A Quantitative Analysis of the User Behavior of a Large E-Broker

The Internet and the World Wide Web provide a global virtual marketplace. However, there is little information about the behavior of e-commerce users worldwide. The goal of the paper is twofold. First, we give an overview of the architecture and implementation of the Miner Family of Web Agents for e-commerce. Then, we present a quantitative study of the user behavior of a large e-broker (i.e., the BookMiner). Considering that the e-broker is used by a large number of users that only speak Portuguese and live in Brazil, we discuss the influence of regional and cultural issues on the e-commerce activities. Although the Web opens a company to a global market, our findings clearly indicate that e-commerce is strongly tied to regional issues, such as language, national customs and regulations, currency conversion and logistics. Also, the Internet infrastructure, mainly the intercontinental links, affects the user