Scaffolding the New Web: Standards and Standards Policy for the Digital Economy
Abstract
With every passing month the digital economy grows stronger and more attractive. Much, perhaps, most of this economy rests upon the Internet and its World Wide Web. They, in turn, rest upon information technology standards. Today's standards appear good enough to see the digital economy through the next few years. But it is unclear how much longer the momentum of such commerce can be sustained absent new standards. Are today's standards processes adequate? Where are they taking the industry (and where is the industry taking them)? Is government intervention required to address systemic failures in their development? To answer these questions, a RAND Science and Technology Policy research team undertook five case studies covering 1. existing Web standards 2. the extensible markup language, XML 3. digital library standards 4. issues related to payments, property, and privacy 5. evolving electronic commerce value chains.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2000
- Accession Number
- ADA379100
Entities
People
- Anna Slomovic
- David R. Frelinger
- James Schneider
- Martin Libicki
Organizations
- RAND Corporation