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Journal ArticleDOI

Open source software development: Some historical perspectives

Alessandro Nuvolari
- 03 Oct 2005 - 
- Vol. 10, Iss: 10, pp 1-30
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TLDR
It is suggested that historical studies of technology can help to account for some, perplexing (at least for traditional economic reasoning) features of open source software development.
Abstract
In this paper we suggest that historical studies of technology can help us to account for some, perplexing (at least for traditional economic reasoning) features of open source software development. From a historical perspective, open source software seems to be a particular case of what Robert C. Allen has termed "collective invention." We explore the interpretive value of this historical parallel in detail, comparing open source software with two remarkable episodes of nineteenth century technical advances.

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Selective revealing in open innovation processes: The case of embedded Linux

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Open Source Software Development - Just Another Case of Collective Invention?

TL;DR: O'Mahony et al. as discussed by the authors show that the governance mechanisms used in OS projects are especially well suited not to crowd out this special kind of motivation, and conclude that OS differentiates itself from other cases of collective invention by its success in solving the second order social dilemma of rule development and enforcement, which depends on institutional as well as motivational factors.
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A Comprehensive Review and Synthesis of Open Source Research

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Network Effects: The Influence of Structural Social Capital on Open Source Project Success

TL;DR: It is found that network social capital is not equally accessible to or appropriated by all projects, and projects with greater internal cohesion are more successful, and external cohesion has an inverse U-shaped relationship with the project's success.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI

Can Patents Deter Innovation? The Anticommons in Biomedical Research

TL;DR: Privatization of biomedical research must be more carefully deployed to sustain both upstream research and downstream product development, because more intellectual property rights may lead paradoxically to fewer useful products for improving human health.
Book

The Cathedral and the Bazaar: Musings on Linux and Open Source by an Accidental Revolutionary

Eric S. Raymond, +1 more
TL;DR: From the Publisher: The Cathedral and the Bazaar is a must read for anyone who cares about the future of the computer industry or the dynamics of the information economy.
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Toward a new economics of science

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors make use of insights from the theory of games of incomplete information to synthesize the classic approach of Arrow and Nelson in examining the implications of the characteristics of information for allocative efficiency in research activities, on the one hand, with the functionalist analysis of institutional structures, reward systems and behavioral norms of "open science" communities associated with the sociology of science in the tradition of Merton.
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The cathedral and the bazaar

TL;DR: A sustained argument from the Linux experience is made for the proposition that "Given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow," and productive analogies with other self-correcting systems of selfish agents are suggested.
Trending Questions (1)
Open source software development- Just another case of collective invention?

Yes, open source software development can be viewed as a form of collective invention, akin to historical episodes like the Cornish pumping engine, as outlined in the paper.