Weighting structures: Evolutionary dynamics of innovation networks in virtual communities

Abstract

We discuss and illustrate alternative analytical strategies for representing coordination networks in innovative virtual communities bounded by production relationships among participants. We use information on email communication networks reconstructed using data from the Apache Open Source project to give empirical contents to our arguments and to substantiate our claims that: (i) Self-organizing networks provide the basic principles of coordination in such communities; (ii) Once in place, deliberate governance arrangements affect coordination patterns within virtual communities; (iii) Structural properties of communication networks change significantly over time depending on their internal organizational logics, and (iv) Affiliation (a.k.a. two mode) networks provide a useful representation for detecting community structures. © 2009 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.