Corporate information servers, such as enterprise information portals, often suffer from high costs of client-server setup, challenges in updating and managing databases, costs required to assure integration with legacy systems, and lack of incentives for employee participation. With flexible, productive communities to tap into, a supply chain becomes a true supply network. In the beginning, they say, the Internet was an enabler of small players and the network was the computer. Structure, control, and efficiency were the Internet's enemies. But e-commerce changed all that.
Individuals create, update, and manage content on their own computers.
There are no centralized servers. There is no controlling authority. Later generations have continued to focus on anonymous communications among users. Although third parties or intermediaries such as portals or centralized servers provide quality assurance for products being exchanged, peers rely on each other to live up to promises. Membership screening may help, but any network that limits itself forgoes the benefits of network externality.