Indeed, its similar to the network computer idea. People use software at their computers (clients) delivered via the Web on demand whenever needed from a website (server).

Providing corporate software to corporate personnel via the Web has been a booming business for years. Chevron uses Citrix, which runs common programs such as Microsoft Office on a server accessed by employees from anywhere (including home) via the Web. FedEx provides package-tracking services to everyone via the FedEx website. Application service providers (ASPs) have created a new industry providing both off-the-shelf and special applications used via the Web, mostly to large businesses. The more interesting aspect of the boom to NBMA members, however, is the small unknown company providing software services.

For a generic example, try ThinkFree (www.thinkfree.com), which provides a word processor, spreadsheet, and presentation program with files compatible with Microsoft Office ($50). You download it, and it runs on your computer. It seamlessly saves your work to online storage (safe, secure, and backed up). You can access your work from anywhere that you can get connected to the Internet. You can download the latest version of this software at any time using any computer (connected to the Internet) and use the software with your files. Never worry about updates, hard disk crashes, backups, or compatibility with Microsoft software. Its $30 per year for the storage.

The classic Web processing is the ecommerce service. You need to offer a shopping cart and a checkout counter to integrate into your ecommerce website in order to collect money for what you sell. Many ISPs give away such software services free. For a reasonable fee, however, you can get a more robust service that even includes accounting and communication features. Look at Miva Merchant (www.miva.com) for a comprehensive ecommerce package that matches expensive corporate ecommerce systems but at 1/100th of the price. Look at modStop (www.modstop.com), which makes dozens of plug-ins for Merchant that extend the functionality of Merchant to super ecommerce capability at a low cost. The bottom line is that this rich and robust software enables you to provide customer service on your ecommerce website.

Why not Java for ThinkFree? My experience is that Java still tends to be comparatively unstable for all day use. Additionally, one has to wait for Java to download every time one boots for the day, perhaps more often. Why not have an application program on your hard disk that saves your work product files to Web storage? The program must be lightweight enough to download quickly. When you are away from the office and need to use a computer, you can download the program (similar to downloading Java) on any computer and use it with your work product files stored on the Web. (To get access in order to download the program, you would have to have the requisite login and password.) In fact, many application providers are using this simple system to deliver powerful programming.

Non-programmers will want to consider a Web application system such as ColdFusion (now owned by Macromedia and integrated into Dreamweaver MX), which you can use to build useful Web applications. With ColdFusion you can invent a software service, deliver it over the Web, and keep your development costs quite low while keeping your development period short. In fact, you can even do it by yourself without a programmer.

Most NBMA members, however, are interested in digital creativity beyond just processing. And therein lies the ultimate potential of the Web: the merger of processing and content. And what service can you create thats not strictly processing? Almost anything!

For example, there are application services today that provide small businesses with multimedia presentations, delivered via the Web. Such services enable small businesses to make presentations that sell their products. Try WT Powers (www.wtpowers.com), which for $20 per month provides an attractive multimedia presentation that a person can show to potential customers from his or her website (but running on the WT Powers server) to promote various types of multilevel marketing businesses. Its a slick Flash presentation. This service also tracks potential customers (who have seen the presentation) and even sends follow-up email.

Indeed, Web services that combine content and processing are very much a part of the silent boom. With the advent of digital multimedia on CDs 1992-96 and then on the Web 1995-2002, the possibilities for software applications expanded dramatically. We now understand that the Internet provides an exceptionally convenient and inexpensive infrastructure for delivering digital processing as well as multimedia content. We have come to appreciate the Web as a competent multimedia medium as well as a delivery system.

Today, its goodbye Web, hello multimedia. We now know how to develop for the Web. Its the accepted medium. Its finally just background noise. Ubiquitous. Whats different now from the digital story of the early 1990s, the CD era? Not much. Having learned the Web, we are now ready to continue forward, but on the Web rather than on CDs. We are ready to do anything on the Web that we can do on a CD.

That's worth repeating. You can put anything on the Web that you can put on a CD.

And you can do even more on the Web. For instance, you can use a database on the Web that you wouldn't put on a CD because it contained sensitive or proprietary data.

What's new is that wide bandwidth (broadband) has made a substantial market penetration. Processing doesnt really work very well via dial-up connections. Broadband (DSL, cable) has created a new market of 30 million users, perhaps more, and has added immensely to the potential for multimedia development. Now its time to get on with the multimedia story. Part of that story is the combinations of various media together online (e.g., convergence). Yet, another equally important part of that story is the combination of processing and content.

Dont be limited by the notion that processing is just for traditional uses (e.g., word processing). Processing is for every service and every product. Its for aesthetic services and products as well as for business services and products. Let your imagination sweep you away. A wide range of processing techniques are now available via broadband to serve your latest and greatest ideas.

For instance, consider multimedia Web-based training products. Theres lots of potential there. Remember the specialty calculators that HP sold (and still does)? Now a specialty calculator doesnt have to be separate from the knowledge about how to make the calculations. The background knowledge, the calculation instructions, and the calculator altogether can be included in one neat package presented for use on the Web. In addition, you can make that package look terrific (with digital art) and even give it different looks for different types of users. Finally, you can make calculators more specialized than ever, since they dont have a physical existence. And the calculator is just one idea out of millions.

And the frosting on the cake? Hey! Many of these processing services on the Web are generating annuity income (i.e., monthly fees). Theyre easy to sell because they cost only a reasonable amount monthly. But the monthly fee goes on forever. It enables you to continually upgrade your product and keep customers happy without ever having to resell the product.

According to Larry Chase, a Web marketing guru, calculators make great attractors for websites. He believes calculators to be the most effective traffic-building devices you can put on a website.