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Information technology (IT) firms are paying developers in Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) projects, leading to the emergence of hybrid forms of work. In order to understand how the firm–project hybridisation process occurs, we present the results of an online survey of participants in the Debian project, as well as interviews with Debian Developers. We find that the intermingling of the commercial logic of the firm and the communal logic of the project requires rhetorical legitimation. We analyse the discourses used to legitimise firm–project cooperation as well as the organisational mechanisms which facilitate this cooperation. A first phase of legitimation, based on firm adoption of open licenses and developer self-fulfilment, aims to erase the commercial/communal divide. A second more recent phase seeks to professionalise work relations inside the project and, in doing so, challenges the social order which restricts participation in FOSS. Ultimately, hybridisation raises the question of the fair distribution of the profits firms derive from FOSS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digitally networked voluntary associations such as free software projects and Wikipedia can be distinguished from capitalist firms in two respects. First, their predominant logic is ‘ethical’. Participation is primarily motivated by self-fulfilment and validated by a community of peers, rather than by earning wages. Second, their governance is ‘modular’, understood in a design sense (decomposable blocks sharing a common interface), but also in political economy terms: participants oppose restricted ownership and control by individually socializing their works into commons. In recent years capitalist-centralized firms have increasingly engaged with ethical-modular organizations, in some cases paying wages to participants (such labour is thus both ‘alienated’ or sold, and ‘communal’, as workers freely cooperate to produce commons). This article reviews the literature dealing with the relationship of these two organizational types. It argues that the manner in which scholars approach a central characteristic of ethical-modular organizations – participants relinquish exclusive property rights over the resource they have created – leads to highly diverse interpretations. Four hypotheses are presented. A ‘panoptic’ view overlooks the abjuration of exclusive property rights, so that ethical-modular organizations can be defined as a variant of the evolution of capitalist firms into post-bureaucratic networks. ‘Skeptics’ view this abjuration as irrelevant, and ethical-modular organizations as increasing worker exploitation. In contrast, ‘activists’ celebrate the abjuration of exclusive property rights, and present ethical-modular organizations as key actors in a historical process leading to the disappearance of capitalism and hierarchy. Finally ‘reformists’ suggest that the co-optation of communal labour by firms will benefit business practices and society. The article examines the analytical focus of each hypothesis in terms of labour, loss of control by firms over workers, and societal impact. Where appropriate, it raises questions and objections. The conclusion addresses communal labour’s effective dependence on capitalist-centralized firms and suggests factors which may contribute to its emancipation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]