2.3 The Information Market
The business between users and Information Providers is buying and selling
information, respectively. Even if the information involved is public
domain information, users must still pay for the service of packaging and
delivery of the information. The market for information selling and
delivery services is an expanding one.
Being the platform for information interchange, the NIG can be seen as the marketplace for this business and in that sense, it would be the nation’s Information Clearing House. As the intermediary between IPs and paying users, the NIG operator can be considered as an Information Broker.
The NIG also performs two marketing functions for information-as-a-merchandise. In the formal definition of “marketing”, delivery is an integral, essential part of it and the NIG plays a significant role in information delivery. The other marketing function is promotion and the NIG does this by being a facilitator for encouraging information use, collectively connecting all IPs to users, thus indirectly promoting information usage in daily life.