the net, and how it might be possible, is, of course, a non-issue to any business in the industrialized world anymore. And, every month at DCSB, we consistently come up with fascinating talks from principals and researchers at the frontiers of digital commerce, people who just email us out of the blue, saying they want to do a talk about something completely new and interesting, and that alone speaks to the fundamental changes the internet and cryptography have made on the economic life of this planet. Next month begins is our fifth year of lunch, high-quality speakers, clueful conversation, and an excellent monthly schmooze at the Harvard Club, and we'd like to celebrate a little bit. So, if you were there in 1995 at the founding of DCSB, we'd love to have you there again for the October 3rd meeting. We'll have the original membership book, some birthday cake and champagne, and lots of memories from people who were there at the beginning, and, of course, all the people who've been to DCSB meetings since then. And, of course, we'll not only talk about the last amazing 5 years, but, as we always do, we'll talk about the next 5 years, and the next 50 years, of commerce on the internet. Cheers, Robert A. Hettinga (still) Moderator, The Digital Commerce Society of Boston - ---------------------------------------- For more information about the Digital Commerce Society of Boston, send "info dcsb" in the body of a message to . If you want to subscribe to the DCSB e-mail list, send "subscribe dcsb" in the body of a message to . We look forward to seeing you there! Cheers, R. A. Hettinga Moderator, The Digital Commerce Society of Boston ----------------- R. A. Hettinga The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To unsubscribe from this list, send a letter to: Majordomo@reservoir.com In the body of the message, write: unsubscribe dcsb-announce Or, to subscribe, write: subscribe dcsb-announce If you have questions, write to me at Owner-DCSB@reservoir.com