【正文】 are also greatly affected by new market entrants, substitute products and services, suppliers, and customers. Information systems help panies pete by maintaining low costs, differentiating products or services, focusing on market niche, strengthening ties with customers and suppliers, and increasing barriers to market entry with high levels of operational excellence.3. How do the value chain and value web models help businesses identify opportunities for strategic information system applications?The value chain model highlights specific activities in the business where petitive strategies and information systems will have the greatest impact. The model views the firm as a series of primary and support activities that add value to a firm’s products or services. Primary activities are directly related to production and distribution, whereas support activities make the delivery of primary activities possible. A firm’s value chain can be linked to the value chains of its suppliers, distributors, and customers. A value web consists of information systems that enhance petitiveness at the industry level by promoting the use of standards and industrywide consortia, and by enabling businesses to work more efficiently with their value partners.4. How do information systems help businesses use synergies, core petencies, and networkbased strategies to achieve petitive advantage?Because firms consist of multiple business units, information systems achieve additional efficiencies or enhance services by tying together the operations of disparate business units. Information systems help businesses leverage their core petencies by promoting the sharing of knowledge across business units. Information systems facilitate business models based on large networks of users or subscribers that take advantage of network economics. A virtual pany strategy uses networks to link to other firms so that a pany can use the capabilities of other panies to build, market, and distribute products and services. In business ecosystems, multiple industries work together to deliver value to the customer. Information systems support a dense network of interactions among the participating firms.5. What are the challenges posed by strategic information systems and how should they be addressed?Implementing strategic systems often requires extensive organizational change and a transition from one sociotechnical level to another. Such changes are called strategic transitions and are often difficult and painful to achieve. Moreover, not all strategic systems are profitable, and they can be expensive to build. Many strategic information systems are easily copied by other firms so that strategic advantage is not always sustainable.IV. Ethical and Social Issues in Information Systems1. What ethical, social, and political issues are raised by information systems?Information technology is introducing changes for which laws and rules of acceptable conduct have not yet been developed. Increasing puting power, storage, and networking capabilities—including the Internet—expand the reach of individual and organizational actions and magnify their impacts. The ease and anonymity with which information is now municated, copied, and manipulated in online environments pose new challenges to the protection of privacy and intellectual property. The main ethical, social, and political issues raised by information systems center around information rights and obligations, property rights and obligations, accountability and control, system quality, and quality of life.2. What specific principles for conduct can be used to guide ethical decisions?Six ethical principles for judging conduct include the Golden Rule, Immanuel Kant’s Categorical Imperative, Descartes’ rule of change, the Utilitarian Principle, the Risk Aversion Principle, and the ethical “no free lunch” rule. These principles should be used in conjunction with an ethical analysis.3. Why do contemporary information systems technology and the Internet pose challenges to the protection of individual privacy and intellectual property?Contemporary data storage and data analysis technology enables panies to easily gather personal data about individuals from many different sources and analyze these data to create detailed electronic profiles about individuals and their behaviors. Data flowing over the Internet can be monitored at many points. Cookies and other Web monitoring tools closely track the activities of Web site visitors. Not all Web sites have strong privacy protection policies, and they do not always allow for informed consent regarding the use of personal information. Traditional copyright laws are insufficient to protect against software piracy because digital material can be copied so easily and transmitted to many different locations simultaneously over the Internet.4. How have information systems affected everyday life?Although puter systems have been sources of efficiency and wealth, they have some negative impacts. Computer errors can cause serious harm to individuals and organizations. Poor data quality is also responsible for disruptions and losses for businesses. Jobs can be lost when puters replace workers or tasks bee unnecessary in reengineered business processes. The ability to own and use a puter may be exacerbating socioeconomic disparities among different racial groups and social classes. Widespread use of puters increases opportunities for puter crime and puter abuse. Computers can also create health problems, such as RSI, puter vision syndrome, and technostress.PART 2: Information Technology InfrastructureV. IT Infrastructure and Emerging Technologies1. What is IT infrastructure and what are its ponents?IT infrastructure is the shared technology resources that provide the platform for the firm’s specific information system applications. IT infrastructure includes hardware, software, and services that are shared across the entire fi