Hybrid Worlds: conducting research in the fringes of online and offline environments

1
Hybrid Worlds conducting research in the
fringes of on-line and off-line environments

• Prodromos Tsiavos
• C3 project, IFI, UIO
• tsiavosp_at_ifi.uio.no

06.10.05
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Backbone

• Pivotal Readings and Persons
• Who am I
• A narrative of my research
• Reconstruction
• Theory
• Data Fields
• Discussion
• Conclusions (?)
• Where Next

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Pivotal Readings/ Persons

• Ciborra (2001) Existential Research
• Scott (2000) Lived Methodology
• Callon (1986) social researcher as an equal to
  the researched subject
• Hine (2000) virtual ethnography
• Lessig (1995, 2003) virtual and real worlds
• Latour (1988) follow the actor
• Schultze (2000) Confessional writing
• Influenced by Behar (1996) Vulnerable Writing and
  Van Maanen (1988)

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Who am I?

• Solicitor
• IS analysis and development
• LSE PhD student
• Creative Commons Legal Project Lead

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A narrative of my research trajectory

• Interaction between technology and law
• Napster case (1999)
• The Gnutella Protocol (peer-to-peer) as a
  dissemination mechanisms
• The Gnutella Protocol as a development process
  based on the General Public Licence (GPL)
• Working for the EU in the DG INFSO in the
  department of distributed systems. Focus on Free/
  Open Source Software policies
• Ecologies of Regulation
• The Creative Commons Project
• Creative Commons Project in the UK (development
  of licences for England and Wales)

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Reconstruction

• Research Theme
• Interaction between technology and law
• Evolution of regulatory ecologies
• Unit of Analysis
• Regulatory ecology
• A Protocol
• A licensing scheme
• Type of Research
• Trying to make sense and challenge the status
  quo Critical Research Howcroft and Trauth
  (2004)
• Follow the Actor Actor Network Theory Latour
  (1988)
• Theory
• Lessig (1989-2005)
• Data Collection
• Mailing list (Gnutella)
• Mailing list, Individual Emails, Episodes
  (Creative Commons)
• Data Analysis
• Employment of Grounded Theory Tools for analysis
  of both theory and data
• Use of AtlasTi
• Actor Network Theory Walsham (1995) for
  argument analysis

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Theory

• Transcending boundaries Callon (1986)
• 48 papers and 31 books by Lawrence Lessig in a
  period of 16 years
• Objective
• to deconstruct his work and reconstruct it in the
  form of a coherent theory
• to come up with a series of concepts supporting
  the exploration of regulatory ecologies
• to then supplement the theory with the empirical
  findings in two different cases
• Method (iterative and incremental)
• First reading of material
• Keyword identification
• Second Reading of the Material
• Collection of texts and conversion to ASCII
  format
• Employment of qualitative analysis (grounded
  theory) Strauss (1967), Strauss and Corbin
  (1997) software tools (AtlasTi)
• Third Reading of the Material focusing on the
  first six years and three key texts (choice by
  reference)
• Start writing abstracts, notional narratives of
  each text until repetition starts occuring
  influences by axial coding
• Fourth Reading
• Construction of a theoretical/ narrative backbone
  in the form of an argument tree (focus on
  modularization)
• Fifth Reading
• Complementing the theoretical backbone
• Lessig as an Internet Persona

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Data Field IThe Gnutella Protocol (Part I)

• Project profile
• Open Protocol GPL based
• Duration operative since March 2000
• Focus on the interactions between the various
  developers in the Gnutella Developers Forum
  (GDF)
• Modes of exploration of the phenomenon
• Prehistory
• through information on the web, following
  references in the form of hyperlinks and searches
• Main Gnutella development
• The GDF, an open forum hosted at the Yahoo!Groups
• Unit of Analysis
• The Gnutella2 incident and its evolution in
  conjunction with the original Gnutella
  development
• Research Question
• How is openness constructed through the
  interactions between the developers and how does
  it relate with the GPL and other regulatory
  forms/ structures
• Data Inputs
• Messages between the developers (over 22,000
  messages)
• The structure of the GDF
• Normative documents (such as the charter of the
  GDF)
• The GPL

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Data Field IThe Gnutella Protocol (Part II)

• Modes of exploration of the phenomenon
• Collection
• Search with Keywords such as Gnutella2, GPL and
  then follow the threads
• Conversion to ASCII files
• Use of AtlasTi
• Data Analysis
• Construction of a copy-paste narrative of all
  relevant discussions
• First Reading
• Identification of key concepts
• Construction of main argument trajectory
• Second Reading
• Identification of higher level concepts
• Construction of specific argument trajectories
• Third Reading
• Theory links
• Comparison with concepts of openness derived from
  Theory
• Type of research intervention
• Stealth (lurking)

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Data Field IICC in the UK (Part I)

• Project profile
• Rolling out of Open Content Licences
• Duration operative since December 2002, March
  2003 (in the UK), March 2004 (my involvement)
• Focus on
• the interactions between the various contributors
  of the licence
• The Creative Commons in the UK licences
• The development process outside the list
• A series of conferences and events around the
  licences
• The institutional environment where the licences
  are created
• Areas of policy that are to be changed as a
  result of the CC licences
• Modes of exploration of the phenomenon
• Prehistory
• through information on the web, following
  references in the form of hyperlinks and searches
• Through discussions (unstructured interviews with
  the contributors of the project
• The CC in the UK development in particualr
• Personal reflections
• The CC in the UK mailing list wiki
• The International Creative Commons mailing list
  wiki
• The Creative Commons and Collecting societies
  mailing list and wiki

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Data Field IICC in the UK (Part II)

• Modes of exploration of the phenomenon
• Collection/ pre-analysis
• Indexing all the relevant material
• Per mailing list
• Communication with particular individuals
  members of the CC-UK/iCC/CC in anglophiile
  jurisdictions/ other
• Personal log
• Relevant publications
• Identification of the material that are related
  to the issue of participation/ classification on
  the basis of keywords and content experience
  reality guts
• Data Analysis
• Construction of a copy-paste narrative of all
  relevant discussions
• First round of Readings
• Identification of key narratives
• Construction of a narrative tree
• Construction of a version history as a result of
  interactions had to do it anyhow as part of my
  work in CC in the UK
• Reflection on my role and my research objectives
  Oates (2004
• Second round of Readings
• Identification of feedback breakdowns
• Reflection on my role and my research objectives
  Oates (2004
• Construction of specific argument trajectories

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Discussion

• Linking it with theory
• Comparison between the two case studies and the
  theoretical framework
• Detached vs. engaged research
• Intersection between the real and the virtual
• Limitations in the way research is conducted
• comparing cases of a different level
• the self reflection element etc
• Contributions to theory
• Ecologies of regulation and related concepts
• Use of ANT for regulation study
• Linking Lessigs work with ANT
• Use of AtlasTi for the literature review
• Contributions to practice
• Regulation in a non-legal context (Gnutella)
• Bottom-up large scale IPR change (CC in the UK)

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Where Next

• The choice of data defines the boundaries of
  the phenomenon and pre-empties the research
  framework
• Gnutella case
• creation of a solely on-line regulatory creature
• global and space dispersed group of developers
• Creative Commons in the UK
• Link with a particular locus
• Need for off-line data
• Global effect
• Meetings with the licence developers
• Further methodological concerns
• An ANT for the ANT
• Further deconstruction of the Lessig/ CC network
• Hybrid research in the Gnutella protocol
• Open Business Models project
• Alternatives
• In the presentation mode
• Manu Luksch http//www.ambienttv.net/index_frame.h
  tml
• Carey Young http//www.careyyoung.com/past/winwin.
  html
• In the feedback Open Source your research
  community based

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References

• Bauer M. and Gaskell G. (2000) Qualitative
  researching with text, image and sound, London,
  SAGE
• Bryant T. et al (2004) Twenty Years of Applying
  Grounded Theory in Information Systems a Coding
  Method,
• Useful Theory Generation Method, or an Orthodox
  Positivist Method of Data Analysis, IFIP 8.2.
  Manchester 2004 http//is.lse.ac.uk/support/ifip_
  wg82/Manchester/BryantPanel.pdf
• Callon, M. (1986). Some Elements of a Sociology
  of Translation Domestication of the Scallops and
  the
• Fishermen of Saint Brieuc Bay. In J. Law (Ed.)
  Power, Action and Belief a new Sociology of
  Knowledge? Sociological Review Monograph. London,
  Routledge and Kegan Paul. 32 196-233
• Ciborra C. (2001) n the Mood for Knowledge a New
  Study of Improvisation, LSE Working Papers
  http//is.lse.ac.uk/wp/pdf/WP94.PDF
• Hine C. (2000) Virtual Ethnography, London, SAGE
• Lessig L. (1995) The Path of Cyberlaw 104 Yale
  Law Journal. 1743
• Lessig L. (2003) Law Regulating Code Regulating
  Law Loyola University of Chicago Law Journal
• Strauss A. and Corbin J. (1997) Grounded Theory
  in practice, London, SAGE