SETTING THE STAGE

- - -

EXPLORING ACTOR ROLES FOR PRIVATE-

COLLECTIVE COMMUNITY SUSTAINABILITY

RESEARCH-IN-PROGRESS

Robin TeiglandStockholm School of Economics

Paul M. Di GangiLoyola University Maryland

Zeynep YetisStockholm School of Economics

February 2012

Introduction & Research Questions

Research Setting & Methodology

Preliminary Results

Questions & Answers

Thank You!

Overview

The Firm

The Collectivevs

E.g., Microsoft~ Built by employees within

organizational boundaries

E.g., Linux~ Built by users and distributed

freely regardless of affiliation

Models of Knowledge Creation

“Open source” communitiesexpanding into complex, physical goods

Community and firm share experiences and knowledge to

co-create value

Community is a complementary asset to be leveraged and combined with firm’s internal assets to deliver

competitive solutions(Dahlander & Wallin 2006)

Private-collective Community

(von Hippel & von Krogh 2003)

But there’s an inherent tension...

Private ModelDistribution of returns

and delegation of value

creation solely to

organization

Collective ModelOpenness and free

distribution of intellectual

ideas for common or

public good

VS

Our Primary Research Purpose

How do private-collective communities sustain

themselves despite the challenges that the

tension produces?

Underlying Research Questions

(RQ1) What are the resources necessary to sustain a private-collective community?

(RQ2) Who are the stakeholders of a private-collective community and what resources do

they contribute to the community?

(RQ3) What characterizes the structure among the different stakeholders of a private-collective

community?

Data Collection for 2007-20091) Developers Mailing List2) Ohloh Commit List3) OpenSim Wiki4) Blogs, homepages, etc.5) Interviews

(RQ1) What are the resources necessary to sustain a private-collective community?

(RQ2) Who are the stakeholders of a private-collective community and what resources do

they contribute to the community?

Academic

Entrepreneur

Hobbyist

Large firm

Other

SME

Academic

Entrepreneur

Hobbyist

Large firm

Other

SME

# messages on OpenSimDevelopers Mailing List

(2007-2009)

# people making commits on OpenSim Ohloh (2007-2009)

(RQ3) What characterizes the structure among the different stakeholders of a private-

collective community?

EntrepreneursAcademics

Large FirmsSME

Hobbyist

Research Institute

Not-for-profit

Local public

Federal public

(RQ3) What characterizes the structure among the different stakeholders of a private-

collective community?

A tightly knit community driven primarily by entrepreneurs

AcademicEntrepreneurHobbyistLarge FirmNon-profitLocal PublicFederal PubResearch InstSME EmployeePeriphery

Collect and analyze data 2009-2011

Conduct further interviews of OpenSim stakeholders

Present at Sunbelt XXXII

Next Steps