How Free Software Developers Work: The Mobilization of 'Distant Communities'

Demazière, Didier; Hørn, François; Jullien, Nicolas

doi:10.2139/ssrn.1301572

Cited by 6 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…Our sample focused on SourceForge "enterprise application development" projects to reduce the spectrum of potential behavioural types in the open source community as a whole. Another limit is the transversal approach not taking into account the different possible cooperation and coordination forms which can emerge in a project team (Demazière et al, 2006). Moreover, the analysis delivered a "one shot result" at a specific time and did not allow a longitudinal analysis of the way research objects evolved over time.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Regarding extrinsic motivations, expected professional opportunities are largely influenced by the developer participation level. While developers' engagements often have a neutral effect on career advantages (Raymond, 2000;Demazière et al, 2006), our development (Von Hippel & Von Krogh, 2003;Lakhani & Von Hippel, 2003;Raymond, 1999). Reputation toward peers turns out to be the most influenced variable (r=0.78) and aligns with Fang & Neufeld's (2009) who observed the social identity of the developer as being one of the two factors sustaining participation in the project.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Toward an Enacted Approach to Understanding OSS Developer’s Motivations

Meissonierm

Bourdon

Amabile³

et al. 2012

International Journal of Technology and Human Interaction

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A large part of the existing literature on Open Source Software (OSS) projects identifies the motivation factors predicting the participation level of members. However, the effective satisfaction of developers toward their project still remains a managerial and theoretical challenge. So, it is also consistent to assess how the effective participation of developers in OSS projects makes sense of their own motivations. This article uses the enactivist approach and considers that motivations are not simple antecedents to actions but are shaped by actions as well. The empirical analysis delivers the results of a survey administrated to participants of business OSS projects. The results reveal reputation, reciprocity and expected professional opportunities as the most positively influenced variables. However, learning motivations and ideology toward open source beliefs and values are the lesser influenced ones. These results counterbalance prior empirical researches which have observed a strong predicting power of both variables on expected participation level of participants. This study suggests that participation seems to make sense regarding motivations for which developers have some visible indicators of their personal achievement.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Toward an Enacted Approach to Understanding OSS Developer’s Motivations

Meissonierm

Bourdon

Amabile³

et al. 2012

International Journal of Technology and Human Interaction

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“…So, a FLOSS based package model means that the firms which publishe the software remain heavily involved in its development in order to control it. As their core competence lies on the management of the software edited, the companies should only invest in the software they edit, and the involvement of salaried developers in other projects should not be encouraged 19 .…”

Section: The Role Of Firms In Floss Communitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…23 The study of FLOSS participants' motivations has already generated a vast literature, reviewed by [38] and [43], [42] among others. The role of a person evolves with time [29], as evolve the reasons why s/he participates [19]. May it be called the "process of joining" [26], the "role migration" [29] or the "co-evolution of systems and communities" [59], the evolution follows a "canonical path", the "onion model" [26] from none to center responsability for the future of the community.…”

Section: A Measuring the Role Of Firmsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…May it be called the "process of joining" [26], the "role migration" [29] or the "co-evolution of systems and communities" [59], the evolution follows a "canonical path", the "onion model" [26] from none to center responsability for the future of the community. This is closed to the sociological notion of "career" [4], as pointed out by [19] [43].…”

Section: A Measuring the Role Of Firmsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Floss firms, users and communities: a viable match?

Jullien¹,

Zimmermann²

2011

Journal of Innovation Economics &Amp; Management

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The participation of firms in Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) communities is growing and is increasingly debated amongst scholars. As [41] explained, FLOSS needs profit and we do not know successfull floss products without firms in their ecosystem, either being via the financial support of foundations (Eclipse, Linux) or the commercial offering of products or services based on specific FLOSS products (SQL, RedHat). Various points of view have been proposed, but most of the time, scholars studied either the implication of firms within a community or the integration of floss into their market strategy, but not both. In this article, we plead for a more structured and global analysis, based on industrial economics tools, and thus starting from the basic conditions of the computer market and of the buyers' competence in software development (the 'dominant user's skill). This conceptual framework helps to distinguish the different roles (understood as 'social roles') firms may play in the FLOSS ecosystem and, specifically the variation in their involvement.

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Firms' contribution to open‐source software and the dominant user's skill

Jullien

Zimmermann

2009

European Management Review

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Free, libre or open‐source software (FLOSS) is nowadays produced not only by individual benevolent developers but, in a growing proportion, by firms that hire programmers for their own objectives of development in open source or for contributing to open‐source projects in the context of dedicated communities. A recent literature has focused on the question of the business models explaining how and why firms may draw benefits from such involvement and their connected activities. They can be considered as the building blocks of a new modus operandi of an industry, built on an alternative approach to intellectual property management. Its prospects will depend on both the firms' willingness to rally and its ability to compete with the traditional ‘proprietary’ approach. As a matter of fact, firms' involvement in FLOSS, while growing, remains very contrasted, depending on the nature of the products and the characteristics of the markets. This paper asks why for‐profit firms contribute to FLOSS development and why some firms contribute more than others. The common explanation is that FLOSS is often a complement to proprietary software (or hardware or services) that the for‐profit firm sells at a positive price. We present an alternative explanation based on the users' skill level. When users are skilled, opening the software is likely to result in a better product because the user base will contribute improvements (find bugs, write fixes and produce new features). We introduce the concept of the dominant user's skill and set up a theoretical model to better understand how it may condition the nature and outcome of the competition between a FLOSS firm and a proprietary firm. We discuss these results in the light of stylized facts drawn from recent trends in the software industry.

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How Free Software Developers Work: The Mobilization of 'Distant Communities'

Cited by 6 publications

References 7 publications

Toward an Enacted Approach to Understanding OSS Developer’s Motivations

Toward an Enacted Approach to Understanding OSS Developer’s Motivations

Floss firms, users and communities: a viable match?

Firms' contribution to open‐source software and the dominant user's skill

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