Self-Organisation of Interest Communities: An Evolutionary Approach

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to study the role of individual contributions and some aspects of online community infrastructure on the self-organizing process of interest-based community. Contrary to the classical conclusions in which the presence of free-riding behavior damages the sustainability of online community, our findings show that the heterogeneity of individual contributions favor the self-organization of interest-based communities. This result is robust to the introduction of bimodal structure of preference. 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.

Keywords: Interest community, Internet, Self-organization

JEL Classification: D23, D8, M15