01876nas a2200205   4500008004100000022001400041245011600055210006900171260004200240300001000282490000600292520119900298653001201497653002701509653003301536653002501569653001601594100002401610856003601634       2013                        eng d  a1927-032100aSustainability in Open Source Software Commons: Lessons Learned from an Empirical Study of SourceForge Projects0 aSustainability in Open Source Software Commons Lessons Learned f  aOttawabTalent First Networkc01/2013  a13-190 v33 aIn this article, we summarize a five-year US National Science Foundation funded study designed to investigate the factors that lead some open source projects to ongoing collaborative success while many others become abandoned. Our primary interest was to conduct a study that was closely representative of the population of open source software projects in the world, rather than focus on the more-often studied, high-profile successful cases. After building a large database of projects (n=174,333) and implementing a major survey of open source developers (n=1403), we were able to conduct statistical analyses to investigate over forty theoretically-based testable hypotheses. Our data firmly support what we call the conventional theory of open source software, showing that projects start small, and, in successful cases, grow slightly larger in terms of team size. We describe the “virtuous circle” supporting conventional wisdom of open source collaboration that comes out of this analysis, and we discuss two other interesting findings related to developer motivations and how team members find each other. Each of these findings is related to the sustainability of these projects. 10acommons10ainstitutional analysis10ainternet-based collaboration10aopen source software10aSourceForge1 aSchweik, Charles, M  uhttp://timreview.ca/article/645