Using the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) as its basis, this study looks at the impact of intrinsic motivation (perceived enjoyment) and extrinsic motivation (perceived usefulness) on Internet usage in Malaysia, where the penetration of this technology is relatively low compared to the more developed nation. Data collected from respondents were factor analysed and the constructs showed good construct validity with high reliability coefficients. The results confirm previous findings that the main driver of Internet usage is perceived usefulness, followed by perceived enjoyment and perceived ease of use. The findings also show that perceived usefulness and perceived enjoyment have consistent impact on the two dimensions of usage, namely frequency of use and extent of daily usage. Although perceived ease of use can be viewed as an important driver of usage behavior, its impact is insignificant in the presence of perceived usefulness.

This paper provides some direction into how organisations can utilise intrinsic (perceived ease of use and perceived enjoyment) and extrinsic (perceived usefulness) motivation to influence user acceptance and utilisation of the Internet. While this paper was published in 2003, I believe some of these ideas can be applied to organisations that are evaluating the introduction of internal social software systems (i.e. wikis, blogs, forums, knowledge bases etc...). The statement in the abstract, "Although perceived ease of use can be viewed as an important driver of usage behavior, its impact is insignificant in the presence of perceived usefulness", makes sense at face value and suggests that the communication of usefulness for people to accept and use technology (i.e. social software systems) is relatively important.

My main purpose to review this paper was to read more literature related to intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. However, i did notice some discrepancies in the definitions of these terms from this paper and another paper I have recently reviewed, namely, Role of Commitment and Motivation in Knowledge Management Systems Implementation: Theory, Conceptualization, and Measurement of Antecedents of Success. The latter paper specifically discusses problems attributed to the ambiguity in distinguishing between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. It also incorporates a strong theoretical background from previous research to propose definitions to these concepts. It is for this reason that I will most likely utilise the definitions presented in the latter paper for future work.

• Technology Acceptance Model (TAM)
• Perceived ease of use
• Perceived enjoyment
• Perceived usefulness