Open Source software plays an essential part in modern software development. Ifn ot used directly by a project, it may very well be used second or even third hand through its dependencies. Any disruption in the delivery, quality or reliability of a vital dependency may send large shock waves throughout a project. This poses the question of how much trust we can put into these open source dependencies and their overall viability. In this study we investigate the effects funding through GitHub Sponsors has on NPM packages and how it affects their viability. By analyzing data queried from GitHub, NPM and NPMS we analyze how different factors affects the viability of NPM packages, with the overall aim of determining the impact funding has on a projects viability.

The emergence of online entrepreneurship platforms made it possible for entrepreneurs to fund their innovative ideas through financial support from business angels, venture capitalists, and crowds. Nevertheless, technology product development projects are the most difficult to fund on such platforms, with the least funding success and highest unsuccessful dollar value among all categories. One major factor affecting funding success on these platforms is the extent of perceived innovativeness of the presented technology products. The extant literature evinces that product innovativeness perception is influenced not only by novelty but also meaningfulness perception and that innovativeness brings higher funding success when novel projects are also perceived to be meaningful. By drawing on the theory of resonance, this study investigates the impact of interactivity on the extent of perceived innovativeness by creating an impact on resonance, which is proposed to represent all pre-identified aspects of meaningfulness. An online experiment was conducted to empirically validate the proposed research model, and increased interactivity was found to be positively associated with perceived product innovativeness through higher resonance. Theoretically, this study proposes the resonance concept to account for the meaningfulness perception regarding innovative product ideas and demonstrates the positive effect of increased interactivity on perceived innovativeness. For practitioners, the results provide evidence for the positive impact of interactive product presentation on the increased perception of resonance and, thus, innovativeness, which evinces a higher potential for funding success in highly innovative product development projects. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

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Crowdfunded marketplaces have recently emerged as a novel avenue for entrepreneurs to raise capital in support of innovative ideas and ventures. In these markets, any individual can propose a project, and interested others can contribute their funds to support it. The economic potential of these markets has recently become apparent and, as a result they have begun gaining significant attention from legislators and regulators, who see crowdfunding as a possible solution to the economic woes currently facing the country. However, the behavior of participants in these marketplaces, a key factor that must be accounted for in any effort to formulate policy or regulation, or to identify appropriate design practices, remains poorly understood, primarily due to the many novelties of crowdfunding. Bearing in mind the need to ensure crowdfunding's sustainability as an industry, the formulation of policy and regulation, as well as best practices for participants, I report on three empirical studies that seek to identify and quantify a variety of important aspects of, and influences upon, participant behavior in crowdfunded markets. These three studies, presented as separate essays herein, i) explore the influence upon subsequent contributors from social information about prior others' actions, ii) examine the frictions that arise due to cultural differences between and amongst users, and iii) assess crowdfunders' use of information-hiding mechanisms, and the subsequent impact on later contributors in the market. In regard to each, I discuss the relevant theory, the methodology, data sources, results and implications. I conclude by highlighting the contributions of my work, and possible avenues for future research. / Business Administration/Management Information Systems

Enabled by the wave of online crowdsourcing activities, extracting the Wisdom of Crowds (WoC) has become an emerging research area, one that is used to aggregate judgments, opinions, or predictions from a large group of individuals for improved decision making. However, existing literature mostly focuses on eliciting the wisdom of crowds in an offline context—without tapping into the vast amount of data available on online crowdsourcing platforms. To extract WoC from participants on online platforms, there exist at least three challenges, including social influence, suboptimal aggregation strategies, and data sparsity. This dissertation aims to answer the research question of how to effectively extract WoC from crowdsourcing platforms for the purpose of making better decisions. In the first study, I designed a new opinions aggregation method, Social Crowd IQ (SCIQ), using a time-based decay function to eliminate the impact of social influence on crowd performance. In the second study, I proposed a statistical learning method, CrowdBoosting, instead of a heuristic-based method, to improve the quality of crowd wisdom. In the third study, I designed a new method, Collective Persuasibility, to solve the challenge of data sparsity in a crowdfunding platform by inferring the backers' preferences and persuasibility. My work shows that people can obtain business benefits from crowd wisdom, and it provides several effective methods to extract wisdom from online crowdsourcing platforms, such as StockTwits, Good Judgment Open, and Kickstarter. / Doctor of Philosophy / Since Web 2.0 and mobile technologies have inspired increasing numbers of people to contribute and interact online, crowdsourcing provides a great opportunity for the businesses to tap into a large group of online users who possess varied capabilities, creativity, and knowledge levels. Howe (2006) first defined crowdsourcing as a method for obtaining necessary ideas, information, or services by asking for contributions from a large group of individuals, especially participants in online communities. Many online platforms have been developed to support various crowdsourcing tasks, including crowdfunding (e.g., Kickstarter and Indiegogo), crowd prediction (e.g., StockTwits, Good Judgment Open, and Estimize), crowd creativity (e.g., Wikipedia), and crowdsolving (e.g., Dell IdeaStorm). The explosive data generated by those platforms give us a good opportunity for business benefits. Specifically, guided by the Wisdom of Crowds (WoC) theory, we can aggregate multiple opinions from a crowd of individuals for improving decision making. In this dissertation, I apply WoC to three crowdsourcing tasks, stock return prediction, event outcome forecast, and crowdfunding project success prediction. Our study shows the effectiveness of WoC and makes both theoretical and practical contributions to the literature of WoC.

The financing phenomenon equity crowdfunding, which is the smallest of the four crowdfunding types, has in recent years expanded quickly. This has led to companies and entrepreneurs that possess limited knowledge about business and are unable to get financed in any other way making their way to this financing type. Their lack of knowledge regarding valuation for businesses has not previously been studied. Researchers has however voiced their concerns regarding valuation for companies on this market, since it has significant implications for the future of the company and the chance for a crowdfunding campaign to succeed. These concerns led to the purpose of the thesis, to study how valuation is conducted in companies that has run equity crowdfunding campaigns in Sweden. To answer this a case study was conducted where seven entrepreneurs, that previously had such a campaign on the swedish platform FundedByMe, was interviewed. This was also complemented with an expert interview with a representative from a Swedish crowdfunding intermediary. During these interviews the entrepreneurs explained why they chose equity crowdfunding, why they chose to offer the amount of equity they did and the valuation process. From this study we can conclude that some of the concerns may be unjustified, even if most of the companies could not get financing in any other way they seem to have a high awareness of the importance of a thorough valuation and in several cases sought external help for this process. Further it can be concluded that the amount of equity offered is closely linked to the amount of capital that the entrepreneur believe they need, but also to keep as many shares as possible to themselves. Another important insight is that the current laws that regulate the area in Sweden is too unspecified and that further regulation is needed to reduce the amount of asymmetric information on the market and to protect investors to a higher degree than today. / Den nya finansieringsformen equity crowdfunding, den minsta av de fyra crowdfundingmodellerna, har under de senaste åren haft en snabb framfart. Detta har dock lett till attföretag och entreprenörer som är ekonomiskt okunniga och ej kan finansiera sig på annat sättsökt sig till equity crowdfunding. Deras okunskap kring värdering har inte tidigare studeratsmen forskare har uttryckt oro kring värderingen av företag inom denna marknad då den harstora implikationer för företagets framtid samt om kampanjen lyckas. Oron kringvärderingsförfarandet ledde till att syftet i denna studie utformades för att undersöka hur dettagår till i företag som tillämpat equity crowdfunding i Sverige. Det har skett genom enfallstudie där sju företag som haft en sådan kampanj hos den svenska plattformenFundedByMe intervjuades. Detta kompletterades även med en expertintervju från enrepresentant för denna intermediär. Under dessa intervjuer förklarade entreprenörerna varförde sökt sig till equity crowdfunding, varför de valde att bjuda ut den del av bolaget som devalde samt värderingsprocessen. Från resultatet av denna studie konstateras att viss oro kandämpas, då förvisso de flesta bolagen inte hade möjlighet att få finansiering på annat sätt,men de hade ändå en god uppfattning kring värderingens betydelse och hade i flera fall tagitin extern kompetens för att assistera med denna. Det går även att konstatera att andelenutbjudet kapital främst är kopplat till det kapitalbehov entreprenörerna upplever att de harsamt en önskan att behålla så många andelar som möjligt i bolaget. En viktig insikt är även attden lagstiftning som finns inom området, i Sverige, idag är alldeles för otydlig och equitycrowdfunding kommer behöva en mycket mer specificerad reglering för att åtgärda denasymmetriska informationen som finns på marknaden samt för att öka det i nulägetbristfälliga investerarskyddet.

Diese Dissertation befasst sich mit Regulierung, Wettbewerb und Konsumentenverhalten in drei unterschiedlichen Plattformmärkten. Kapitel 1 analysiert den Wettbewerb zwischen Netzanbietern und die Zwischenschaltung von Content-Delivery-Networks im Rahmen der Netzneutralitätsdebatte. Die Ergebnisse legen nahe, dass eine Abkehr vom Prinzip der strikten Netzneutralität mit Effizienzgewinnen verbunden ist. Content-Delivery-Networks schaffen dabei einerseits zusätzliche Investitionsanreize für Netzanbieter, andererseits reduzieren sie die Intensität des Wettbewerbs um Endnutzer. Kapitel 2 analysiert den Wettbewerb zwischen werbefinanzierten Online-Plattformen und deren Anreize Nutzerdaten zu sammeln. Die modelltheoretische Analyse legt dar, dass derartige Märkte zu einem Marktversagen neigen, da im Marktgleichgewicht eine ineffiziente Menge an persönlichen Daten gesammelt wird. Dieses Ergebnis rechtfertig Regulierungen im Datenschutzbereich und den Einsatz wettbewerbspolitischer Maßnahmen, wobei dem Marktversagen auch durch die Schaffung eines Marktes für Nutzerdaten entgegengewirkt werden kann. Kapitel 3 analysiert Crowdfunding-Plattformen als Finanzierungsquelle bei unsicherer Gesamtnachfrage. Die Ergebnisse legen nahe, dass die Nachfrage in Crowdfunding-Kampagnen strategisch reduziert wird um künftigen Preisänderungen entgegenzuwirken. Dies impliziert, dass Crowdfunding-kampagnen nur bedingt geeignet sind um Nachfrageunsicherheit zu reduzieren. / This thesis analyzes regulation, competition and consumer decisions in three distinct platform markets. Chapter 1 studies competition between internet service providers and the interconnection of Content-Delivery-Networks in the light of the net neutrality debate. The results suggest that a departure from a regime of strict net neutrality is associated with efficiency gains. Content-delivery-networks lead to higher incentives for investment on the one hand, however, soften competition for consumers on the other hand. Chapter 2 analyzes competition between ad-based online platforms and platforms’ incentives to collect user data. The model predicts a market failure in this type of environment as the level of data collection in the market equilibrium is inefficient. This result provides a justification for privacy regulation as well as competition policy measures, while the market failure can also be counteracted by establishing a market for personal data. Chapter 3 analyzes crowdfunding platforms as a means to collect funds in light of aggregate demand uncertainty. The results suggest that demand in crowdfunding campaigns is strategically withheld in order to counteract future price changes which implies a limited ability of crowdfunding campaigns to reduce demand uncertainty.

Crowdfunding as it looks today has had rapid growth in popularity as a financing alternative for start-ups. By seeking capital from a large number of private investors who will invest a smaller amount of money, the financing market has changed and access to capital has increased. This study has made a comparison between the different funding options. The aim of this study is to compare the development of companies financed by crowdfunding against companies traditionally financed to evaluate which approach is the strongest. Furthermore, the authors intend to identify risks with crowdfunding and to observe trends. The study has been conducted through a quantitative method with a deductive approach where the data is collected mostly from the companies annual reports. The result of the study shows that the companies that are traditionally financed have a higher level of sales and sales growth. One trend that the study has shown is that after the company's first two years, sales, sales growth and operating profit from companies financed through crowdfunding begin to decline.

O objetivo principal desta pesquisa é estudar o crowdfunding de recompensas como uma alternativa de financiamento às Empresas de Base Tecnologica (EBTs) no Brasil. Na primeira parte, realiza-se uma pesquisa descritiva-exploratória por meio de dados secundários que buscam desenhar o panorama atual da utilização do crowdfunding como opção de capital empreendedor. Na segunda parte, é conduzido um estudo de múltiplos casos com cinco EBTs para identificar as razões que levaram seus empreendedores a optarem pelo crowdfunding de recompensas como modelo de financiamento e as condições por eles consideradas determinantes para o sucesso de campanha. Os resultados da revelam um cenário com poucas campanhas vitoriosas no País e uma distribuição bastante heterogênia no que tange meta financeira, capital levantado e quantidade de apoiadores. São encontrados também indícios de que as EBTs escolhem o crowdfunding de recompensas como modelo de financiamento porque são empresas em estágio inicial de desenvolvimento, porque buscam recursos para financiar projetos específicos e por motivações que não envolvem diretamente a obtenção dos recursos. Sobre as condições consideradas determinantes para o sucesso das campanhas, houve relativo concenso em torno de determinadas características, como a importância de uma boa divulgação / The main goal of this research is to study reward-based crowdfunding as a financing alternative for Technology-based companies (TBC) in Brazil. In the first part, a descriptive exploratory research through secondary data is made, which tends to outline the actual panorama of crowdfunding use as an option of venture capital. In the second part, a multiple case study with five TBCs is performed to identify the reasons that led their entrepreneurs to choose reward-based crowdfunding as a financing model and the conditions considered essential for the success of the campaign. The results show a scenario with few successful campaigns in the country and a mostly heterogeneous distribution in which concerns financial goal, raised capital and amount of supporters. Evidences are found that the TBCs choose reward-based crowdfunding as a financing model because they are companies in the starting stage of development, because they look for resources to finance specific projects and for motivations which don\'t directly concern the obtaining of resources. About the determinant considered conditions for the success of the campaigns, there was relative agreement on certain characteristics, such as the importance of a good publicity

Equity crowdfunding (ECF) is the smallest of four main types of crowdfunding (CF) and has emerged as a new form of investment, where investors receive equity of a company in return for capital. Over the past years, the development of CF has given entrepreneurs the option to seek funding from a new source, instead of relying solely on venture capital (VC) and other sources of funding (Mollick, 2013). However, the implementation of regulations for ECF has not yet developed enough to make such investing equally consistent for everyone.   Equity crowdfunded ventures can potentially attract a large number of investors that can possibly create corporate governance issues between the entrepreneur and investors. Additionally, individual investors might both lack the competence or incentive to extensively research and assess a venture and make an investment. Due to the growth in ECF and the lack of knowledge of it, the purpose of this thesis was to discover the perceptions of Swedish fund managers (FMs) regarding the nature of ECF and their interest in it.   In order to fulfill the purpose of this study, previous studies were carefully examined to gain a thorough understanding of the area of study. Furthermore, the empirical findings were gathered through a course of seven semi-structured interviews of Swedish FMs.   Empirical findings suggested that ECF has remained as a means of providing only seed-stage funding for ventures and that it is a marginal phenomenon in Sweden. ECF was believed to potentially disturb the VC industry if it grew and moved to a later stage. Additionally, ECF was found to be a good option for companies that were unable to receive funding from traditional funding methods. Risks of fraud and other scandals should be prevented for ECF to maintain its popularity. The findings implied that the future of ECF remains uncertain. Based on the perceptions of Swedish FMs, ECF neither would replace nor be a threat to traditional methods.