%0 Conference Proceedings %B The Twenty-Third International Conference on Information Systems %D 2002 %T Economic incentives for participating in open source software projects %A Il-Horn Hann %A Jeff Roberts %A Sandra Slaughter %A Roy Fielding %K apache %K contributions %K email %K email archives %K mailing list %K organizational sponsorship %K participation %K patch %K scm %K source code %K Survey %K version control %X Using the Internet as a basis for communication, collaboration, and storage of artifacts, the open source community is producing software of a quality that was previously thought to be achievable only by professional engineers following strict software development paradigms. This accomplishment is even more astounding as developers contribute to the source code without any remuneration. Open source leaders as well as academics have proposed theories about the motivation of open source developers that are rooted in diverse fields such as social psychology and anthropology. However, Lerner and Tirole (2000) argue that developer participation in open source projects may, in part, be explained by existing economic theory regarding career concerns. This research seeks to confirm or disconfirm the existence of economic returns to participation in open source development. Our findings suggest that greater open source participation per se, as measured in contributions made, is not associated with wage increases. However, a higher status in a merit-based ranking within the Apache Project is associated with significantly higher wages. This suggests that employers do not reward the gain in experience through open source participation as an increase in human capital. The results are also consistent with the notion that a high rank within the Apache Software Foundation is a credible signal of the productive capacity of a programmer. %B The Twenty-Third International Conference on Information Systems %P 365–372 %G eng %> https://flosshub.org/sites/flosshub.org/files/42.pdf %0 Conference Paper %B Proceedings of the 2nd ICSE Workshop on Open Source %D 2002 %T Why Do Developers Contribute to Open Source Projects? First Evidence of Economic Incentives %A Il-Horn Hann %A Jeff Roberts %A Sandra Slaughter %A Roy Fielding %K apache %K contributions %K cvs %K developers %K ECONOMICS %K email %K email archives %K financial %K Human capital %K mailing list %K MOTIVATION %K participation %K source code %K version control %X The availability of commercial quality, free software products such as the Apache HTTP (web) server or the Linux operating system has focused significant attention on the open source development process by which these products were created. One of the more perplexing aspects of open source software projects is why developers freely devote their time and energy to these projects. While many open source participants cite idealistic motives for participation, Lerner and Tirole (2000) argue that developer participation in open source projects may, in part, be explained by existing economic theory regarding career concerns. This research seeks to confirm or disconfirm the existence of economic returns to participation in open source development. Preliminary results of our empirical investigation suggest that greater open source participation per se, as measured in contributions made, does not lead to wage increases. However, a higher status in a merit-based ranking within the Apache Project does lead to significantly higher wages. This suggests that employers do not reward the gain in experience through open source participation as an increase in human capital. The results are also consistent with the notion that a high rank within the Apache Software Foundation is a credible signal of the productive capacity of a programmer. %B Proceedings of the 2nd ICSE Workshop on Open Source %> https://flosshub.org/sites/flosshub.org/files/HannRobertsSlaughterFielding.pdf