Emerging Web services technologies provide an open infrastructure for automated business interaction, thereby creating new opportunities for business actors to collaborate within a networked constellation of enterprises via the Internet. The basis for a viable network of Web services (the supporting information system of such a networked constellation of enterprises) is a value model that shows sound value propositions to all actors involved. Requirements engineering techniques can be developed to support: (1) exploring alternative business models, and (2) evaluating alternatives on their economic viability, leading into the design and implementation of technical systems. In this paper, we present a business-oriented approach supporting Web services idea exploration (BASSIE), which exploits the synergy between the agent- and goal-oriented i* framework and the value-based e/sup 3/value framework. The approach iterates between exploration of structural alternatives and qualitative evaluation using i*, and quantitative modeling and evaluation of business value using e/sup 3/value. The approach is illustrated with a real life case study in digital music distribution.

Based on interviews with a number of architects and managers from a wide range of organizations, we characterize how architecture is perceived in practice. We identify three groups of organizations that differ with respect to their level of architectural thinking and the alignment of business and IT on architectural issues. Analysis of the interviews further indicates that these three groups differ in the architecture aspects and critical success factors they emphasize. Our results provide a starting point for assessing architecture maturity and alignment within organizations, and can be used to help harmonize different architectural tunes played within organizations.