ABSTRACT
Recent years have seen a surge of interest by practitioners and academics in the development of open-source software (OSS), computer software that is “made freely available to all” (von Hippel and von Krogh 2003). This interest has also spread to the development of the three-dimensional (3D) immersive Internet or virtual worlds, with OpenSimulator, realXtend, and Hippo Browser representing some of the OSS projects with virtual world applications. For example, the OpenSimulator project is an open-source 3D application server that enables users to develop and customize their own virtual worlds based on their specific technology and use preferences. The OpenSimulator community comprises a very diverse group of actors from across the globe, for example, independent users and hobbyists, freelancers, nonprofit organizations such as universities and research institutes, entrepreneurs and small and large for-profit firms who volunteer their time, effort, and resources for the development of OpenSimulator. The sustainability, or the continuous provision of “benefits for members over the long term” (Butler 2001, 347), of OSS communities such as the OpenSimulator, is dependent on the ability of the community’s diverse actors to strike a balance between their often conflicting goals, norms, and values. Furthermore, sustainability may be especially difficult when the community is embedded within an external environment characterized by turbulent change—such as high technological uncertainty.
