researching free/libre open source software communities

Yuwei Lin | CITASA Pre-Conference 2008, 31st July 2008, Boston

Researching Free/Libre Open Source Software Communities

Yuwei Lin

UK ESRC National Centre for e-Social Science, University of Manchester


What is FLOSS? (I)

Richard Stallman's freedoms and definition of free software


What is FLOSS? (II)

Open Source Initiative (OSI) Open Source Development Method


What is FLOSS? (III)

Analogy to other peer-production activities in today's information society: open science (Science 2.0), Web2.0, Perpetual Beta, user-driven, user-created content)


What is FLOSS? (IV)

Hacker culture – amateur expertise (similar to astronomers, farmers, photographers...)

Professionalisation and institutionalisation


A Snapshot of FLOSS Communities

Stakeholders: Industry (IBM, Novell, HP, Microsoft, Google...) + Governments (local and central) + research funders (JISC) + NGOs/NPOs

Distributions (Debian, RedHat, Ubuntu, SuSE, Fedora GNU/Linux...)

Linux User Groups around the world Development projects: GNU, Apache,

OpenOffice.org, Linux Kernel, Firefox, MediaWiki & Wikipedia...


Social Worlds Theory

For observing practicebased communities and interactions between different actors

Diagram taken from A. Clarke (1991)


6 Principles

Characteristics of FLOSS communities: Diversity Dynamics Materiality

Methodological Engagement Mutuality Reflexivity


Diversity

Distributed communities -> Members from different socio-cultural backgrounds, residing at different time and space

Different opinions are given as to development ranging from what is a bug and how to fix a bug

Workplace studies: orderliness How diversity is managed? Leadership?

Mechanisms? Instruments?


Dynamics

Open membership Multiple memberships Mobilities Logitudinal perspective: from a novice

learner to a key contributor in the centre of the community

Biographical life plan How do we catch these dynamics?How do we catch these dynamics?


Materiality

It's all about technologies Materiality of ICT: Affordance Technology defines the interests of the

people involved (who they are). ≠ Technology-deterministic Mediated interactions How do we capture the complexity emerge

from the adoption and development of advanced ICT?


Why Go Qualitative?

Fixed categories from the quantitative surveys that tried to capture indivisuals' motivations of participating in FLOSS:

Just for fun

Reputation

Mutuality

Gratification

Job required

Self-help: to fix a bug at hand


Why Go Qualitative?

Fixed categories from the quantitative surveys that tried to capture indivisuals' motivations of participating in FLOSS:

Just for fun

Reputation

Mutuality

Gratification

Job required

Self-help: to fix a bug at hand

God told me soGod told me so


Hacking for Christ


Methods

Mixed methods (or e-Social Science methods)

Qualitative in-depth interview with developers and users (semi-structured and unstructured)

Ethnographic observation online Biographical Time-consuming and demanding


6 Principles

Characteristics of FLOSS communities: Dynamics Diversity Materiality

Methodological Engagement Mutuality Reflexivity


Engagement

Engage respondents/the researched: they might know it better than you. Get their intelligence. (Both the researcher and the researched are 'knowing subjects', or bear a hybrid role as both a subject and an object.)

Be part of the community? Distance from the field? Without 'going native'?

Engage with technology: Get experienced. Autoethnography


Mutuality

'Participatory Action Research' or 'Collaborative Research' The positioning of researcher and researched as

knowing subjects, rather than as the knower and the known, accords dignity to research participants. [T]he voices and interpretations of research participants themselves actively contribute to new understanding. (Gunzenhauser, 2006: 643)

Contribute back to the community Intervention – get our hands dirty Taking action and making a difference


Mutual Critique

[T]he efficacy of mutual critique is inescapable. Increasingly readers are becoming skilled at amateur deconstruction of research texts and expect to explore

intertextuality in qualitative research texts. Possibilities for understanding are multiplied through the

researcher’s exploration of multiple mutual critiques. Researchers in these studies learned the most from expanding the boundaries of their subjectivities.

(Gunzenhauser, 2006: 644)


Reflexivity

Self-aware and self-critical -> challenge 'the ideology of objectivity and distance in ethnographic research. Researchers are not unbiasedor impartial observer.

Have I overlooked anything? Have I generalised too much? What have I learned? What can I contribute? It's not just about doing/researching; it's

about mutual learning.


Case Studies

Glocalisation of FLOSS Women in FLOSS Usability Studies UK National Centre for e-Social Science


Glocalisation of FLOSS

Linux Migration and Implementation in governments and schools (e.g., Spain, Germany, Italy, UK, Norway, Peru, Brazil...)

Accessibility and disability Customisation, localisation and

internationalisation User-driven, User-led, User-centered Glocalised understandings and makings of

FLOSS


Women in FLOSS

Why there were so few women in FLOSS?

Barriers: lack of models, sexist language... Number is not the issue; The fundamental issue

lies in what labour is valued more by the communities. What's recognised? * RTFM*

Activist group: Gender Changer Academy, KDE-Women, Debian-Women (now we have Gnome-Women, Ubuntu-Women)

Goals: mutual help & network

How FLOSS culture is embodied & performed


Whose Wonder Woman?Whose female hacker?

Global or Local versions?


Usability Studies

myExperiment.org: agile approach for developing a “Perpetual Beta”

How to manage a distributed project How to gather requirements given the

dispersed communities? How to draw the boundary of an emerging

user community? (fostering community or building community?)

Design choice: Performance or usability?


National Centre for e-Social Science

Major ESRC investment Distributed structure: co-ordinating hub at

Manchester and research nodes and small grant projects distributed across the UK

To help social scientists make the best use of e-Infrastructure to address key social science research challenges

To simulate the uptake of e-Infrastructure To advise on the future strategic direction

of e-Social Science


What is e-Social Science?

Who are the e-Social Scientists?


Conclusion

Freedom Openness Networking

Collaboration


Conclusion

Freedom Openness Networking

Collaboration

Equity Diversity Mutuality Democracy


Thank you.

http://www.ylin.org

http://www.ncess.ac.uk

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http://www.ncess.ac.uk/

researching free/libre open source software communities

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