Pre-1994 Reference to e-Commerce?

pkaral asks: "Does anyone know a reference to ecommerce that predates 1994 (maybe from sci-fi)? I work with a company facing the Bellboy e-Commerce patent claim. It turns out that the patent must be taken seriously, but can be defeated by a pre-1994 description - fiction or not - of an online purchase."

"Requirements:

(1) Description of someone buying/ordering something over a computer network,
(2) buyer gets real-time order confirmation (a salient aspect of the patent), and
(3) the text was published before Dec 17, 1993.

I figure some author, maybe William Gibson, may have written something along these lines. If the Slashdot community knows of a specific reference we could rid the world of this ridiculous patent."

Comments

Uhm... Compuserve?

[Magic5Ball]

Circa 1993:
1) toll-free dial-in at 4800 on 7E1 to get local compuserve dial-in number
2) sign up for a new account, pay for using Visa/MC
3) access is granted
4) 'go epic'
5) Register Epic Pinball (and other great titles), billed to credit card, download SFX zip file, message sent to messaging account once transaction is successful.

I'm sure there are other compuserve/prodigy/etc examples that predate this (lexis-nexis comes to mind).

Prior art in trading

[sigwinch]

Stocks, bonds, and commodities have long been sold using computers, and real-time confirmation is an essential part of the business. Commodities sales in particular constitute an actual purchase of deliverable physical chattels, and are indistinguishable from modern 'e-commerce'. Ditto for bank transactions that involve currency conversion (which unlike a simple transaction constitute a sale of goods at a profit).

Frankly, I wouldn't lift a damn finger until the patent holder sued for willful criminal infringement, then I'd rape the individuals involved (not the companies -- if they are gonna personally be idiots, they have to be personally punished) violently with prior art and fraud counterclaims. But then I tend to have a scorched earth approach...

This one's far too easy to slam-dunk:

[WolfWings]

How about a RPG from 1989?
ShadowRun, first edition.
Every transaction you make in that universe is done with a variant on credit cards that are electronically verified over thier version of the internet, and payment confirmed with the same system, before you can even buy a candy bar.