Open Source Software Communities and Industrial Districts: A Useful Comparison?

Aim of this paper is to add a new and complementary perspective on the existing economic analysis of open-source software by comparing the structure and evolution of open-source software communities and of industrial districts, a peculiar organisational form of production based on a large number of interacting small and medium sized enterprises. The comparison between open-source software communities and industrial districts, in spite of some major differences allows the recognition of the role played by agglomeration economies, an explicit analysis of the incentives structure - governing the private provision of complex public goods-, and an in depth study of the governance structure and evolution of these phenomena. The paper presents some simple simulations which show the dependence of the governance structure's evolution on transaction costs dynamics.