[Air-L] Open source literature

Sat Nov 1 10:22:47 PDT 2008

In addition to the good suggestions of others, you might find these  
review articles useful:

Scacchi, W. (2007). Free and open source software development: Recent  
research results and methods. In Zelkowitz, M., editor, Advances in  
Computers, volume 69, pages 243–295. Elsevier Press.

Crowston, K., Wei, K., Howison, J. and Wiggins, A. (2008). Free/Libre  
Open Source Software: What we know and what we do not know. Under  
Review.
http://floss.syr.edu/StudyP/floss%20review%20paper.pdf

They both focus primarily on the empirical, as opposed to conceptual,  
research about FLOSS development and implementation.  They are both a  
little out of date, given the rapid pace of publishing (and change) in  
this field.

As to your two focus areas, there is some work on implementation of  
FLOSS in organizations and the like, but nothing very specific comes  
to mind about resistance to open source, as such. There was a  
potentially useful exchange on the F/OSS discuss list, which I copy  
below, though.  I'd love to see more research on resistance to and  
failures of open source :)

As for "how the community of developers/contributors maintains a  
collaborative environment" let me give an only half-joking answer: by  
not working together very much :)  However you might also find an  
analysis of group maintenance behaviors, drawing on politeness  
theories, which our research group is still working on:

Scialdone, Michael, Na Li, James Howison, Robert Heckman, and Kevin  
Crowston. (2008). Group Maintenance in Technology-Supported  
Distributed Teams. Best Paper Proceedings of the 2008 Academy of  
Management Annual Meeting, Anaheim, CA: August 8-13, 2008.
http://floss.syr.edu/publications/AOM08fullpaper.pdf

hth,
James

ps. Your colleague may wish to join these two lists, which have many  
researchers of FLOSS on them, although the conversation is manageable  
sparse.  The second is especially good for knowledge about publicly  
available datasets on FLOSS.

http://opensource.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/community

https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/ossmole-discuss

pps. Sorry if people received this twice, I think I originally sent it  
from a non-subscribed email address and it didn't show up, but the  
listserv software didn't let me know there was an error.  I sent it  
again because it didn't show up in the archives.

ppps. here's the copied discussion from the F/OSS community list,  
maybe read bottom up.

> Hi Louis,
>
> On the "more prosaic than Latour" side of things you might want to  
> examine studies in the Information Systems literature, starting with  
> the old standby, "Technology Acceptance Model" (TAM).  That said you  
> may find TAM specific literature to be too tightly confined to a  
> rational actor model, concerned more with assessments of system  
> characteristics (ease of use, usefulness etc) than the types of  
> reasons you consider below.  You may find the critiques of the TAM  
> to be more useful in that regard.  There was a special edition on  
> where next for TAM recently.  Journal of the Association for  
> Information Studies, Vol 8, Issue 4 (2007):
>
> http://jais.aisnet.org/articles/default.asp?vol=8&art=16
>
> I suspect you will also find useful work in the tradition of  
> considering organizational politics in technology acceptance.   
> Perhaps start with Markus (1983) and work forward in the MIS  
> literature (ISR, MISQ, JAIS etc). I know there have been a number of  
> politics of ERP implementation studies more recently.
>
> Markus, M L (1983) Power, Politics and MIS Implementation.   
> COmmunications of the ACM. Volume 26,  Issue 6.
> http://www.bus.ucf.edu/csaunders/ism7939/Power%20Politics%20CACM.pdf
>
> Another starting point might be the diffusion of innovations  
> literature (rogers et al), perhaps this special edition will be a  
> useful starting point:
>
> Database (ACM SIGMIS)
> Special issue on adoption, diffusion, and infusion of IT
> http://portal.acm.org/toc.cfm?id=506724&type=issue&coll=GUIDE&dl=GUIDE&CFID=5065933&CFTOKEN=57901000#506725
>
> Having said that you might also want to look in the marketing  
> literature, where I'm sure this phenomenon is highly researched,  
> outside IT artifacts and potentially at the individual level where  
> you indicate you are concentrating.
>
> Finally, you may find interesting historical considerations in the  
> european tradition of political economy, particularly historical  
> studies of Luddism.
>
> Cheers,
> James
>
> On 5 Oct 2008, at 5:30 PM, Louis Suarez-Potts wrote:
>
>> Hi
>> To clarify:
>>
>> I am interested NOT in the Latour problematic of technological  
>> dissemination in the abstract but in the particular and personal  
>> problem of persuading fellow humans to adopt technology that  
>> affects them in a likely mysterious and possibly adverse way. Thus,  
>> Geertz, Foucault, those theorists are probably more relevant, but  
>> still likely to be too abstract. Looking at, say, the history of  
>> evolution's dissemination may be more to the point but only insofar  
>> as it focuses on what was gained or lost by particular individuals  
>> in their public acceptance or rejection of its claims.
>>
>> ciao,
>> Louis
>>
>> On 2008-10-05, at 21:46 , Louis Suarez-Potts wrote:
>>
>>> I'm not sure my subject line is accurate. I'm interested in  
>>> studies that examine the specific behavioural/human aspects of  
>>> technological dissemination within any given population. My focus  
>>> happens to be Foss, but it could actually be anything.
>>>
>>> The problem: all of us have doubtless encountered human obstacles  
>>> (so to speak) who resist clearly better technology and techniques  
>>> for producing and distributing it.  These people resist for  
>>> generally rational but personal reasons: they will lose power,  
>>> influence, their job if they acquiesce to the new order. You can't  
>>> really fault them and working with them is the generally the best  
>>> solution. But what studies are out there that examine this general  
>>> phenomenon, that could be characterized as, "Resisting the New"?  
>>> Again, Foss is my focus but it could be anything, or perhaps  
>>> anything sufficiently disruptive to a large enough group. I'd  
>>> suspect that anthropology has examined this best but I'd not be  
>>> surprised if behavioural economics has also taken on the issue. If  
>>> not, it's a fine subject :-) One need only choose a particular  
>>> technology, practice, issue.
>>>
>>> Thanks
>>> louis
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Louis Suarez-Potts, PhD
>>> Community Manager, Sun Microsystems, Inc.
>>> OpenOffice.org
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Community mailing list
>>> Community at opensource.mit.edu
>>> http://opensource.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/community
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Community mailing list
>> Community at opensource.mit.edu
>> http://opensource.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/community
>>
>

On 30 Oct 2008, at 6:56 PM, jeremy hunsinger wrote:

> it's only somewhat current but:
> http://opensource.mit.edu/
>
> On Oct 30, 2008, at 6:47 PM, Angela Adkins wrote:
>
>> Hello all,
>>
>> I have been asked for literature suggestions by a colleague with a  
>> budding interest in research on open source, particularly in how  
>> the community of developers/contributors maintains a collaborative  
>> environment and in resistance to open source. I would like to help  
>> him but alas, I am not overly familiar with specific research on  
>> that topic. But I am always impressed at the helpfulness and  
>> willingness to share on this list, so I thought this would be a  
>> good place to ask. Does anyone have suggestions for good sources to  
>> get started? I would gladly pass them along--anything would be much  
>> appreciated
>>
>> Thank you!
>>
>> -- 
>> Angela Adkins
>> Department of Sociology
>> The University of Akron
>> Akron, OH 44325-1905
>> Ph: (330) 234-1499
>> Email: ama13 at uakron.edu
>>
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