Internet technologies are having a significant impact on the learning industry. For-profit organizations and traditional institutions of higher education have developed and are using web-based courses, but little is known about their effectiveness compared to traditional classroom education. Our work focuses on the effectiveness of a webbased virtual learning environment (VLE) in the context of basic information technology skills training. This article provides three main contributions. First, it introduces and defines the concept of VLE, discussing how a VLE differs from the traditional classroom and differentiating it from the related, but narrower, concept of computer aided instruction (CAI). Second, it presents a framework of VLE effectiveness, grounded in the technologymediated learning literature, which frames the VLE research domain, and addresses the relationship between the main constructs. Finally, it focuses on one essential VLE design variable, learner control, and compares a web-based VLE to a traditional classroom through a longitudinal experimental design. Our results indicate that, in the context of IT basic skills training in undergraduate education, there are no significant differences in performance

This paper critically reviews measures of user information satisfaction and selects one for replication and extension. A survey of production managers is used to provide additional support for the instrument, eliminate scales that are psychometrically unsound, and develop a standard short form for use when only an overall assessment of information satisfaction is required and survey time is limited.

User involvement in the design of computer-based information systems is enthusiastically endorsed in the prescriptive literature. However determining when and how much, or even if, user involvement is appropriate are questions that have received inadequate research attention. In this paper research that examines the link between user involvement and indicators of system success is reviewed. The authors find that much of the existing research is poorly grounded in theory and methodologically flawed; as a result, the benefits of user involvement have not been convincingly demonstrated. Until higher quality studies are completed intuition, experience, and unsubstantiated prescriptions will remain the practitioner's best guide to the determination of appropriate levels and types of user involvement; these will generally suggest that user involvement is appropriate for unstructured problems or when user acceptance is important. In order to foster higher quality integrated research and to increase understanding of the user involvement-system success relationship, the authors present the following: a conceptual framework into which previous research has been mapped that can provide direction to future efforts; a review of existing measures of user involvement and system success; a set of variables that have been proposed as potentially impacting the relationship between user involvement and system success.user involvement, participative decision making, information systems

Executive support is often prescribed as critical for fully tapping the benefits of information technology (IT). However, few investigations have attempted to determine what type of executive support is likely or organizationally appropriate. This article puts forward alternative models of executive support. The models are tested by examining chief executive officers' behaviors in and perceptions of IT activities. CEOs and information systems executives are surveyed and further data collected from industry handbooks and from chairmen's annual letters to shareholders. The results suggest that executive involvement (a psychological state) is more strongly associated with the firm's progressive use of IT than executive participation (actual behaviors) in IT activities. Executive involvement is influenced by a CEO's participation, prevailing organizational conditions, and the executive's functional background. CEO's perceptions about the importance of IT in their firms were generally positive, although they participated in IT activities rather infrequently.

The role of information systems in the creation and appropriation of economic value has a long tradition of research, within which falls the literature on the sustainability of IT-dependent competitive advantage. In this article, we formally define the notion of IT-dependent strategic initiative and use 1 Jane Webster was the accepting senior editor for this paper. Anitesh Barua was the associate editor. Jeanne Ross, Anandhi Bharadwaj, and Paul Pavlou served as reviewers.