‘Patches don’t have gender’: What is not open in open source software

2011 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 669-683 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dawn Nafus
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
Software Development ◽  
Open Source ◽  
Open Source Software ◽  
Social Ties ◽  
Gift Exchange ◽  
Everyday Practice ◽  
Gift Economy ◽  
Software Production ◽  
The Social

While open source software development promises a fairer, more democratic model of software production often compared to a gift economy, it also is far more male dominated than other forms of software production. The specific ways F/LOSS instantiates notions of openness in everyday practice exacerbates the exclusion of women. ‘Openness’ is a complex construct that affects more than intellectual property arrangements. It weaves together ideas about authorship, agency, and the circumstances under which knowledge and code can and cannot be exchanged. While open source developers believe technology is orthogonal to the social, notions of openness tie the social to the technical by separating persons from one another and relieving them of obligations that might be created in the course of other forms of gift exchange. In doing so, men monopolize code authorship and simultaneously de-legitimize the kinds of social ties necessary to build mechanisms for women’s inclusion.

scholarly journals The Social Order of Open Source Software Production

2011 ◽  
pp. 168-182 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jochen Gläser
Keyword(s):  
Open Source ◽  
Open Source Software ◽  
Subject Matter ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Production Systems ◽  
Social Mechanism ◽  
Complete Uncertainty ◽  
Software Production ◽  
The Social ◽  
Collective Production

This chapter contributes to the sociological understanding of open source software (OSS) production by identifying the social mechanism that creates social order in OSS communities. OSS communities are identified as production communities whose mode of production employs autonomous decentralized decision making on contributions and autonomous production of contributions while maintaining the necessary order by adjustment to the common subject matter of work. Thus, OSS communities belong to the same type of collective production system as scientific communities. Both consist of members who not only work on a common product, but are also aware of this collective work and adjust their actions accordingly. Membership is based on the self-perception of working with the community’s subject matter (software or respectively scientific knowledge). The major differences between the two are due to the different subject matters of work. Production communities are compared to the previously known collective production systems, namely, markets, organizations, and networks. They have a competitive advantage in the production under complete uncertainty, that is, when neither the nature of a problem, nor the way in which it can be solved, nor the skills required for its solution are known in advance.

The Impact of Open Source Development on the Social Construction of Intellectual Property

2008 ◽  
pp. 3777-3805
Author(s):  
Bernd Carsten Stahl
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
Social Construction ◽  
Open Source ◽  
Open Source Software ◽  
Natural Rights ◽  
The Social ◽  
Software Changes ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Open Source Development

This chapter discusses the impact that open source software has on our perception and use of intellectual property. The theoretical foundation of the paper is constructionist in that it holds intellectual property to be a social construction that is created and legitimized by narratives. In a first step, the chapter recounts the narratives that are usually found in the literature to justify the creation and protection of intellectual property. The two most important streams of narratives are the utilitarian and the natural rights arguments. In a second step, the paper proceeds to the impact that the use of information and communication technology (ICT) has on the narratives of intellectual property. From there, the chapter progresses to a discussion of the impact of open source software on these narratives. It will be argued that open source software changes our perception of intellectual property because it offers evidence that some of the classical narratives are simplistic. At the same time it will become clear that open source is not a frontal assault on intellectual property because it is partly based on ownership of intellectual artefacts. The conclusion discusses how this change of narratives caused by open source software may reflect on our institutions, laws, and regulations of intellectual property.

Intellectual Property Rights in Open Source Software Communities

2011 ◽  
pp. 285-290
Author(s):  
Chitu Okoli ◽  
Kevin Carillo
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
Property Rights ◽  
Software Development ◽  
Open Source ◽  
Intellectual Property Rights ◽  
Open Source Software ◽  
Virtual Community ◽  
Source Model ◽  
Software Projects ◽  
Software Development Model

Intellectual property is an old concept, with the first recorded instances of patents (1449) and copyrights (1662) both occurring in England (“Intellectual property”, Wikipedia, 2004). The first piece of software was submitted for copyright to the United States Copyright Office in 1961, and was accepted as copyrightable under existing copyright law (Hollaar, 2002). The open source movement has relied upon controversial intellectual property rights that are rooted in the overall history of software development (Lerner & Tirole, 2002; von Hippel & von Krogh, 2003). By defining specific legal mechanisms and designing various software licenses, the open source phenomenon has successfully proposed an alternative software development model whose approach to the concept of intellectual property is quite different from that taken by traditional proprietary software. A separate article in this encyclopedia treats open source software communities in general as a type of virtual community. This article takes a historical approach to examining how the intellectual property rights that have protected free/open source software have contributed towards the formation and evolution of virtual communities whose central focus is software projects based on the open source model.

scholarly journals Exploring the Impact of Soclo-Technlcal Core-Periphery Structures in Open Source Software Development

2010 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 216-229 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chintan Amrit ◽  
Jos van Hillegersberg
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
Open Source ◽  
Open Source Software ◽  
Pattern Theory ◽  
The Core ◽  
Network Concept ◽  
Technical Structure ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Insight Into

In this paper we apply the social network concept of core-periphery structure to the socio-technical structure of a software development team. We propose a socio-technical pattern that can be used to locate emerging coordination problems in Open Source projects. With the help of our tool and method called TESNA, we demonstrate a method to monitor the socio-technical core-periphery movement in Open Source projects. We then study the impact of different core-periphery movements on Open Source projects. We conclude that a steady core-periphery shift towards the core is beneficial to the project, whereas shifts away from the core are clearly not good. Furthermore, oscillatory shifts towards and away from the core can be considered as an Indication of the instability of the project. Such an analysis can provide developers with a good Insight into the health of an Open Source project. Researchers can gain from the pattern theory, and from the method we use to study the core-periphery movements.

Women's Worth and Wedding Gift Exchange in Maradi, Niger, 1907–89

1995 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 121-140 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara M. Cooper
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Social Ties ◽  
Safety Net ◽  
Gift Exchange ◽  
Turn Of The Century ◽  
Exchange Value ◽  
Gift Economy ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Gift ◽  
Pastoral Economy

Wedding gift exchange from the turn of the century to the present has served as a medium through which women in the Maradi valley of Niger could assert their worth, create social ties and respond to a shifting political economy. Rather than exploring the implications of ‘bridewealth’ and ‘dowry’ in isolation, this paper sees wedding prestations as an ongoing and evolving dialogue in which women's roles and worth are contested, the nature of wealth is redefined and the terms of marriage are negotiated. The crisis in domestic labor which arose with the decline of slavery in the early decades of the century gave rise to informal unions through which the labor of junior women could be controlled. Women responded to these informal marriages by staging highly visible ceremonies which established the worth and standing of the bride. With the growth of an increasingly urban-centered commercial and bureaucratic economy, women have been drawn into a desperate ‘search for money’ to continue to meet their obligations in the gift economy. While the outward form of wedding gift exchange appears unchanged, the importance of cash to the acquisition of goods, services, and productive resources has radically altered both the content and the significance of gift exchange. Gifts no longer embody wealth in people derived from ability within an agro-pastoral economy. Instead they reveal the giver's access to the resources of the state and the market. Women's eroding position within the economy since 1950 has drawn them further and further into gift exchange, both in order to build a safety net in the form of exchange value stored in a woman's dowry and to secure the social ties which can ensure their continued access to increasingly contested resources.

The Impact of Open Source Development on the Social Construction of Intellectual Property

2005 ◽  
pp. 259-272 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bernd C. Stahl
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
Social Construction ◽  
Open Source ◽  
Open Source Software ◽  
Natural Rights ◽  
The Social ◽  
Software Changes ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Open Source Development

This chapter discusses the impact that open source software has on our perception and use of intellectual property. The theoretical foundation of the paper is constructionist in that it holds intellectual property to be a social construction that is created and legitimized by narratives. In a first step, the chapter recounts the narratives that are usually found in the literature to justify the creation and protection of intellectual property. The two most important streams of narratives are the utilitarian and the natural rights arguments. In a second step, the paper proceeds to the impact that the use of information and communication technology (ICT) has on the narratives of intellectual property. From there, the chapter progresses to a discussion of the impact of open source software on these narratives. It will be argued that open source software changes our perception of intellectual property because it offers evidence that some of the classical narratives are simplistic. At the same time it will become clear that open source is not a frontal assault on intellectual property because it is partly based on ownership of intellectual artefacts. The conclusion discusses how this change of narratives caused by open source software may reflect on our institutions, laws, and regulations of intellectual property.

Success of Open Source in Developing Countries

2014 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 50-65 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alireza Amrollahi ◽  
Mohammad Khansari ◽  
Amir Manian
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Software Development ◽  
Open Source ◽  
Open Source Software ◽  
Cultural Context ◽  
Research Model ◽  
Management Tools ◽  
Factors Affecting ◽  
The Social ◽  
Using Data

Open Source approach has been recognized as one of the best methods for software development in developing countries. Previous research however underemphasized different aspects of Open Source Software (OSS) success in context of developing countries compared to western context. In this research the authors use exploratory mixed methodology to study measures of and factors affecting OSS success with emphasize on the social and cultural context of Iran. In the qualitative section of the research 13 interviews with experts of the field have been conducted and the result is reflected in the research model. In the quantitative section, five research hypotheses have been evaluated by using data of 109 Iranian projects from sourceforge.net repository. The results indicate that the license type and use of project management tools may affect the success of OSS. The authors finally conclude that OSS research especially in the field of OSS success may lead to different findings in different contexts.

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