Abstract:
Commercial Web developers typically make extensive use of prototypes early in the development life cycle. Rather
than supporting requirements validation or elicitation, one of the key objectives of this utilisation of prototypes is
to support clients in understanding how the system under development may impact upon their business processes
or even business models. Despite this there has been little research into understanding the extent and nature of
clients interpretation of early prototypes and how they inform them about potential business impacts. In this paper
we report on a pilot study aimed at identifying the key issues in this prototype exploration process, and in
particular what aspects of the relationship between prototypes and business models should be considered further.
Key outcomes include a number of unexpected indicators, such as pointers towards potential impacts that are not
adequately addressed by current prototype exploration, and differences in the capabilities of clients versus
developers in understanding system impacts. We also describe key open issues that need further investigation if
we are to adequately understand this aspect of the Web development process.
