Does Superposition Influence the Success of FLOSS Projects? An Examination of Open-Source Software Development by Organizations and Individuals: Examining open source software development by organizations and individuals

Poonacha Medappa; Shirish C. Srivastava

doi:10.1287/isre.2018.0829

Does Superposition Influence the Success of FLOSS Projects? An Examination of Open-Source Software Development by Organizations and Individuals: Examining open source software development by organizations and individuals

Poonacha Medappa^*, Shirish C. Srivastava

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Scientific › peer-review

Abstract

Collaboration through open superposition describes the dominant work orchestration mechanism observed in Free (Libre) and Open Source Software (FLOSS), wherein the software development occurs by the sequential layering of individual tasks. This work orchestration mechanism is different from the traditional idea of software development, where the focus is towards co-work and concurrent development facilitated by a modular software design architecture. Our study theorizes and examines the motivational mechanisms that operate within superposed work structures to influence the success of FLOSS projects. We also unearth the contextual conditions that may limit the influence of the superposed nature of work on FLOSS project success. Furthermore, given the increasing usage of FLOSS by organizations, we investigate the specificities brought to these motivational mechanisms when FLOSS projects are owned by organizations. The results from our analysis of over 6500 FLOSS projects hosted on GitHub support a nonlinear relationship between the degree of superposition and the success of the FLOSS project. Moreover, we find that the type of ownership moderates this nonlinear relationship such that (1) organizational ownership mitigates the influence of the degree of superposition on the success of the project, and (2) under organizational ownership, the optimal degree of superposition (the point at which the success of the project is at a maximum) is lower than for individual-owned projects. This research advances our understanding of work structures, motivation, and organizational participation in FLOSS environments by describing the influence of task structures on the success of projects. The study also provides FLOSS practitioners with valuable insights for modeling project task structures to facilitate their success.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	764-786
Number of pages	786
Journal	Information Systems Research
Volume	30
Issue number	3
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1287/isre.2018.0829
Publication status	Published - Sept 2019
Externally published	Yes

Keywords

open source software
collaboration
virtual teams
motivation
task structure
IS development

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10.1287/isre.2018.0829

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title = "Does Superposition Influence the Success of FLOSS Projects? An Examination of Open-Source Software Development by Organizations and Individuals: Examining open source software development by organizations and individuals",

abstract = "Collaboration through open superposition describes the dominant work orchestration mechanism observed in Free (Libre) and Open Source Software (FLOSS), wherein the software development occurs by the sequential layering of individual tasks. This work orchestration mechanism is different from the traditional idea of software development, where the focus is towards co-work and concurrent development facilitated by a modular software design architecture. Our study theorizes and examines the motivational mechanisms that operate within superposed work structures to influence the success of FLOSS projects. We also unearth the contextual conditions that may limit the influence of the superposed nature of work on FLOSS project success. Furthermore, given the increasing usage of FLOSS by organizations, we investigate the specificities brought to these motivational mechanisms when FLOSS projects are owned by organizations. The results from our analysis of over 6500 FLOSS projects hosted on GitHub support a nonlinear relationship between the degree of superposition and the success of the FLOSS project. Moreover, we find that the type of ownership moderates this nonlinear relationship such that (1) organizational ownership mitigates the influence of the degree of superposition on the success of the project, and (2) under organizational ownership, the optimal degree of superposition (the point at which the success of the project is at a maximum) is lower than for individual-owned projects. This research advances our understanding of work structures, motivation, and organizational participation in FLOSS environments by describing the influence of task structures on the success of projects. The study also provides FLOSS practitioners with valuable insights for modeling project task structures to facilitate their success.",

keywords = "open source software, collaboration, virtual teams, motivation, task structure, IS development",

author = "Poonacha Medappa and Srivastava, {Shirish C.}",

year = "2019",

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doi = "10.1287/isre.2018.0829",

language = "English",

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Does Superposition Influence the Success of FLOSS Projects? An Examination of Open-Source Software Development by Organizations and Individuals: Examining open source software development by organizations and individuals. / Medappa, Poonacha; Srivastava, Shirish C.
In: Information Systems Research, Vol. 30, No. 3, 09.2019, p. 764-786.

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Scientific › peer-review

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