Research into free and open source software development projects has so far largely focused on how the major tasks of software development are organized and motivated. But a complete project requires the execution of “mundane but necessary” tasks as well. In this paper, we explore how the mundane but necessary task of field support is organized in the case of Apache web server software, and why some project participants are motivated to provide this service gratis to others. We find that the Apache field support system functions effectively. We also find that, when we partition the help system into its component tasks, 98 % of the effort expended by information providers in fact returns direct learning benefits to those providers. This finding considerably reduces the puzzle of why information providers are willing to perform this task “for free. ” Implications are discussed.

This study focuses on the relationship between industrial clustering and innovation. It contributes to this literature by showing two empirical properties of the cluster learning process: first, that the structure of the knowledge network in a cluster is related with the heterogeneous distribution of firm knowledge bases and, second, that business interactions and inter-firm knowledge flows are not highly co-occurring phenomena. In particular, this paper highlights how the heterogeneity of firms’ knowledge bases generates uneven distribution of knowledge and selective inter-firm learning. This study has been based on empirical evidence collected at firm level in three wine clusters in Italy and Chile. Methods of social network analysis have been applied to process the data.

It is known that end users of products and services sometimes innovate, and that innovations developed by users sometimes become the basis for important new commercial products and services. It has also been argued and to some extent shown that such innovations will be found concentrated in a “lead user ” segment of the user community. However, neither the characteristics of innovating users nor the scope of the community that they “lead ” has been explored in depth. In this paper, we explore the characteristics of innovation, innovators and innovation sharing by library users of OPAC information search systems in Australia. This market has capable users, but it is nonetheless clearly a “follower" with respect to worldwide technological advance. We find that 26 % of users in this local market nonetheless do modify their OPACs in both major and minor ways, and that OPAC manufacturers judge many of these user modifications to be of commercial interest. We find that we can distinguish modifying from nonmodifying

Abstract: Commercial firms increasingly contribute to the development of open source software (OSS). However, a conflict often arises between the requirements of the General Public License to make “derived work ” available, and firms ’ interest to protect their intellectual property embodied in the code. If there are ways to mitigate or solve this conflict, the conditions under which OSS will be an appealing solution to firms become much more general. This paper is the first to provide a quantitative empirical study of this conflict and the ways firms deal with it. I present a study of embedded Linux, based on an online-survey that yielded 268 valid responses. It turns out that firms routinely use various means to protect their developments, while keeping the GPL. Still, they do reveal a considerable share of their code— on average, 49%. Heterogeneity between firms is analyzed using multivariate analysis. I show how the relative importance of various benefits and downsides of revealing determines a firm’s pattern of revealing. An analysis of reported reasons for revealing and of the type of code that is revealed provides further insights into these patterns. Putting the different dimensions of revealing behavior together, I find that consistent patterns of revealing can be identified for different types of firms.

The present study deals with the development of new firms in Eastern Germany. Firm formations are regarded as a means to reduce the still high unemployment in Eastern Germany through the creation of new jobs. Primarily, the analyses concentrate on the employment growth of manufacturing firms founded between 1992 and 1996. Hypotheses on the influence of various potential growth factors are derived by the combination of theoretical approaches. The validity of these growth hypothesis is tested for by multivariate analyses, based on data of the ZEW-Foundation Panel (East). The results of the multivariate analyses regarding employment dynamics and growth potential of young (innovative) firms show that innovative firms achieve significantly higher growth rates compared to non-innovative firms. The results also indicate that innovative as well as non-innovative firms start with a suboptimal size and realize high growth rates in the first years of existence. In addition, effects on growth result from the legal form. Firms, that are founded with a liabilitylimited legal form, achieve higher growth rates compared to formations where the

This study contributes to our understanding of the innovation process by bringing attention to and investigating the process by which innovators outside of firms obtain innovationrelated resources and assistance. This study is the first to explicitly examine how userinnovators gather the information and assistance they need to develop their ideas and how they share and diffuse the resulting innovations. Specifically, this exploratory study analyzes the context within which individuals who belong to voluntary special-interest communities develop sports-related consumer product innovations. We find that these individuals often prototype novel sports-related products and that they receive assistance in developing their innovations from fellow community members. We find that innovation-related information and assistance, as well as the innovations themselves, are freely shared within these communities. The nature of these voluntary communities, and the "institutional" structure supporting innovation and free sharing of innovations is likely to be of interest to innovation researchers and managers both within and beyond this product arena.

1 Content 1. Kulwer Academic Publisher Editorial – An Update from OCP-IP ……3 2. ARM Column- Cortex-R4, A comparison with the ARM9E processor family

This paper is about the role of MNE subsidiaries in the generation of knowledge and linkages in industrialising countries. It develops an original typology of MNE subsidiaries based on the nature of their global linkages. Then, it explores how this typology is connected with different mental models of MNE’s and discusses the impact of these two aspects on intra-subsidiary innovative activity and the formation of knowledge linkages at the local level – two important dimensions affecting subsidiaries ’ capacity to generate knowledge spillovers in host countries. Based on Argentinean data, the empirical analysis suggests that MNE subsidiaries engage in very diverse types of global networking. More specifically, the paper finds that the nature of such diverse global networks affects the local capabilities and the formation of knowledge linkages at the domestic level. In the light of this finding, we discuss the role of different types of subsidiaries on the generation of technological spillovers in host industrialising countries.

The link between firms engaging in open source software (OSS) development and the OSS community is established by individual developers. This linkage might entail a principalagent issue due to the developer’s double allegiance to firm and OSS community, and expose the firm to the risk of losing intellectual property. Using both interviews and a large-scale survey, I substantiate the importance of the developer’s role. However, neither interview data nor regression analysis show indications of commercially harmful revealing behavior induced by “Free Software ideology. ” Management, on the other hand, sometimes seems to be overly concerned about openness. I conclude that a more positive stance towards openness will allow firms to better share in the benefits of open innovation processes.

version: 10/2010 Abstract: In patent theory, the cost of communicating technical knowledge is small. In human capital theory, it is large. But evidence suggests that these costs are actually endogenous. Firms invest in reducing communication costs, but only when technology is sufficiently advanced. This can make competition different for early stage technologies: patents do not increase innovation incentives, employee mobility matters and inventors might choose to freely exchange knowledge. Behavior and optimal policy differ then. Endogenous communication costs help explain changes in patent propensity, in the geographic localization of innovation and why successful developing countries have difficulty moving to the innovation frontier.