IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/orisre/v19y2008i3p369-391.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Emergence of New Project Teams from Open Source Software Developer Networks: Impact of Prior Collaboration Ties

Author

Listed:
  • Jungpil Hahn

    (Krannert Graduate School of Management, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana 47907)

  • Jae Yun Moon

    (Business School, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong)

  • Chen Zhang

    (Fogelman College of Business and Economics, The University of Memphis, Memphis, Tennessee 38152)

Abstract

Recent years have witnessed a surge in self-organizing voluntary teams collaborating online to produce goods and services. Motivated by this phenomenon, this research investigates how these teams are formed and how individuals make decisions about which teams to join in the context of open source software development (OSSD). The focus of this paper is to explore how the collaborative network affects developers' choice of newly initiated OSS projects to participate in. More specifically, by analyzing software project data from real-world OSSD projects, we empirically test the impact of past collaborative ties with and perceived status of project members in the network on the self-assembly of OSSD teams. Overall, we find that a developer is more likely to join a project when he has strong collaborative ties with its initiator. We also find that perceived status of the noninitiator members of a project influences its probability of attracting developers. We discuss the implications of our results with respect to self-organizing teams and OSSD.

Suggested Citation

  • Jungpil Hahn & Jae Yun Moon & Chen Zhang, 2008. "Emergence of New Project Teams from Open Source Software Developer Networks: Impact of Prior Collaboration Ties," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 19(3), pages 369-391, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:orisre:v:19:y:2008:i:3:p:369-391
    DOI: 10.1287/isre.1080.0192
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/isre.1080.0192
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/isre.1080.0192?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Josh Lerner & Jean Tirole, 2002. "Some Simple Economics of Open Source," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(2), pages 197-234, June.
    2. Hinds, Pamela J. & Carley, Kathleen M. & Krackhardt, David & Wholey, Doug, 2000. "Choosing Work Group Members: Balancing Similarity, Competence, and Familiarity," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 81(2), pages 226-251, March.
    3. Hertel, Guido & Niedner, Sven & Herrmann, Stefanie, 2003. "Motivation of software developers in Open Source projects: an Internet-based survey of contributors to the Linux kernel," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32(7), pages 1159-1177, July.
    4. King, Gary & Zeng, Langche, 2001. "Logistic Regression in Rare Events Data," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 9(2), pages 137-163, January.
    5. Jeffrey A. Roberts & Il-Horn Hann & Sandra A. Slaughter, 2006. "Understanding the Motivations, Participation, and Performance of Open Source Software Developers: A Longitudinal Study of the Apache Projects," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 52(7), pages 984-999, July.
    6. Jasjit Singh, 2005. "Collaborative Networks as Determinants of Knowledge Diffusion Patterns," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(5), pages 756-770, May.
    7. von Krogh, Georg & Spaeth, Sebastian & Lakhani, Karim R., 2003. "Community, joining, and specialization in open source software innovation: a case study," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32(7), pages 1217-1241, July.
    8. Kogut, Bruce, 1989. "The Stability of Joint Ventures: Reciprocity and Competitive Rivalry," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(2), pages 183-198, December.
    9. Katherine J. Stewart & Anthony P. Ammeter & Likoebe M. Maruping, 2006. "Impacts of License Choice and Organizational Sponsorship on User Interest and Development Activity in Open Source Software Projects," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 17(2), pages 126-144, June.
    10. Samer Faraj & Lee Sproull, 2000. "Coordinating Expertise in Software Development Teams," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 46(12), pages 1554-1568, December.
    11. Eric von Hippel & Georg von Krogh, 2003. "Open Source Software and the “Private-Collective” Innovation Model: Issues for Organization Science," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 14(2), pages 209-223, April.
    12. Gruenfeld, Deborah H & Mannix, Elizabeth A. & Williams, Katherine Y. & Neale, Margaret A., 1996. "Group Composition and Decision Making: How Member Familiarity and Information Distribution Affect Process and Performance," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 67(1), pages 1-15, July.
    13. Manski, Charles F & Lerman, Steven R, 1977. "The Estimation of Choice Probabilities from Choice Based Samples," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 45(8), pages 1977-1988, November.
    14. Rajdeep Grewal & Gary L. Lilien & Girish Mallapragada, 2006. "Location, Location, Location: How Network Embeddedness Affects Project Success in Open Source Systems," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 52(7), pages 1043-1056, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Slivko, Olga, 2014. "Peer effects in collaborative content generation: The evidence from German Wikipedia," ZEW Discussion Papers 14-128, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    2. Pollok, Patrick & Amft, André & Diener, Kathleen & Lüttgens, Dirk & Piller, Frank T., 2021. "Knowledge diversity and team creativity: How hobbyists beat professional designers in creating novel board games," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 50(8).
    3. Girish Mallapragada & Rajdeep Grewal & Gary Lilien, 2012. "User-Generated Open Source Products: Founder's Social Capital and Time to Product Release," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 31(3), pages 474-492, May.
    4. Xuan Yang & Xiao Li & Daning Hu & Harry Jiannan Wang, 2021. "Differential impacts of social influence on initial and sustained participation in open source software projects," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 72(9), pages 1133-1147, September.
    5. Wang, Jing & Hu, Michael Y. & Shanker, Murali, 2012. "Human agency, social networks, and FOSS project success," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 65(7), pages 977-984.
    6. Mario Schaarschmidt & Dirk Homscheid & Thomas Kilian, 2019. "Application Developer Engagement In Open Software Platforms: An Empirical Study Of Apple Ios And Google Android Developers," International Journal of Innovation Management (ijim), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 23(04), pages 1-33, May.
    7. Param Vir Singh & Corey Phelps, 2013. "Networks, Social Influence, and the Choice Among Competing Innovations: Insights from Open Source Software Licenses," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(3), pages 539-560, September.
    8. Jorge Colazo, 2016. "A Cognitive Load View And Empirical Test Of Collaboration Network Structure Versus Learning Rates In New Software Development," International Journal of Innovation Management (ijim), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 20(01), pages 1-28, January.
    9. Chen Zhang & Jungpil Hahn & Prabuddha De, 2013. "Research Note ---Continued Participation in Online Innovation Communities: Does Community Response Matter Equally for Everyone?," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(4), pages 1112-1130, December.
    10. Arun Sundararajan & Foster Provost & Gal Oestreicher-Singer & Sinan Aral, 2013. "Research Commentary ---Information in Digital, Economic, and Social Networks," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(4), pages 883-905, December.
    11. Tong, Yu & Yang, Xue & Teo, Hock Hai, 2013. "Spontaneous virtual teams: Improving organizational performance through information and communication technology," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 56(3), pages 361-375.
    12. Yuqing Ren & Jilin Chen & John Riedl, 2016. "The Impact and Evolution of Group Diversity in Online Open Collaboration," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(6), pages 1668-1686, June.
    13. Yongqiang Sun & Yulin Fang & Kai H. Lim & Detmar Straub, 2012. "User Satisfaction with Information Technology Service Delivery: A Social Capital Perspective," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 23(4), pages 1195-1211, December.
    14. Smirnova, Inna & Reitzig, Markus & Alexy, Oliver, 2022. "What makes the right OSS contributor tick? Treatments to motivate high-skilled developers," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(1).
    15. Matthew J. Hashim & Karthik N. Kannan & Sandra Maximiano, 2017. "Information Feedback, Targeting, and Coordination: An Experimental Study," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 28(2), pages 289-308, June.
    16. Kirchner, Alexander & Labusch, Nils & Lopez Cordoba, Adriana & Sartor, Sebastian & Tumbas, Sanja & Villalon, Enrique & Wiethoff, Sebastian, 2011. "Network e-Volution," ERCIS Working Papers 11, University of Münster, European Research Center for Information Systems (ERCIS).
    17. Wang, Jing, 2012. "Survival factors for Free Open Source Software projects: A multi-stage perspective," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 30(4), pages 352-371.
    18. Stefan Behfar & Ekaterina Turkina & Thierry Burger-Helmchen, 2017. "Network tie structure causing OSS group innovation and growth," Post-Print hal-02153061, HAL.
    19. Wen Wen & Chris Forman & Stuart J. H. Graham, 2013. "Research Note ---The Impact of Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement on Open Source Software Project Success," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(4), pages 1131-1146, December.
    20. Shiu, Jing-Ming & Dallas, Mark P. & Huang, Hui-Hsuan, 2023. "A friend of a friend? Informal authority, social capital, and networks in telecommunications standard-setting organizations," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    21. Negin Salimi & Rudi Bekkers & Koen Frenken, 2013. "Governance and success of university-industry collaborations on the basis of Ph.D. projects: an explorative study," Working Papers 13-05, Eindhoven Center for Innovation Studies, revised Apr 2013.
    22. Lee, Saerom & Baek, Hyunmi & Jahng, Jungjoo, 2017. "Governance strategies for open collaboration: Focusing on resource allocation in open source software development organizations," International Journal of Information Management, Elsevier, vol. 37(5), pages 431-437.
    23. Wei Chen & Fujie Jin & Ling Xue, 2022. "Flourish or Perish? The Impact of Technological Acquisitions on Contributions to Open-Source Software," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 33(3), pages 867-886, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Maha Shaikh & Emmanuelle Vaast, 2016. "Folding and Unfolding: Balancing Openness and Transparency in Open Source Communities," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 27(4), pages 813-833, December.
    2. Sherae Daniel & Ritu Agarwal & Katherine J. Stewart, 2013. "The Effects of Diversity in Global, Distributed Collectives: A Study of Open Source Project Success," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(2), pages 312-333, June.
    3. Chen Zhang & Jungpil Hahn & Prabuddha De, 2013. "Research Note ---Continued Participation in Online Innovation Communities: Does Community Response Matter Equally for Everyone?," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(4), pages 1112-1130, December.
    4. Smirnova, Inna & Reitzig, Markus & Alexy, Oliver, 2022. "What makes the right OSS contributor tick? Treatments to motivate high-skilled developers," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(1).
    5. Islam, Mazhar & Miller, Jacob & Park, Haemin Dennis, 2017. "But what will it cost me? How do private costs of participation affect open source software projects?," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 46(6), pages 1062-1070.
    6. Zaggl, Michael A., 2017. "Manipulation of explicit reputation in innovation and knowledge exchange communities: The example of referencing in science," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 46(5), pages 970-983.
    7. Wonseok Oh & Jae Yun Moon & Jungpil Hahn & Taekyung Kim, 2016. "Research Note—Leader Influence on Sustained Participation in Online Collaborative Work Communities: A Simulation-Based Approach," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 27(2), pages 383-402, June.
    8. Simon Gaechter & Georg von Krogh & Stefan Haefliger, 2006. "Private-Collective Innovation and the Fragility of Knowledge Sharing," Discussion Papers 2006-21, The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham.
    9. Gächter, Simon & von Krogh, Georg & Haefliger, Stefan, 2010. "Initiating private-collective innovation: The fragility of knowledge sharing," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(7), pages 893-906, September.
    10. Xuan Yang & Xiao Li & Daning Hu & Harry Jiannan Wang, 2021. "Differential impacts of social influence on initial and sustained participation in open source software projects," Journal of the Association for Information Science & Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 72(9), pages 1133-1147, September.
    11. Amit Mehra & Rajiv Dewan & Marshall Freimer, 2011. "Firms as Incubators of Open-Source Software," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 22(1), pages 22-38, March.
    12. Wen Wen & Chris Forman & Stuart J. H. Graham, 2013. "Research Note ---The Impact of Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement on Open Source Software Project Success," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(4), pages 1131-1146, December.
    13. A. Yalta & A. Yalta, 2010. "Should Economists Use Open Source Software for Doing Research?," Computational Economics, Springer;Society for Computational Economics, vol. 35(4), pages 371-394, April.
    14. Adrián Kovács & Bart Looy & Bruno Cassiman, 2015. "Exploring the scope of open innovation: a bibliometric review of a decade of research," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 104(3), pages 951-983, September.
    15. Pankaj Setia & Balaji Rajagopalan & Vallabh Sambamurthy & Roger Calantone, 2012. "How Peripheral Developers Contribute to Open-Source Software Development," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 23(1), pages 144-163, March.
    16. Shuk Ying Ho & Arun Rai, 2017. "Continued Voluntary Participation Intention in Firm-Participating Open Source Software Projects," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 28(3), pages 603-625, September.
    17. Rullani, Francesco & Haefliger, Stefan, 2013. "The periphery on stage: The intra-organizational dynamics in online communities of creation," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 42(4), pages 941-953.
    18. Michael A. Stanko, 2016. "Toward a Theory of Remixing in Online Innovation Communities," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 27(4), pages 773-791, December.
    19. Sebastian Spaeth & Georg von Krogh & Fang He, 2015. "Research Note —Perceived Firm Attributes and Intrinsic Motivation in Sponsored Open Source Software Projects," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 26(1), pages 224-237, March.
    20. Chen, Xiaogang & Li, Xue & Clark, Jan Guynes & Dietrich, Glenn B., 2013. "Knowledge sharing in open source software project teams: A transactive memory system perspective," International Journal of Information Management, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 553-563.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:inm:orisre:v:19:y:2008:i:3:p:369-391. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.