Editorial 25/3: Electronic Markets on ecosystems and tourism

Abstract

Dear readers of Electronic Markets, This editorial was spurred by two observations. First, ElectronicMarkets (EM) enjoys a growing volume of submissions and now repeatedly receives manuscripts that are out of the journal’s scope. Obviously, this requires an understanding on the topics that are within EM’s scope. For this purpose, the following aims at clarifying this boundary. Second, the third issue of Electronic Markets includes a special issue on BSmart tourism^. In fact, tourism was one of the industries that gave birth to electronic markets in the early 1960s and experienced an impressive development by transforming the entire airline industry. Thus, the editorial exploits the close link between the emergence of electronic markets and the history of computerized reservation systems (CRS) in tourism to clarify the scope of EM as well as to motivate the present special issue. When looking back, the phenomenon of electronic markets originated only in a small number of industries and was by no means as omnipresent as today. Among these industries were four sectors: agriculture, banking, retail and tourism.