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Codes of Conduct in Open Source

Open access
Frluckaj, Hana, Howison, James·2024·Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in Software Engineering
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4842-9651-6_17
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Abstract

Hana Frluckaj, James Howison, Qiwei Li, and Laura Dabbish

AI snapshot

Written from the paper’s full text.

TL;DR

This chapter reviews the history, content, controversies, and research on codes of conduct in open source, arguing they are governance documents and inclusivity signals whose effectiveness depends on enforcement. It synthesizes prior literature and presents findings from ongoing interview studies with 21 trans contributors and 21 OSS maintainers, plus recommendations and open questions.

Key findings

  • CoCs are community-wide governance documents; the Contributor Covenant is the most significant, containing a pledge, standards, enforcement responsibilities and scope, enforcement guidelines, and attribution, with four enforcement levels: written warning, reduced interactions, temporary ban, and permanent ban.
  • Prior research finds CoCs can be value-based, rule-based, or mixed; all CoCs studied by Tourani et al. championed diversity and a welcoming community and encouraged respectful collaboration, and enforcement must be clearly spelled out and visible. In community conversations, most sampled projects had neutral or positive stances toward proposed CoCs, but most proposals received minimal interaction (e.g., zero comments/likes) and were often eventually merged; CoC conversations often occurred in private spaces.
  • CoCs are generally considered helpful in attracting newcomers, but there is little empirical evidence for this; evidence indicates CoC presence has no bearing on newcomer joining compared with other factors. In ongoing interviews, 21 trans contributors screened projects for toxicity, using CoC presence as a positive indicator but stressing enforcement; 21 maintainers discussed the CoC’s role in community management, with some dismissing it as performative or “greenwashing.”
  • Recommendations include building community consensus, making discussions public, designating an enforcement contact, being firm and fair, avoiding deletion of negative interactions unless they target individuals or groups, and not adopting a CoC unless prepared to enforce it.

Methods

  • Conceptual/review chapter: provides history, context, and controversies; synthesizes literature on CoCs; identifies open research questions and recommendations.
  • Draws on prior content analysis of over 400 OSS community conversations after viewing thousands of GitHub issues [15].
  • Presents results from two ongoing unpublished qualitative interview studies: 21 trans-contributors and 21 OSS maintainers.

Limitations

  • Stated: future research should include more diverse perspectives (e.g., non-white, cismale) when considering participant experiences in OSS; open questions remain about the prevalence and long-term implications of deleting negative interactions, how to achieve consensus on CoC content, and trade-offs between nurturing versus punitive moderation.
  • Evident: the two interview studies are described as ongoing and unpublished, with 21 participants each; the chapter is an overview rather than a systematic review or empirical test of CoC effects on newcomer attraction.
  • Evident: findings about community conversations rely on prior work and a sample of over 400 conversations; no detailed sampling or analysis limitations are reported in this chapter.

Model-written summary. Check it against the paper before relying on it.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1007/978-1-4842-9651-6_17

Cites

22 of 22 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Nothing to recompute.

Claims the paper makes

9 of 27 cited sources checked · 4 supported · 0 flagged · accuracy not yet measured

  • Premisecitation

    Women tend to leave projects earlier than men.

    “Unsurprisingly, women tend to leave projects earlier than men [13].”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim1 of 1 sources checked
    • cites [13] Kuechler, V., Gilbertson, C., & Jensen, C. (2012). Gender Differences in Early Free and Open Source Software Joining Process. In I. Hammouda, B. Lundell, T. Mikkonen, & W. Scacchi (eds.), Open Source Systems: Long-Term Sustainability (Vol. 378, pp. 78–93). Springer Berlin Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-33442-9_6 source
  • Premisecitation

    This philosophy has contributed to a notoriously antagonistic environment for women and minorities.

    “This philosophy has contributed to a notoriously antagonistic environment for women and minorities [14,16,23], with CoCs as a particular sore spot.”
    Quote in the paperSubstantial claim1 of 3 sources checked
    • cites [14] Lee, A., & Carver, J. C. (2019). FLOSS Participants’ Perceptions About Gender and Inclusiveness: A Survey. 2019 IEEE/ACM 41st International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE), 677–687. https://doi.org/10.1109/ICSE.2019.00077 source
    • cites [16] Mendez, C., Padala, H. S., Steine-Hanson, Z., Hilderbrand, C., Horvath, A., Hill, C., Simpson, L., Patil, N., Sarma, A., & Burnett, M. (2018). Open source barriers to entry, revisited: A sociotechnical perspective. Proceedings of the 40th International Conference on Software Engineering, 1004–1015. https://doi.org/10.1145/3180155.3180241 source

      Section 4.1 says OSS communities often describe themselves as meritocracies and that such cultures tend to be male-dominated and unfriendly to women; it also describes acrimonious interactions as a reason women leave. This supports the claim about women, but our copy does not establish that the philosophy creates an antagonistic environment for minorities more broadly. (LLM, conf=0.86)

      Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
    • cites [23] Terrell, J., Kofink, A., Middleton, J., Rainear, C., Murphy-Hill, E., Parnin, C., & Stallings, J. (2017). Gender differences and bias in open source: Pull request acceptance of women versus men. PeerJ Computer Science, 3, e111. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj-cs.111 source
  • Premisecitation

    CoC conversations are common in private in large projects with hierarchical structures.

    “If CoC conversations are done privately, common in large projects with hierarchical structures [3], leaders should make an effort to replicate that discussion publicly.”
    Quote in the paperSubstantial claim1 of 1 sources checked
    • cites [3] Eghbal, N. (2020). Working in Public: The Making and Maintenance of Open Source Software. Stripe Press. https://doi.org/10.1145/3359224 source

      The “Code of conduct” section discusses a code of conduct as a signal of a welcoming community, while §4.8 discusses conversations visible in issues and pull requests. Neither addresses whether CoC conversations commonly happen privately in large projects with hierarchical structures (searched: private conversations, hierarchy, large projects). (LLM, conf=0.76)

      Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
  • Premisecitation

    There is little to no empirical evidence to support that CoCs help attract newcomers.

    “CoCs are generally considered helpful in attracting newcomers [18,21], yet there is little to no empirical evidence to support that.”
    Quote in the paperSubstantial claim1 of 2 sources checked
    • cites [9] Fronchetti, F., Wiese, I., Pinto, G., & Steinmacher, I. (2019). What Attracts Newcomers to Onboard on OSS Projects? TL;DR: Popularity. In F. Bordeleau, A. Sillitti, P. Meirelles, & V. Lenarduzzi (eds.), Open Source Systems (Vol. 556, pp. 91–103). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-20883-7_9 source
    • cites [19] Qiu, H. S., Li, Y. L., Padala, S., Sarma, A., & Vasilescu, B. (2019). The Signals that Potential Contributors Look for When Choosing Open-source Projects. Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, 3(CSCW), 1–29. https://doi.org/10.1145/3359224 source
  • Premisecitation

    There is evidence that the CoC's presence has no bearing on a newcomer's joining of a new project compared with other factors considered.

    “In fact, there is evidence that the CoC's presence has no bearing on a newcomer's joining of a new project compared with other factors considered [9,19].”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim1 of 2 sources checked
    • cites [9] Fronchetti, F., Wiese, I., Pinto, G., & Steinmacher, I. (2019). What Attracts Newcomers to Onboard on OSS Projects? TL;DR: Popularity. In F. Bordeleau, A. Sillitti, P. Meirelles, & V. Lenarduzzi (eds.), Open Source Systems (Vol. 556, pp. 91–103). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-20883-7_9 source
    • cites [19] Qiu, H. S., Li, Y. L., Padala, S., Sarma, A., & Vasilescu, B. (2019). The Signals that Potential Contributors Look for When Choosing Open-source Projects. Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, 3(CSCW), 1–29. https://doi.org/10.1145/3359224 source

      Section 2.3 reports that a prior study ranked CODE OF CONDUCT files among the least informative factors for predicting growth in new committers. That does not establish that a code of conduct has no bearing on whether a newcomer joins, and the paper cautions that the prior study’s sampling may explain the weak predictive power. Its “Code of conduct” section also reports a participant who viewed one as a signal of a welcoming community. (LLM, conf=0.86)

      Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
  • Classified as probably not a substantial claim. 35
  • May combine two claims. 19

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing). May combine two claims.

    Premisecitation

    FLOSS/OSS is an important form of digital infrastructure and technical career pathway for many developers.

    “Free/libre open source software (FLOSS/OSS) is an important form of digital infrastructure and technical career pathway for many developers [4,20].”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim1 of 2 sources checked
    • cites [4] Allen, C., & Mehler, D. M. A. (2019). Open science challenges, benefits and tips in early career and beyond. PLOS Biology, 17(5), e3000246. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3000246 source

      In “Benefit 2: New helpful systems,” the paper describes open-source software and repositories as tools that support research workflows and collaboration. “Benefit 3: Investment in your future” discusses career benefits for early-career researchers who adopt open-science practices. It does not establish FLOSS/OSS as a technical career pathway for many developers. (LLM, conf=0.82)

      Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
    • cites [20] Riehle, D. (2015). How Open Source Is Changing the Software Developer’s Career. Computer, 48, 51–57. https://doi.org/10.1109/MC.2015.132 source

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing).

    Premisecitation

    CoCs are generally considered helpful in attracting newcomers.

    “CoCs are generally considered helpful in attracting newcomers [18,21], yet there is little to no empirical evidence to support that.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim2 of 2 sources checked
    • cites [18] Prana, G. A. A., Ford, D., Rastogi, A., Lo, D., Purandare, R., & Nagappan, N. (2021). Including Everyone, Everywhere: Understanding Opportunities and Challenges of Geographic Gender-Inclusion in OSS. IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, 1–1. https://doi.org/10.1109/TSE.2021.3092813 source
    • cites [21] Sholler, D., Steinmacher, I., Ford, D., Averick, M., Hoye, M., & Wilson, G. (2019). Ten simple rules for helping newcomers become contributors to open projects. PLOS Computational Biology, 15(9), e1007296. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1007296 source

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing), S4 (based).

    Findingnone given

    Google's Code of Conduct borrows heavily from the Contributor's Covenant, albeit terser and more direct.

    “Google's Code of Conductfoot_3 borrows heavily from the CC, albeit terser and more direct.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing). May combine two claims.

    Findingown data

    As a maintainer, they expressed a sincere desire to ensure a welcoming environment for everyone and hoped that the CoC would be a meaningful and supporting document for contributors.

    “As a maintainer, they expressed a sincere desire to ensure a welcoming environment for everyone and hoped that the CoC would be a meaningful and supporting document for contributors.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • May combine two claims.

    Findingreasoning

    There was little public conversation around CoC additions, but longer deliberation when moderation was perceived as unfair, likely due to no shared understanding of the CoC and its usage.

    “There was little public conversation around CoC additions, but longer deliberation when moderation was perceived as unfair, likely due to no shared understanding of the CoC and its usage.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing).

    Findingnone given

    Individual projects decide their moderation schema, derived from several reflective values such as leadership team transparency and driving moderation philosophies.

    “Individual projects decide their moderation schema, derived from several reflective values (e.g., leadership team transparency, driving moderation philosophies, etc.).”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing), S4 (based).

    Findingnone given

    The Rust programming language's CoC only has two sections: Conduct and Moderation.

    “Finally, the CoCfoot_5 of the Rust programming language only has two sections: Conduct and Moderation.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing), S4 (based).

    Findingnone given

    While CoCs vary in prose and content, they all convey a sense of community values and expectations.

    “While CoCs vary in prose and content, they all convey a sense of community values and expectations.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing). May combine two claims.

    Findingnone given

    Django separates its CoC from its enforcement manual, with the former focusing on community ideals and the latter on enforcement.

    “The web framework Django is unique in separating its CoCfoot_4 from its enforcement manual, the former focusing on community ideals and the latter on enforcement.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S1 (asserted), S3 (load-bearing), S4 (based). May combine two claims.

    Findingnone given

    Others believe CoCs are an ineffective moderation tool and are skeptical of their capability to curb negative behavior.

    “Others believe CoCs are an infective moderation tool and are skeptical of their capability to curb negative behavior.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing), S4 (based).

    Findingnone given

    As CoCs grow in popularity, disapproval from the broader project community is becoming increasingly uncommon.

    “As CoCs grow in popularity, disapproval from the broader project community is becoming increasingly uncommon.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • May combine two claims.

    Findingown data

    While the presence of the CoC was a positive indicator, participants also stressed its enforcement.

    “While the presence of the CoC was a positive indicator, our participants also stressed its enforcement.”
    Quote in the paperSubstantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing).

    Findingown data

    Another maintainer participant spoke passionately about proactively creating an inclusive and welcoming environment for any contributors.

    “Another participant spoke passionately about proactively creating an inclusive and welcoming environment for any contributors.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing). May combine two claims.

    Findingnone given

    Common moderated behaviors included the complaints of disgruntled users and offensives due to a language barrier.

    “Common moderated behaviors included the complaints of disgruntled users and offensives due to a language barrier.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing), S4 (based). May combine two claims.

    Findingnone given

    Those protesting the inclusion of a CoC often consider it an antithesis to OSS philosophy, claiming it limits free speech and free code.

    “Those protesting the inclusion of a CoC often consider it an antithesis to OSS philosophy, claiming it limits free speech and free code (assuming that all code is neutral).”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing), S4 (based).

    Findingnone given

    In the early stages of CoC introduction to OSS, primarily larger, successful, and more established OSS projects were the first to adopt them.

    “In the early stages of CoC introduction to OSS, it was primarily larger, successful, and more established OSS projects that were the first to adopt them (e.g., Mozilla and Django).”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing).

    Findingnone given

    The proposal to include a CoC can incite different reactions of disapproval, approval, and ambivalence among community members.

    “The proposal to include a CoC can incite different reactions of disapproval, approval, and ambivalence among community members.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing).

    Findingnone given

    There are many OSS bots for detecting non-inclusive language in GitHub projects and forums where contributors connect synchronously.

    “There are many OSS bots for detecting non-inclusive language (e.g., in-solidarity-bot 7 and probotfoot_7 ) in GitHub projects and forums where contributors connect synchronously.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S2 (checkable), S4 (based). May combine two claims.

    Findingnone given

    We've seen CoCs viewed as a signal of perceived project inclusivity and their enforcement as indicators of the project leadership's commitment to that message.

    “We've seen CoCs viewed as a signal of perceived project inclusivity and their enforcement as indicators of the project leadership's commitment to that message.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Classified as probably not a substantial claim.

    Findingown data

    Participants hoped that communities would enforce community guidelines, rather than simply allowing and ignoring instances of bigotry.

    “Our participants hoped that communities would enforce community guidelines, rather than simply allowing and ignoring instances of bigotry.”
    Quote in the paperSubstantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing).

    Findingreasoning

    In this case, CoCs were often eventually merged.

    “In this case, CoCs were often eventually merged.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing), S4 (based). May combine two claims.

    Findingnone given

    Mozilla's Community Impact Guidelines predates the Contributor's Covenant and helped shape it.

    “Mozilla's Community Impact Guidelinesfoot_2 predates the CC and helped shape it.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing).

    Findingown data

    A participant likened the CoC to greenwashing, which conveys a false impression about how a company's products are environmentally sound.

    “They likened it to greenwashing, 9 which conveys a false impression about how a company's products are environmentally sound.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • May combine two claims.

    Findingown data

    Dismissal of CoCs emerged in interviews, including a participant discussing the potentially performative nature of the CoC.

    “Dismissal of CoCs emerged in our interviews, including a participant discussing the potentially performative nature of the CoC.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • May combine two claims.

    Findingnone given

    The CoC was used proactively to enforce community guidelines and reactively to moderate unwelcome behaviors.

    “The CoC was used proactively to enforce community guidelines and reactively to moderate unwelcome behaviors.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • May combine two claims.

    Interpretationreasoning

    The strength of CoCs derives from community backing of values and project leaders enforcing them.

    “The strength of CoCs derives from community backing of values and project leaders enforcing them.”
    Quote in the paperSubstantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S2 (checkable), S3 (load-bearing), S4 (based).

    Interpretationreasoning

    The lack of engagement from the community could potentially spell trouble for later drama, infringements, or miscommunication.

    “The lack of engagement from the community could potentially spell trouble for later drama, infringements, or miscommunication.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Classified as probably not a substantial claim.

    Interpretationreasoning

    Withholding accountability or allowing negative behavior undermines the authority of the CoC.

    “Withholding accountability or allowing negative behavior undermines the authority of the CoC.”
    Quote in the paperSubstantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing), S4 (based). May combine two claims.

    Interpretationnone given

    A trade-off exists between efficiency and quality of moderation; maintainers and moderators can react quickly to infringements with less careful responses or can spend more time crafting their responses, leaving open the possibility of harm spreading.

    “A trade-off exists between efficiency and quality of moderation; maintainers and moderators can react quickly to infringements with less careful responses or can spend more time crafting their responses, leaving open the possibility of harm spreading.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing).

    Premisecitation

    Cases of contributors leaving projects due to the inclusion of a CoC have occurred.

    “this reaction has even included cases of contributors leaving projects due to the inclusion of a CoC [2].”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim0 of 1 sources checked
    • cites [2] Larabel, M. (2018). One Of LLVM’s Top Contributors Quits Development Over CoC, Outreach Program. www.fastcompany.com/90250846/codes-of-ethics-probably-dont-work

      Not checked in the free run.

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing).

    Premisecitation

    Previous research has found that the content of CoCs can be value-based, rule-based, or a mixture of both.

    “Previous research has found that the content of CoCs can be value-based, rule-based, or a mixture of both.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim0 of 1 sources checked
    • cites [24] Tourani, P., Adams, B., & Serebrenik, A. (2017). Code of conduct in open source projects. 2017 IEEE 24th International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution and Reengineering (SANER), 24–33. https://doi.org/10.1109/SANER.2017.7884606 source

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing), S4 (based).

    Interpretationreasoning

    CoCs provide rules that can penalize infringers with unseemly consequences such as temporary or permanent ban.

    “CoCs provide rules that can penalize infringers with unseemly consequences (e.g., temporary or permanent ban).”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing). May combine two claims.

    Premisecitation

    For a CoC to be effective, disciplinary actions must be clearly spelt out, and any enforcement should be visible to the community.

    “Finally, for a CoC to be effective, disciplinary actions must be clearly spelt out, and any enforcement should be visible to the community.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim0 of 1 sources checked
    • cites [1] Aurora, V., & Gardiner, M. (2018). How to Respond to Code of Conduct Reports. A practical step-by-step guide to handling code of conduct issues. Frame Shift Consulting.

      Not checked in the free run.

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S2 (checkable), S3 (load-bearing). May combine two claims.

    Premisecitation

    A clear community consensus on unacceptable behaviors and their enforcement promotes mutual social learning and can reduce later tension and divisions in the event of a serious infringement.

    “A clear community consensus on unacceptable behaviors and their enforcement promotes mutual social learning [6] and can reduce later tension and divisions in the event of a serious infringement.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim0 of 1 sources checked
    • cites [6] Chandrasekharan, E., Samory, M., Jhaver, S., Charvat, H., Bruckman, A., Lampe, C., Eisenstein, J., & Gilbert, E. (2018). The Internet’s Hidden Rules: An Empirical Study of Reddit Norm Violations at Micro, Meso, and Macro Scales. Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, 2(CSCW), 1–25. https://doi.org/10.1145/3274301 source

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing). May combine two claims.

    Premisecitation

    Public enforcement serves two purposes: potential offenders know there is a consequence to actions, and marginal community members feel safer knowing protections exist with the backing of the broader community.

    “Public enforcement serves two purposes: potential offenders know there is a consequence to actions, and marginal community members feel safer knowing protections exist with the backing of the broader community [1].”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim0 of 1 sources checked
    • cites [1] Aurora, V., & Gardiner, M. (2018). How to Respond to Code of Conduct Reports. A practical step-by-step guide to handling code of conduct issues. Frame Shift Consulting.

      Not checked in the free run.

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S2 (checkable), S4 (based). May combine two claims.

    Interpretationnone given

    CoCs are a place to express and define shared community values in OSS projects, an important governance document for moderation, and an indicator of project inclusivity and safety, especially for vulnerable contributors.

    “CoCs are a place to express and define shared community values in OSS projects, an important governance document for moderation, and an indicator of project inclusivity and safety, especially for vulnerable contributors.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing).

    Premisecitation

    The most popular CoC templates include the Contributor's Covenant and the Python Code of Conduct.

    “The most popular templates include the CCfoot_0 and the Python Code of Conductfoot_1 [24].”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim0 of 1 sources checked
    • cites [24] Tourani, P., Adams, B., & Serebrenik, A. (2017). Code of conduct in open source projects. 2017 IEEE 24th International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution and Reengineering (SANER), 24–33. https://doi.org/10.1109/SANER.2017.7884606 source

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing). May combine two claims.

    Premisecitation

    All CoCs studied by Tourani et al. championed diversity and a welcoming community and encouraged respectful and constructive collaboration.

    “All CoCs studied by Tourani et al. championed diversity and a welcoming community and encouraged respectful and constructive collaboration [22,24].”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim0 of 2 sources checked
    • cites [22] Singh, V., & Brandon, W. (2019). Open Source Software Community Inclusion Initiatives to Support Women Participation. In F. Bordeleau, A. Sillitti, P. Meirelles, & V. Lenarduzzi (eds.), Open Source Systems (Vol. 556, pp. 68–79). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-20883-7_7 source
    • cites [24] Tourani, P., Adams, B., & Serebrenik, A. (2017). Code of conduct in open source projects. 2017 IEEE 24th International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution and Reengineering (SANER), 24–33. https://doi.org/10.1109/SANER.2017.7884606 source

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S3 (load-bearing).

    Interpretationreasoning

    Project leaders and advocates can exert authority through their reaction and utilizing CoCs for enforcement.

    “Admittedly, communities cannot control the emergence of negative behavior, yet project leaders and advocates can exert authority through their reaction and utilizing CoCs for enforcement.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim
    • Rests on an assumption: Communities cannot control the emergence of negative behavior.

  • Probably not a substantial claim: may not pass S2 (checkable), S4 (based).

    Interpretationreasoning

    If a project is not committed to enforcement, the CoC's presence may lull contributors into a false sense of safety, especially harmful for vulnerable contributors.

    “If a project is not committed to enforcement, the CoC's presence may lull contributors into a false sense of safety, especially harmful for vulnerable contributors.”
    Quote in the paperNot a substantial claim
40 of 40

  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Communities cannot control the emergence of negative behavior.

    “Admittedly, communities cannot control the emergence of negative behavior, yet project leaders and advocates can exert authority through their reaction and utilizing CoCs for enforcement.”
1 of 1

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

Each contradiction between two passages listed here was confirmed by an independent check.

  • Tourani et al. is cited as reference 24, but listed as 25

    Minor

    The statement explicitly attributes the CoC finding to Tourani et al. and cites reference 24. The bibliography lists Tourani et al. as reference 25; reference 24 is a different study.

  • Contributor's Covenant is called first despite an earlier Mozilla CoC

    Minor

    The paper calls the Contributor's Covenant the first CoC, but later says Mozilla's CoC predates it.

2 of 2

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 1

  1. Qiu, H. S., Li, Y. L., Padala, S., Sarma, A., & Vasilescu, B. (2019). The Signals that Potential Contributors Look for When Choosing Open-source Projects. Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, 3(CSCW), 1–29. https://doi.org/10.1145/3359224 · DOI · Paper page

Cited by

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Related

Authors
Frluckaj, H., & Howison, J.
Affiliations
The University of Texas at Austin (US)
ORCID
Venue
Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in Software Engineering
Publisher
Apress
Published
2024
Pages
295-308
DOI
10.1007/978-1-4842-9651-6_17
OpenAlex
W4402666631
Cited by
3
References
22
Citations by year
2025: 3
FWCI
4.88
Type
book chapter
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
Apress eBooks (publishedVersion, cc-by)
Topics
  • Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Computer Science Applications › Open Source Software Innovations
  • Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › Software Engineering Techniques and Practices
  • Social Sciences › Communication › Wikis in Education and Collaboration
Keywords
codes of conduct, open source software, community norms, contributor behavior, online communities

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Claims read by deepseek-v4.1-flash under definition version 3 (extract-v3) on 2026-11-02.

Classified by jev-1.13-20260917 (gold-guideline-v0.2) on 2026-11-02.

Cited sources are checked by gpt-6-sol.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

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