The construction industry's adoption of the Internet

Geoffrey A. Moore (1991) divides the potential customers of a specific high-tech market into five categories: Innovators, Early Adopters, Early Majority, Late Majority and Laggards. According to Moore, the single greatest challenge for the potential market dominance of a high-tech product is the "crossing of the chasm." The "chasm" represents the gap between the profile characteristics of the Early Adopters and the Early Majority, between the visionary and the pragmatist. The visionary and the pragmatist do not adopt technology for the same reasons. Furthermore, according to Moore, the "pragmatists are not anxious to reference visionaries in their buying decisions." Thus between the two occurs a "chasm" that the Internet service providers and software firms utilizing Internet technology must cross. The research presented in this paper measured the standing of construction companies relative to the Moore classification. The findings show that the "chasm" has been crossed and that the use of the Internet by general contractors is not limited to those visionary few who pursue changes in technology for technology's sake. The use of the Internet is widespread among the pragmatic Early Majority and even the Late Majority who typically wait until a product has become an established standard before moving ahead with Internet technology adoption.