Self-organisation of interest communities: an evolutionary approach

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to study the role of individual on the self-organizing process of interest-based community. Contrary to the classical conclusions in which the presence of free-riding behaviour damages the sustainability of online community, our findings show that the heterogeneity of individual contributions favour the self-organization of interest-based communities. We also consider two designed strategies which link the ability to provide information for the community and the perceived switching costs. The results show that both positive and negative correlations between contributions and switching costs may lead to the emergence of self-organized community of interest. If agents are (not) sensitive to the diversity of information, a positive (negative) correlation between contributions and switching costs is likely to produce self-organization. RESUME. L'objectif de cet article est d'etudier le role des contributions individuelles sur les processus d'auto-organisation des communautes d'interet en ligne. Contrairement aux conclusions traditionnelles qui montrent que le comportement de passager clandestin est nuisible aux succes des communautes en ligne, nos conclusions montrent que l'heterogeneite des contributions individuelles favorise l'auto-organisation de ces communautes. Nous considerons egalement deux strategies qui lient la capacite des contributeurs a produire de l'information et les couts de changement percus lors d'un deplacement vers une autre communaute. Les resultats montrent que des correlations positives et negatives entre contributions et couts de changement peuvent toutes les deux conduire a l'auto-organisation. Si les agents sont (ne sont pas) sensibles a la diversite informationnelle, une correlation positive (negative) entre contributions et couts de changement conduit a l'auto-organisation des preferences au sein des communautes.