110 research outputs found
The three dimensions of a communitarian institution. The Open Source Software Community Case
The analysis of the empirical studies relative to the Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) case highlights the necessity to enlarge the set of categories used to describe developers incentives. In particular, the evidences stress the important role played by another category of incentives, broadly and roughly defined as psychological and social motivations. However, the theories elaborated to cope with this dimension, such as ift economy,epistemic community or community of practice, are not combined into a unique structured framework. Each one of them, in fact, is focused on particular features of the FLOSS model, so that the FLOSS community itself is often described as ahybrid institution, obtained combining different perspectives. However, it is possible construct a mechanism here called reflexive identity able to bridge the analyzed theories and to explain the empirical evidences left aside by self-supply, reputation and signaling. The reflexive identity mechanism develops through the nexus of ties connecting the community members. In order to cooperate, members have to negotiate the system of meanings they use to interface with the world and with the communitarian environment. But this means reshaping also their own vision of the world, redefining their values and thus their identity. The space opened by the negotiation, then, is the space where community aims, principles and ethos act directly on membersidentity, making them internalize the communitarian structure of rules. The reflexive identity principle, then, merges the psychological and social dimension of the FLOSS phenomenon with the structure of rules adopted by the FLOSS community, and thus it constitutes together with self-supply, signaling, reputation and peer regard the basis upon which the FLOSS community is built.Open Source Software; FLOSS
Dynamics of Innovation in an âOpen Sourceâ Collaboration Environment: Lurking, Laboring and Launching FLOSS Projects on SourceForge
A systems analysis perspective is adopted to examine the critical properties of the Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) mode of innovation, as reflected on the SourceForge platform (SF.net). This approach re-scales Marchâs (1991) framework and applies it to characterize the âinnovation systemâ of a âdistributed organizationâ of interacting agents in a virtual collaboration environment. The innovation system of the virtual collaboration environment is an emergent property of two âcoupledâ processes: one involves interactions among agents searching for information to use in designing novel software products, and the other involves the mobilization of individual capabilities for application in the software development projects. Micro-dynamics of this system are studied empirically by constructing transition probability matrices representing movements of 222,835 SF.net users among 7 different activity states. Estimated probabilities are found to form first-order Markov chains describing ergodic processes. This makes it possible to computate the equilibrium distribution of agents among the states, thereby suppressing transient effects and revealing persisting patterns of project-joining and project-launching.innovation systems, collaborative development environments, industrial districts, exploration and exploitation dynamics, open source software, FLOSS, SourceForge, project-joining, project-founding, Markov chain analysis.
The Debate and the Community. âReflexive Identityâ in the FLOSS Community
The empirical studies relative to the Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) case stress the important role played by psychological and social motivations. However, the theories elaborated to cope with this dimension, such as âgift economyâ, âepistemic communityâ or âcommunity of practiceâ, are not combined into a unique structured framework. It is possible to draw inspiration from philosophical studies about language and from sociological studies about collective action in order to construct a mechanism âhere called âreflexive identityâ- able to bridge the analyzed theories and to explain the empirical evidences left aside by self-supply, reputation and signaling. The reflexive identity mechanism is triggered by the dialog between the members. In order to simply communicate, in fact, members have to ânegotiateâ the system of meanings they use to interface with the world and with the communitarian environment. But this means reshaping also their own vision of the world, redefining their identity. Community aims, principles and ethos act directly on membersâ identity, making them internalize the communitarian structure of rules. The reflexive identity principle, then, merges the psychological and social dimension of the FLOSS phenomenon with the structure of rules adopted by the FLOSS community, and thus it constitutes together with self-supply, signaling, reputation and peer regard the basis upon which the FLOSS community is built.The empirical studies relative to the Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) case stress the important role played by psychological and social motivations. However, the theories elaborated to cope with this dimension, such as âgift economyâ, âepistemic communityâ or âcommunity of practiceâ, are not combined into a unique structured framework. It is possible to draw inspiration from philosophical studies about language and from sociological studies about collective action in order to construct a mechanism âhere called âreflexive identityâ- able to bridge the analyzed theories and to explain the empirical evidences left aside by self-supply, reputation and signaling. The reflexive identity mechanism is triggered by the dialog between the members. In order to simply communicate, in fact, members have to ânegotiateâ the system of meanings they use to interface with the world and with the communitarian environment. But this means reshaping also their own vision of the world, redefining their identity. Community aims, principles and ethos act directly on membersâ identity, making them internalize the communitarian structure of rules. The reflexive identity principle, then, merges the psychological and social dimension of the FLOSS phenomenon with the structure of rules adopted by the FLOSS community, and thus it constitutes together with self-supply, signaling, reputation and peer regard the basis upon which the FLOSS community is built.Non-Refereed Working Papers / of national relevance onl
Dragging developers towards the core
The paper presents a dynamic perspective on the landscape of Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) developersâ motivations and tries to isolate mechanisms sustaining developersâ contribution over time. The first part of the paper uses data gathered by the empirical studies relative to the FLOSS case to judge the relative importance of each group of incentives detected by the literature. In the second part of the paper, the same data are used to further characterize developersâ motivations in dynamics terms, showing how the relative importance of different incentives changes over time. Drawing inspiration from these results, the third part of the paper identifies a specific mechanism fostering developersâ contribution to the community activities, namely that: âIndependently of developersâ exogenous preferences, the more their exposure to the FLOSS community social environment, the more their contribution to the community activitiesâ. The key point of this hypothesis is that, if the exposure to the FLOSS community social environment is able to foster developersâ contribution beyond the level granted by their predetermined preferences, this leads directly to the evidence that the FLOSS community is provided with a mechanism sustaining and enhancing developersâ incentives to produce and diffuse code. In the last part of the paper, data relative to 14,497 developers working on SourceForge.net during two years (2001-2002) are employed to estimate a model testing the aforementioned hypothesis. Endogeneity problems are explicitly accounted for, and robustness checks are performed in order to make sure that the observed confirmation of the hypothesis is actually an empirically grounded result.The paper presents a dynamic perspective on the landscape of Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) developersâ motivations and tries to isolate mechanisms sustaining developersâ contribution over time. The first part of the paper uses data gathered by the empirical studies relative to the FLOSS case to judge the relative importance of each group of incentives detected by the literature. In the second part of the paper, the same data are used to further characterize developersâ motivations in dynamics terms, showing how the relative importance of different incentives changes over time. Drawing inspiration from these results, the third part of the paper identifies a specific mechanism fostering developersâ contribution to the community activities, namely that: âIndependently of developersâ exogenous preferences, the more their exposure to the FLOSS community social environment, the more their contribution to the community activitiesâ. The key point of this hypothesis is that, if the exposure to the FLOSS community social environment is able to foster developersâ contribution beyond the level granted by their predetermined preferences, this leads directly to the evidence that the FLOSS community is provided with a mechanism sustaining and enhancing developersâ incentives to produce and diffuse code. In the last part of the paper, data relative to 14,497 developers working on SourceForge.net during two years (2001-2002) are employed to estimate a model testing the aforementioned hypothesis. Endogeneity problems are explicitly accounted for, and robustness checks are performed in order to make sure that the observed confirmation of the hypothesis is actually an empirically grounded result.Non-Refereed Working Papers / of national relevance onl
The three dimensions of a communitarian institution. The Open Source Software Community Case
The analysis of the empirical studies relative to the Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) case highlights the necessity to enlarge the set of categories used to describe developers incentives. In particular, the evidences stress the important role played by another category of incentives, broadly and roughly defined as psychological and social motivations. However, the theories elaborated to cope with this dimension, such as ift economy,epistemic community or community of practice, are not combined into a unique structured framework. Each one of them, in fact, is focused on particular features of the FLOSS model, so that the FLOSS community itself is often described as ahybrid institution, obtained combining different perspectives. However, it is possible construct a mechanism here called reflexive identity able to bridge the analyzed theories and to explain the empirical evidences left aside by self-supply, reputation and signaling. The reflexive identity mechanism develops through the nexus of ties connecting the community members. In order to cooperate, members have to negotiate the system of meanings they use to interface with the world and with the communitarian environment. But this means reshaping also their own vision of the world, redefining their values and thus their identity. The space opened by the negotiation, then, is the space where community aims, principles and ethos act directly on membersidentity, making them internalize the communitarian structure of rules. The reflexive identity principle, then, merges the psychological and social dimension of the FLOSS phenomenon with the structure of rules adopted by the FLOSS community, and thus it constitutes together with self-supply, signaling, reputation and peer regard the basis upon which the FLOSS community is built.The analysis of the empirical studies relative to the Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) case highlights the necessity to enlarge the set of categories used to describe developers incentives. In particular, the evidences stress the important role played by another category of incentives, broadly and roughly defined as psychological and social motivations. However, the theories elaborated to cope with this dimension, such as ift economy,epistemic community or community of practice, are not combined into a unique structured framework. Each one of them, in fact, is focused on particular features of the FLOSS model, so that the FLOSS community itself is often described as ahybrid institution, obtained combining different perspectives. However, it is possible construct a mechanism here called reflexive identity able to bridge the analyzed theories and to explain the empirical evidences left aside by self-supply, reputation and signaling. The reflexive identity mechanism develops through the nexus of ties connecting the community members. In order to cooperate, members have to negotiate the system of meanings they use to interface with the world and with the communitarian environment. But this means reshaping also their own vision of the world, redefining their values and thus their identity. The space opened by the negotiation, then, is the space where community aims, principles and ethos act directly on membersidentity, making them internalize the communitarian structure of rules. The reflexive identity principle, then, merges the psychological and social dimension of the FLOSS phenomenon with the structure of rules adopted by the FLOSS community, and thus it constitutes together with self-supply, signaling, reputation and peer regard the basis upon which the FLOSS community is built.Non-Refereed Working Papers / of national relevance onl
Artificial Intelligence Creativity Support Tools for Creating Social Enterprises' Business Models
Social enterprises are home to different logics, thus making the search for business
models capable of reconciling conflicts between economic and social goals is very complex.
We posit that digital technologies can help social entrepreneurs overcome this difficulty.
Indeed, this paper aims at offering a comprehensive picture of the state of the art of literature
about (1) business model innovation, (2) social enterprises, and (3) creativity support tools
based on artificial intelligence, by conducting a systematic literature review of these different
streams of research. Rather than offering a comprehensive review of the three literatures, we
aim at identifying the main themes and sub-themes connecting them. On this basis, we then
propose a new point of view on how complex business model innovation (such as that dealing
with social enterprisesâ hybrid model) can be boosted by creativity support tools based on
artificial intelligence, and draw an agenda for expanding research about this promising nexus
A supply side story for a threshold model: Endogenous growth of the free and open source community
The study of social institutions producing and disseminating knowledge has mainly concentrated
on two main concepts: Science and Technology. This paper examines a recent institutional form
that seems not to resemble either of the other two; that is, knowledge-intensive communities,
where individuals freely exchange knowledge through information and communication
technology. Using free and open source software as an example, we develop a model where this
phenomenon is confronted with Technology with respect to its ability to attract researchers
Re-designing knowledge production in the Post-Covid-19 era. A task-based approach
This paper seeks to single out what micro-level working activities may be more conducive
of faster Covid-19 transmission. We do so from an innovation perspective, knowing that knowledge
production has an important component rooted in tacit knowledge, whose sharing is heavily based
on physical interaction. Specifically, we hypothesize that communication-intense working activities
(including those needed to transfer tacit knowledge) may accelerate Covid-19 contagion, and must
be re-designed with more urgency and attention than other working activities that apparently may
look as dangerous, such as selling or training. We test this empirically employing data from 9
different sources relative to US Metropolitan Statistical Areas, and confirm our hypothesis,
eventually elaborating policy and managerial implications for dealing with innovation (and beyond)
during the pandemi
Skills, Division of Labor and Performance in Collective Inventions. Evidence from the Open Source Software
This paper investigates the role of skills and the division of labor among participants in collective inventions. Our analysis draws on a large sample of projects registered at Sourceforge.net, the worldâs largest incubator of open source software activity. We explore the hypothesis that the level of skills of participants and their skill variety are important for project performance. Skill heterogeneity across participants is in line with two fundamental organizational features of the open source development model: team work and modular design. We also test the hypothesis whether the level of modularization of project activities is an important predictor of performance. The results provide support to the hypothesis that the skill level is important for the survival of open source projects. Moreover, we found that skill heterogeneity is positive for innovation. Finally, design modularity is positively associated with the performance of the project.Software, Technological innovation, Human capital, Modularity
Bio-Ecological Diversity vs. Socio-Economic Diversity: A Comparison of Existing Measures
This paper aims to enrich the standard toolbox for measuring diversity in economics. In so doing, we compare the indicators of diversity used by economists with those used by biologists and ecologists. Ecologists and biologists are concerned about biodiversity: the diversity of organisms that inhabit a given area. Concepts of species diversity such as alpha (diversity within community), beta (diversity across communities) and gamma (diversity due to differences among samples when they are combined into a single sample) have been developed (Whittaker, 1960). Biodiversity is more complex than just the species that are present, it includes species richness and species evenness. Those various aspects of diversity are measured by biodiversity indices such as Simpsonâs Diversity Indices, Species Richness Index, Shannon Weaver Diversity Indices, Patil and Taillie Index, Modified Hillâs Ratio. In economics, diversity measures are multi-faceted ranging from inequality (Lorenz curve, Gini coefficient, quintile distribution), to polarisation (Esteban and Ray, 1994; Wolfon, 1994, DâAmbrosio (2001)) and heterogeneity (Alesina, Baqir and Hoxby, 2000). We propose an interdisciplinary comparison between indicators. We review their theoretical background and applications. We provide an assessment of their possible use according to their specific properties.Diversity, Growth, Knowledge
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