The paper presents a dynamic perspective on the landscape of Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) developers' motivations and tries to isolate mechanisms sustaining developers' contribution over time. The first part of the paper uses data gathered by the empirical studies relative to the...

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 March's (1991) framework and applies it to characterize the innovation...

In order to simply communicate members of the Free/Open/Source Software community (FLOSS) 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 visions of the world, redefining their...

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 world's largest incubator of open source software activity. We test the hypothesis that the level...

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 world’s largest incubator of open source software activity. We explore the hypothesis that the...

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 gift economyʺ, epistemic communityʺ or community of practiceʺ, are...

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...

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...

The paper presents a dynamic perspective on the landscape of Free/Libre/Open Source Software (FLOSS) developers' motivations and tries to isolate mechanisms sustaining developers' contribution over time. The first part of the paper uses data gathered by the empirical studies relative to the...

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 world's largest incubator of open source software activity. We test the hypothesis that the level...