Motivations in FLOSS communities

(aka the Chocolate talk)Sébastien Heymann - Gephi Consortium

http://sebastien.pro seb@gephi.org

Some words about me...

Community manager of the Gephi project.I democratize network thinking.

PhD candidate in complex networks @LIP6.I love chocolates too :)

Motivations in studying motivations

Who would be likely to contribute to my project?

How to attract skilled developers?

Who is worth the time spent?

What win-win deals can we make?

"In many ways, I actually think the real idea of open source is for it to allow everybody to be 'selfish', not about trying to get everybody to

contribute to some common good.[...]

Now, those selfish reasons by no means need to be about 'financial reward', though."

Interview of L. Torvalds for the BBC, June 2012

"When I started making a living writing add-ons and other Mozilla software, I felt I needed

to give something back [...]. So there were altruistic and selfish reasons mixed together."

Interview of B. King (Mozilla volunteer) by Tristan Nitot, Dec 2012

Plan: beyond altruism vs selfishness

1. Why motivation matters?2. Intrinsic vs extrinsic motivation.3. Why care about intrinsic motivation?4. Open questions.

3. Why motivation matters?image: The Big Lebowski

Key issues in FLOSS communities

Fast evolution! need for creativity.

Contributors are not paid most of the time.

Contributions based on free will.

Willingness to cooperate.

Contributors?

People who:

● develop● communicate● manage● use and spread the word● ...

Why contribute for FREE?

What about you?

for glory?

for t3h lulz? :)

for White Russians?

What about them?

R. Stallman L. Torvalds

For personal values

R. Stallman

"I refuse to break solidarity with other users. [...] So that I can continue to use computers without dishonor, I have decided to put together a sufficient body of free software..."

The GNU Manifesto [online], 1985

For social status

L. Torvalds

"I have enough recognition that I feel good about myself, that I know that what I'm doing is actually meaningful to people."

Linux Manifesto [online], 1998

2. Intrinsic vs extrinsic motivationimage: AllTheRageFaces.com

dude, come on

Motivation: what makes [a dude] engaged for something. (Deci & Ryan, 1985)

Intrinsic vs extrinsic motivation

Intrinsic motivation:Something is "valued for its own sake and appears to be self sustained".(Calder & Straw, 1975)

Extrinsic motivation:Something is perceived as an investment.(Deci & Ryan, 1985)

Some intrinsic incentives

Feeling of being skilled and being proud of something.

Joy to give and be useful.

Aesthetic/creative pleasure.

To satisfy some personal values, like freedom.

Some extrinsic (positive) incentives

Money, rewards.

Source code for personal needs.

Positive feedbacks.

Social status / reputation.

3. Why care about intrinsic motivation?

People with high intrinsic motivations are great

contributors.

"People for whom [the pure artistic satisfaction of designing beautiful software

and making it work] is not a significant motivation never become hackers in the first

place, just as people who don't love music never become composers."

- Homesteading the Noosphere, chap.7, 2000 E. Raymond

Benefits of intrinsic motivations

Better creativity.

Faster learning.

Increased autonomy of contributors.

Better code.

FLOSS communities: we may not have oil, but we have

intrinsic motivation.

How to get intrinsic motivations high?

Take care of contributors':● autonomy,● emotional attachment (to the project),● skills evolution.

How to get intrinsic motivations high?

Take care of contributors':● autonomy,● emotional attachment (to the project),● skills evolution.

Intrinsic motivation increases when one:● feels that he/she has the control,● and receives positive, detailed feedback.

"Individuals join for various reasons, and no one reason tends to dominate

the community." (Lakhani & Wolf, 2003)

Why not increasing both types of motivation?

"Hidden costs of rewards"

Increase of extrinsic motivations=>

Increase of the feeling of external control=>

decrease of intrinsic motivations

Lepper & Greene, 1978

"Hidden costs of rewards"

Increase of extrinsic motivations=>

Increase of the feeling of external control=>

decrease of intrinsic motivations

Lepper & Greene, 1978

/!\ hybrid communitiesIf some people are paid to contribute, the motivation of the other people may decrease.

Conclusion: good communities are motivation dealers.

Contributors come with various reasons.

Taking care of intrinsic incentives seems to be a key to improve contributions.

A good balance may be hard to reach: critical issue for open source business ecosystems.

3 open questions

How to better understand the motivations of FLOSS contributors?

How motivations evolvealong the way?

Can we extract some advices for FLOSS community management?

Some references

Communautés de Logiciel Libre : écosystème des motivations, S. Heymann, 2009 [PDF].The self perception of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, Calder B. & Straw B., in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, n°31, pp.599-605, 1975.Intrinsic motivation in a new light, Lindenberg S., in Kylos, n°54 pp.317-342, 2001.Le logiciel libre et la communauté autorégulée, Meyer M. & Montagne F., in Les carnets du centre de philosophie du Droit, n°113, 2005.Intrinsic motivation and self-determination of behavior, Deci E. & Ryan R., Plenum Press, New York, 1985.Linux Manifesto [online], 1998.Les motivations des développeurs dans l’Open Source Une revue de la littérature, Jean-Jacques Gauguier, 2005 [PDF].Lakhani K. & Wolf R., Why hackers do what they do : Understanding motivation effort in free/open source software projects, MIT Sloan School of Management (2003), no. 4425-03.

Credits

Slide 1: Chocolates, by J. Paxon Reyes, under CC by-nc 2.0.Slide 2: Screenshot of Gephi 0.7.Slide 6: Image from The Big Lebowski, 1998.Slide 9: Dude Vinci, by Colin Cotterill, from https://dudeism.com/.Slide 10, 11: Richard Stallman gives a talk on Free Software and Copyright law at The University of Pittsburgh, by Victor Powell, under CC by-sa 3.0.Slide 10, 12: Linus Torvalds, Linuxmag.com, under CC by-sa 3.0.Slide 13: AllTheRageFaces.com.Slide 18: Focus Shift, 2008.Slide 28: Chocolate mocha, by Debbie R, under CC by-nc-nd 2.0.