Abstract Mathieu O'NEIL

Mathieu O’NEIL (Université Paris-Sorbonne Paris IV & Australian National University) : « Modeling Online Peer Projects ».

Groups of people collaborating online to produce public goods such as free software or free encyclopedias were initially conceptualised as “communities”, and later as “networks”. It has now become clear that they constitute a new type of organisational arrangement, characterised by autonomous and distributed work practices, known as “peer production” (participants self-select their tasks and the amount of time they can contribute) as well as by overlapping forms of justifications for legitimate expert or administrative actions. Online tribal bureaucracies thus comprise collectivist, bureaucratic and charismatic features. Despite the premium placed on deliberation and consensus they are frequently the site of conflicts. They also have benefits, such as being immune from the productivity-limiting norms popular amongst corporate employees, or replacing the interminable meetings of communes by asynchronous communications. Does this development signify, following a well-worn alternative, an increase in soft control or the dawning of a more politically participatory age? In fact, both scenarios must contend with resistance to scalability, uncertainty over identity and competence, and online peer projects' foundational critique of the separated authority of experts and leaders, which all complicate connections with corporate structures.