Technology-In-Practice and its Influence on User Involvement in OSS 2.0 Projects

There is evidence of a lack of non-developer user involvement and usability problems with free and open source software. Open source software (OSS) 2.0 communities where developers are not the users of the software often have greater commercial and non-profit involvement in the project. As such these types of projects have a greater need to engage non-developer users and are likely to employ more rigorous project software development practices. The study of OSS 2.0 communities provides an opportunity to expand on our understanding of the structures that support involving non-developer users in distributed participatory design. Utilizing the structuralization perspective of technology as the main theoretical foundation, this poster presents initial results from a pilot study of one OSS 2.0 community discussing virtual mediation practices and their effect on users’ involvement with regard to knowledge transfer and influence over design outcomes.ye