Durability

... in May 1998, for example, the French Post Office's financiers could only access the stock market's progress by Minitel, which gave the previous evening's results, whereas on servers such as La Tribune Interactive (http://www.latribune.fr) the main market results were available free with only 20 minutes' delay. An insurance company can allow its customers to follow the progress of a claim, via its Web server. Still in the insurance sector, the quality of customer relations can improve considerably, even with the best customers. Normally, customers only hear about their money when they pay their premium or make a claim, which means that insurance companies don't have a very positive image. With the minimal cost of e-mail, the company can contact its customers regularly by Internet, to wish them a Happy Christmas, or notify them of important events, or simply to send them practical advice from time to time about the prevention of various risks, all of which helps strengthen the bond between the insurance company and the public, who feel more confident and become more faithful customers as a result.

The consequences of continuity vary according to the sector : the 'biological' rhythm of the current news services (television or print) have been conditioned by material limitations. The shortest publication frequency of the printed press is usually a day. For television, it's difficult for a general-interest channel to programme more than four news bulletins a day. On Internet, at best, information can be announced in real time. And this is the future formula for news distribution. With Internet, there is no longer an need to wait '20 hours' to get a complete picture of the news, you can have it continuously and in real time.

next: Transparency: the client sees everything, knows everything and can do anything