Ever since digital communications became a consumer phenomenon, industry officials have searched for the "killer app," an application so strong that the entire industry would thrive as a result of its appeal to customers. To the industry's chagrin, the Internet - a noncommercial system - has become the de facto killer app, driving consumer interest in the communications revolution and training would-be users of the "electronic universe" how to "live" in the new environment. The Internet fulfills the killer app requirements: generating a strong consumer drive and effectively forcing commercial entities to reshape their thinking to suit the killer app's existence.
The Internet as killer app has changed bandwidth requirements from broad to middle range and has altered the rules under which on-line marketing will operate. In the new environment, companies must recognize that the new electronic market will be a "come and go market," meaning that everything needs to be considered temporal. As a result, they need to "get comfortable with surface chaos," experience of which will lead to the thought that "the Internet is necessary but not sufficient." In the end, marketers must understand the customers' utilitization needs to create successful products and services for the Internet and that means recognizing that in this electronic killer app "context drives content."