On 7/2/05, Martin Michlmayr <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > * Kevin Mark <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [2005-07-01 23:34]: > > > and we are doing a sociological survey on Debian in order to > > > better understand the Debian community. > > > > didn't tbm do some research into this? > > Yes and no. There is currently a lot of interest in free software and > various researchers study it from their perspectives, e.g. sociology, > management, economics, software engineering, etc
Biella Coleman has also done some really fascinanting anthropo/sociological research around FOSS, hacker ethics and Debian. Some of her papers are published here: http://www.healthhacker.com/biella/ She's also been teaching at Chicago Uni on the subject of FOSS communities, and finishing her phd thesis -- of which I've seen some partial drafts and found really interesting. Last Debconf she instigated a "let's tell stories of back then" gathering with Ian, Bdale and others, I captured a bit of that on video, and she's got all (or most) of it on audio tapes. Dont' know if it was ever transcribed. I'd love to get my hands on those tapes and post them somewhere as mp3/ogg. cheers, martin
