Period Pants

IBM’s online transaction processing (OLTP), which was developed in the 1960s and enabled the processing of financial transactions in real-time, was one of the first types of online trading. One of its applications was the Semi-Automatic Business Research Environment (SABRE), a computerized ticket reservation system designed for American Airlines. Computer terminals in various travel agencies were connected to a massive IBM mainframe computer, which handled and organized transactions so that all travel agents had access to the same information at the same time.

With the advent of the Internet came the rise of online shopping as we know it today.

Initially, this website mainly served as a tool for businesses to advertise their goods and provide information about them. Thanks to the introduction of interactive Web pages and protected transmissions, it soon progressed from Period Pants this basic utility to real online shopping transactions. [4] In particular, the internet’s development as a safe shopping platform began in 1994, with the first sales of Sting’s album “Ten Sumner’s Tales.”  Wine, chocolates, and flowers were among the first retail categories to fuel the growth of online shopping, and they were among the pioneering retail categories that fuelled the growth of online shopping.

Researchers discovered that providing e-commerce-ready goods is a crucial predictor of Internet success. [6] Many of these items did well because they were generic products that consumers could purchase without having to touch or feel them. But, more importantly, in the early days, there were few online shoppers, and those who did were from a specific demographic: wealthy men in their 30s. Since those early days, online shopping has come a long way and now accounts for large percentages in the UK (depending on product category as percentages can vary).

Increase in the number of people shopping online

As online sales grew in popularity, researchers identified various types of online shoppers. Rohm & Swaninathan identified four types of online shoppers and labelled them “convenience shoppers, variety seekers, healthy consumers, and store-oriented shoppers.” They looked at shopping motives and discovered that the range of items available and the perceived ease of shopping online marketplace were important motivators. Offline shoppers, on the other hand, were more inspired by time savings and recreational reasons.

In the 1980s, Michael Aldrich was a pioneer of online shopping.

In 1979, Michael Aldrich, an English entrepreneur, was a pioneer of online shopping. His system used a domestic telephone line to connect a modified domestic TV to a real-time transaction processing machine. He saw videotex, which combines modified domestic TV technology with a simple menu-driven human–computer interface, as a “modern, widely applicable, participatory communication medium — the first since the invention of the telephone.”

This enabled ‘closed’ corporate information systems to be opened to ‘outside’ correspondents for e-messaging, information retrieval, and dissemination, later known as e-business. His conception of the modern mass communications medium as ‘participative’ [interactive, many-to-many] was a radical departure from conventional conceptions of mass communication and mass media, and it was a forerunner to social networking on the Internet 25 years later. In March 1980, he launched Redifon’s Office Revolution, which enabled buyers, customers, agents, distributors, suppliers, and service companies to link on-line to corporate systems and conduct real-time business transactions.

He developed, manufactured, marketed, built, maintained, and assisted many online shopping systems using videotex technology during the 1980s.These systems, which included voice response and handprint scanning, predated the Internet and the World Wide Web, the IBM PC, and Microsoft MS-DOS, and were mostly used by large companies in the United Kingdom.

Tim Berners-Lee developed the first World Wide Web server and browser in 1989, and it became commercially available in 1991.

Following that, in 1994, we saw the introduction of online banking, Pizza Hut’s first online pizza store, Netscape’s SSL v2 encryption protocol for safe data transfer, and Intershop’s first online shopping framework. In 1994, NetMarket or Internet Shopping Network conducted the first safe online retail purchase.

Amazon.com followed suit in 1995 with the introduction of its online shopping platform, and eBay followed suit in 1996. Taobao and Tmall, two Alibaba sites, were launched in 2003 and 2008, respectively. Retailers are increasingly using “pretail” to test, create, and manage demand for products and services before they are available.

By Anurag Rathod

Anurag Rathod is an Editor of Appclonescript.com, who is passionate for app-based startup solutions and on-demand business ideas. He believes in spreading tech trends. He is an avid reader and loves thinking out of the box to promote new technologies.