Firms' contribution to open source software and the dominant skilled user

: 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 contrasting, depending on the nature of the products and the characteristics of the markets. The aim of this paper is to emphasize that, beside factors like the importance of software as a core competence of the firm, the role of users on the related markets - and more precisely their level of skills - may provide a major explanation of such diversity. We introduce the concept of the dominant skilled user and we 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 empirical stylized facts drawn from the recent trends in the software industrySoftware ; Open Source ; Intellectual Property ; Competition ; Users

An Economic Approach to Voluntary Association

We develop an economic model of association based on voluntary contributions. Different equilibria corresponding to the different modes of formation of associations are analyzed and the results are compared with the existing empirical literature. The main contribution consists in analyzing voluntary associations as a means of providing collective consumption goods or services while allowing for some heterogeneity of preferences concerning the quality of these goods or services. Thus we introduce the concept of subjective quality as a possible incentive for volunteering. The model stresses the importance of non-pecuniary rewards and of accepted differentiation for the well-functioning of voluntary organizations.Voluntary Association; Public Good; Volunteering

AN ECONOMIC APPROACH TO VOLUNTARY ASSOCIATION

We develop an economic model of association based on voluntary contributions. Different equilibria corresponding to the different modes of formation of associations are analyzed and the results are compared with existing empirical literature. The main contribution consists in formalizing the voluntary association as a means of providing collectiveconsumption goods or services. We introduce the concept of the subjective quality as a possible incentive for volunteering. The model stresses the importance of non-pecuniary rewards and of accepted differentiation for well-functioning of voluntary organizations.Voluntary Association, Public Good, Volunteering

La Musique à l'Heure de l'Internet : du Patrimoine aux Communs ?

De tous temps la création musicale s'est trouvée dans une situation de dualité entre dimension individuelle du créateur et dimension sociale de son audience. Dès l'origine, les structures sociales s'organisent selon le principe que les talents musicaux sont distribués de manière inégale et que la musique a une fonction sociale, éventuellement spirituelle, mais n'est pas production de biens de subsistance. Il appartient alors à la société de prendre en charge ceux qu'elle reconnaît comme musiciens. La question de la rémunération des artistes est donc posée, dès lors que leur art est socialement entériné. Le deuxième aspect fondamental est celui de la diffusion de l’oeuvre, la constitution d'une audience. L’oeuvre musicale atteint son objectif, sa raison d'être à partir du moment où elle rencontre son public. Elle acquiert une valeur sociale sous cette condition et sous cette condition seulement. Avec l'arrivée des technologies d'enregistrement et de radiodiffusion, l'industrie musicale qui en est née a privilégié le star système et normalisé les préférences au nom des économies d'échelle en faisant l'amalgame entre valeur sociale et valeur marchande des oeuvres. La numérisation et le développement d'Internet ont récemment posé les limites d'un tel modèle, dès lors que la circulation des oeuvres ne serait plus entravée par des barrières économiques. Le nouveau monde de la création musicale en train d'émerger pourrait s'apparenter davantage à un bien commun, dont les Creative Commons pourraient constituer le support juridique dans une nouvelle façon de gérer le droit d'auteur comme faisceau de droits

Firms' contribution to open source software and the dominant skilled user

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 contrasting, depending on the nature of the products and the characteristics of the markets. The aim of this paper is to emphasize that, beside factors like the importance of software as a core competence of the firm, the role of users on the related markets - and more precisely their level of skills - may provide a major explanation of such diversity. We introduce the concept of the dominant skilled user and we 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 empirical stylized facts drawn from the recent trends in the software industr

Floss firms, users and communities: a viable match?

International audienceThe 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

L'aire métropolitaine marseillaise et les territoires de l'industrie

Document de travail LEST-GREQAML'industrie marseillaise tend aujourd'hui à s'organiser à l'échelle de sa métropole. Mais unetelle tendance n'a pas toujours été de soi. D'abord organisée autour de son port et dans l'articulation avec l'outre-mer et notamment l'empire colonial, le complexe industrialoportuaire ne connaissait pas de véritable hinterland et traduisait l'état d'esprit d'une ville enserrée dans ses collines et exclusivement tournée vers la mer. Avec les temps de crises, cette déconnexion de Marseille avec sa périphérie s'est retournée à son encontre, laissant une ville sombrer dans la crise économique et sociale et la paupérisation, tandis qu'autour d'elle le développement de nouvelles dynamiques économiques prenait l'allure d'une revanche et mobilisait les rivalités de tous ordres. Aujourd'hui, la ville centre bénéficie d'un retour en grâce ; porteuse d'une image renouvelée, elle n'est désormais plus boudée des Français ni des investisseurs. Forte de sa situation littorale, de sa culture urbaine et de son potentiel scientifique, elle se trouve en bonne position pour accueillir et développer des activités industrielles modernes orientées sur l'immatériel et la connaissance. Dès lors c'est toute la force d'un système métropolitain qui peut demain émerger et se construire, mettant en valeur les complémentarité d'un ensemble urbain et périurbain qui fonde sa richesse sur la variété de ses ressources. Mais encore faudra-t-il sans doute qu'une véritable volonté politique métropolitaine s'impose en lieu et place des vieux sectarismes et des méfiances réciproques

Industrial Clusters and the Knowledge Based Economy : from open to distributed structures ?

Document de Travail GREQAM ; 2007-07During the recent years, clusters have been at the heart of a vast literature supposed to bring new arguments and perspectives to local development preoccupations. Two complementary factors are stressing for firms and territories the importance of governing the interactions of industrial actors: the globalisation of the economy and the technology and the emergence of a knowledge based economy. In local systems, agents are mostly connected with agents situated in their spatial proximity, while these local networks, as open systems, benefit from the long distance connections that some of their members are able to activate. Co-location of actors in a geographical proximity by itself is not a sufficient condition for co-ordination but can contribute to its efficiency, provided the existence of other shared dimensions among agents: organic level, representations, projects, ... As far as efficiency and performances of "classical" clusters are not only the result of the intensity and quality of internal but also external interactions and coordination, into which extent can we still consider the relevance of interaction structures restricted to bounded geographical areas? In this paper we turn our attention to the way industrial actors take into account the question of the local-global articulation for the strategic building of their own ego-network, that is the set of links they may build in order to achieve efficient interactions with partners and competitors. Thus interfaces between local and global relationships are a key feature that can be achieved through different approaches. To this aim we introduce the two concepts of knowledge gatekeeper and temporary proximity that appear as providing alternative approaches of actors partnering, likely to provide a better flexibility in the local-global trade-off. We will then present the basic form of the ego-networks on which the individual firm is able to build her relational neighbourhood. This raises the question of the combination of individual ego-networks into a consistent networked structure into which local networks are articulated by the way of local-global interfaces. On this basis we present a typology of the basic new forms of clustering where time and space can be alternatively and complementarily combined in order to achieve more flexibility and costs reduction of the localisation game

FLOSS in an industrial economics perspective

National audienceThe spread of free/libre open source software (FLOSS) represents one of the most important developments in the Information Technology (IT) industry in recent years. Within the context of a knowledge-based economy, this sort of approach appears exemplary for a growing number of industrial activities in which the amount of knowledge that has to be mastered is too large for a single agent, however powerful. Considering knowledge as a mutual resource requires a rethinking of the value chain concept, since cash flow is derived from use of the knowledge base (services, complementary products), not from the knowledge itself. In a classical industrial economics perspective, this reshaping of the value chain must be analyzed not only at the global ecosystem level (who produces what, between firms and universities, users and producers, etc.), but also at the industry level (once the industrys role has been identified, how does it organize itself?). Various points of view have been proposed, but researchers have generally studied either the involvement of firms in a community or the integration of FLOSS into their market strategy, but not both. In this article, we argue for a more structured and global analysis, based on the tools of industrial economics, and thus starting from the basic conditions of the computer market and of the buyers competence in software development (the dominant users skill). This conceptual framework helps to distinguish the different types of corporate behavior we see in the FLOSS ecosystem and more specifically their varying degrees of involvement.Ces dernières années, la diffusion du logiciel libre, ou open source, représente une des évolutions les plus importantes de l’industrie des technologies de l’information. Dans un contexte d’une économie basée sur la connaissance, ce modèle apparaît comme exemplaire pour de nombreuses industries, où la quantité de connaissance qu’il faut maîtriser est trop grande pour être maîtrisée par un seul agent, même puissant. Considérer la connaissance comme une ressource partagée implique de repenser le concept de chaîne de valeur, car la richesse est générée par les usages de cette base de connaissance (services, produits complémentaires) et non plus de la connaissance par elle-même. Si l’on se place dans une perspective d’économie industrielle « classique », cette restructuration de la valeur doit être étudiée au niveau de l’écosystème global (qui produit quoi entre les entreprises et les universités, entre les utilisateurs et les producteurs, etc.), mais aussi au niveau industriel (une fois que le rôle de l’industrie est compris, comment celle-ci s’organise). De nombreuses explications ont été proposées, mais, la plupart du temps, les chercheurs étudient soit l’implication des entreprises dans les communautés, soit l’intégration du logiciel libre dans leurs stratégies commerciales, rarement les deux. Dans cet article, nous défendons l’idée d’une approche plus structurée et globale, partant des conditions initiales du marché de l’informatique et des compétences des acheteurs en terme de développement logiciel (les compétences de l’utilisateur « représentatif »). Ce cadre conceptuel permet d’éclairer les différents comportements des entreprises que l’on constate dans l’écosystème libre, et spécifiquement la variation de leur implication

Free/Libre/Open Source Software (Floss): Lessons for Intellectual Property Rights Management in a Knowledge-Based Economy

International audienceThe aim of this paper is to focus on the emerging situation in which open source software is nowadays produced not only by individual 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. As commercial firms it is important to analyze how and why they are capable of drawing benefits from such involvement and their connected activities. Moreover, we want to stress the different types of business model these firms rely on and the possible evolution they are likely to follow in the near future. We shown how Open Source principles provide an alternative way of thinking and managing intellectual property that do not come up against the same problems but needs a radical change in the way of drawing commercial benefits from knowledge development tasks. Then we analyze the growing involvement of commercial actors by setting up a typology of the different business models that can be observed in the OS landscape, how they correspond to the different strategies of industrial firms according to the main characteristics of their technical skills and market position. Finally, in a conclusive section we will draw the main lessons of the FLOSS experience for a possible enlargement of those principles of IPR management and business to other knowledge based commercial activities