The Internet is the most important innovation since the development of the printing press. If we get it right, it has the potential to radically transform not just the way individuals go about conducting their business with each other, but also the very essence of what it means to be a human being in society.

Tom Novak and I see the Internet as a computer-mediated environment in which people interact with each other and with computers. In this sense the Internet is a destination. When we look at the Internet as a market, it turns out to be very different than terrestrial targets of opportunity.

The key distinguishing feature of course is interactivity. I think it's very important to realize that this interactivity is not just with other people, but with other computers and their agents. When interactivity is combined with telepresence -- a person's mediated perception of an environment -- along with multimedia and hypertext, the result is a virtual environment.

But the virtual environment is not a simulation of the environment. Instead, it is an alternative destination in which consumers may engage in different activities.

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