9. Companies.

A company is an organisation that produces goods or services to make a profit. There are many different types.

A small business might become a medium or large business. If a company sells directly to the public, it is a retail business. A wholesale business sells goods in bulk to other companies. Some companies have Ltd in their name. This stands for Limited company. Here, shareholders only lose what they invested if the company goes bankrupt. A company with PLC after its name is a Public limited company -its shares can be freely bought and sold. In contrast a Private limited company only passes shares to another person if other shareholders agree. A conglomerate consists of several companies that have joined together. A multinational or transnational company has global operations in many different countries.

Funding influences the type of ownership. Companies can be funded by share capital, money raised from investors who bought shares. It is owned by the shareholders who elect a board of directors to make decisions and set company policy. Venture capital companies lend money to people to start a new business. Some projects which venture capitalists invest in may be high risk and unable to attract funding from elsewhere. If a person owns their own company without investors, they are a sole proprietor. When two or more people join together to start a company, they form a partnership. A company is bought by another company in a takeover, which can be friendly or hostile.

Traditionally a company board's main responsibility was to increase profits on behalf of the company's shareholders. In contrast, business ethics have been influenced by the idea of the stakeholder, which advocates that a firm also has an obligation to a wide range of people and groups, including shareholders, employees, suppliers, customers, government agencies, protest groups and the community in which the company operates.

A successful company needs change management, charismatic leadership with a commitment to Innovation and improving performance, a clear business strategy and an easily identified corporate identity (so that the company name or products are recognised). However, James C Collins found that a key factor in companies that made the transition from good to great was a company culture that encouraged disciplined people to act in a disciplined manner.

The ethics and actions of big companies have increasingly come under scrutiny, it will be interesting to monitor which qualities and values come to define the most successful companies of the twenty-first century.

10. The Web

Now that the Internet has arrived, it is difficult to imagine how we lived without it; it has revolutionised communications. Changes are taking place at an incredible speed. Hardware is becoming more compact, faster and more affordable, allowing more individuals and companies to utilise the Net. In the past, research took longer, important documents got lost in the post and information could be difficult to find.

Unfortunately this revolution has brought with it a new set of problems. Research is certainly quicker but connections can be slow, making it difficult to access the websites that you need. Documents can still get lost, but now they float around cyberspace. Spam can be a problem when your e-mail account becomes overloaded with advertising that you don't want, but more sinister are the various computer viruses which can make your computer crash. And not all countries have equal access to the advantages of new technology.

The global economy has come to rely on the constant exchange of up-to-the-minute information. Information and communication technologies (ICTs) have transformed the way that companies and individuals communicate. E-commerce and the changing way that businesses connect to customers, suppliers and new markets are gradually creating a new economy. Traditional business models and processes may need to be re-evaluated and adapted to the network economy of tomorrow.

Technology has also opened up new horizons for education. E-learning continues to grow, allowing educational and professional courses to be taken by distance learning. This means that access to courses is not determined by geographic location. Online seminars can be synchronous (in real time) or asynchronous (where students and lecturers post messages for reading later). Blended learning: integrates both online and traditional learning techniques. Language learning has also benefited from the technological breakthroughs with TELL (technology enhanced language learning) - using computers multimedia and other new technologies.

The World Wide Web is still young. It will continue to evolve and change; both individuals and businesses are still coming to terms with the impact and applications of the vast flow of knowledge at their fingertips. Can the Internet of the future help bring about true global communication and shared prosperity? Only if the gap between the information-rich and the information-poor can be bridged.