Carrots and Rainbows: Motivation and Social Practice in Open Source Software Development1
Abstract
Open source software (OSS) is a social and economic phenomenon that raises fundamental questions about the motivations of contributors to information systems development. Some developers are unpaid volunteers who seek to solve their own technical problems, while others create OSS as part of their employment contract. For the past 10 years, a substantial amount of academic work has theorized about and empirically examined developer motivations. We review this work and suggest considering motivation in terms of the values of the social practice in which developers participate. Based on the social philosophy of Alasdair MacIntyre, we construct a theoretical framework that expands our assumptions about individual motivation to include the idea of a long-term, value-informed quest beyond short-term rewards. This motivation–practice framework depicts how the social practice and its supporting institutions mediate between individual motivation and outcome. The framework contains three theoretical conjectures that seek to explain how collectively elaborated standards of excellence prompt developers to produce high-quality software, change institutions, and sustain OSS development. From the framework, we derive six concrete propositions and suggest a new research agenda on motivation in OSS.
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Contrary to open source licenses that prevent appropriation of the developed software, public ledgers introduce authentication into digital settings, moving from 'carrots and rainbows' to rivalry.
“Contrary to open source licenses that prevent anyone to appropriate the "matter of trade" (i.e. the developed software), public ledgers introduce authentication into digital settings.So we move from 'carrots and rainbows' [20] to rivalry;”
From Tribal Governance: The Business of Blockchain Authentication (2018) · cites this paper as [20]
The bazaar governance mode is based on openness and transparency: software developers build up their reputation, which they can then spend providing assistance on the software they know.
“The consequent governance mode is based on openness and transparency: software developers build up their reputation, which they can then spend providing assistance on the software they know [20].”
From Tribal Governance: The Business of Blockchain Authentication (2018) · cites this paper as [20]
Several scholars have argued that open source sustainability is a latent key issue that requires detailed study.
“At the same time, several scholars have argued that open source sustainability is a latent key issue (Krishnamurthy et al., 2014), that requires detailed study (Von Krogh et al., 2012).”
From The sustainability of open source commons (2023) · cites this paper as Von Krogh et al., 2012
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References 165 · Cited by 698
- Authors
- von Krogh, G., Haefliger, S., Spaeth, S., & Wallin, M. W.
- Affiliations
- ETH Zurich, Switzerland
- ETH Zurich (CH)
- Venue
- MIS Quarterly
- Publisher
- MIS Quarterly
- Published
- 2012-06-01
- Volume
- 36
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 649-676
- ISSN
- 0276-7783 (ISSN-L)
- 2162-9730
- OpenAlex
- W65801920
- Cited by
- 698
- References
- 165
- Citations by year
- 2026: 31 · 2025: 44 · 2024: 36 · 2023: 61 · 2022: 46 · 2021: 78 · 2020: 52 · 2019: 65 · 2018: 56 · 2017: 45 · 2016: 41 · 2015: 51 · 2014: 38 · 2013: 35 · 2012: 16
- FWCI
- 71.87
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- MIS Quarterly (publishedVersion)
- City Research Online (City University London) (acceptedVersion)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation
- Harvard Business School
- University of Notre Dame
- Copenhagen Business School
- University of Cambridge
- Schweizerischer Nationalfonds zur Förderung der Wissenschaftlichen Forschung
- Università degli Studi di Trento
- Göteborgs Universitet
- Università Bocconi
- Stanford Bio-X
- Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research
- 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 › Business, Management and Accounting › Strategy and Management › Digital Platforms and Economics
- Keywords
- open source software, developer motivation, social practices, Alasdair MacIntyre, virtue, volunteer developers, institutional change, software quality, standards of excellence, information system development
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