ABSTRACT Title of dissertation: INSTITUTIONAL LOGICS, INDIE SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS AND PLATFORM GOVERNANCE Yixin Qiu, Doctor of Philosophy, 2013 Dissertation directed by Professor Anandasivam Gopal Professor Il-Horn Hann Department of Decision, Operations & Information Technologies, R.H.Smith School of Business This two-essay dissertation aims to study institutional logics in the context of Apple’s independent third-party software developers. In essay 1, I investigate the embedded agency aspect of the institutional logics theory. It builds on the premise that logics constrain preferences, interests and behaviors of individuals and organizations, thereby determining the appropriate and legitimate decisions and actions of actors. In the meantime, most social actors operate in fields characterized by multiple institutional logics where contradictions exist, allowing individuals and organizations with opportunities for negotiation and change through exploitation or management of these contradictions. I specifically study two competing institutional logics: professional and market logics when they are experienced simultaneously by independent iOS app entrepreneurs. Using participant observation and semi-structured interviews, I delineate the ways in which logic tension is reconciled through mechanisms of logic synthesis in three entrepreneurial areas –app ideation, app execution and app marketing, and conditions which facilitate or inhibit logic synthesis. In essay 2, I study the emergence and evolution of field-level logics in the context of Apple’s desktop developers –Mac indies. Following the cultural emergence model of field-level logics in Thornton et al. (2012), and the argument that “field-level logics are both embedded insocietal-level logics and subject to field-level processes that generate distinct forms of instantiation, variation, and combination of societal logics” (p148), I particularly examine the relationship between resource environment and the emergence and evolution of field-level logics. Taking advantage of a critical change in developers’ resource environment –Apple’s opening of the iOS App Store and subsequently the Mac App Store, and hence its governance model shifting from mainly a technological platform to a platform that includes a market exchange place, I identify developers’logics before and after the change, namely, the software ecosystem logic and platform ecosystem logic. Two ideal types are constructed for the logics along elemental categories, and a content analysis demonstrates the logic shift pattern as resource environments change. A further analysis of the two logics suggests that the software ecosystem logic and platform ecosystem logic are in contestation at this early stage of institutional change. INSTITUTIONAL LOGICS, INDIE SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS AND PLATFORM GOVERNANCE by Yixin Qiu Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2013 Advisory Committee: Professor Anandasivam Gopal, Co-Chair Professor Il-Horn Hann, Co-Chair Professor Ritu Agarwal Professor Brent Goldfarb Professor Erve Chambers (Dean’s Representative) ©Copyright by Yixin Qiu 2013 Dedicated to my parents: Qianzheng Gu, Yong’an Qiu and my husband Tao Shen. ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This dissertation would not have been possible without many people’s contribution and support. My deepest gratitude is to my co-advisers: Dr. Anand Gopal and Dr. Il-Horn Hann. It has been a unique and unforgettable experience of conducting a study on institutional logic using qualitative interpretive methodology with two economists. I am truly indebted and thankful to them for having faith in my work, and pushing me to think deep on the theoretical front. They have urged me to document the methodology more systematically and organize the writing in a more structured way. I have been very fortunate to work with Anand and Il-Horn. Dr. Ritu Agarwal has been one of the best academic role models I have ever known. Her constructive criticism on my conceptual framework has been enormously thought- provoking. I would also like to thank Dr. Kislaya Prasad for his time in advising the weekly IS student presentation series. I have benefited a great deal from his comments on my work. I am grateful to Dr. Brent Goldfarb for a great class and his interest in my work. His class on entrepreneurship is one of my favorite in the doctoral program. I have forever learned to keep a critical mind in evaluating the causal inference in any academic research. Brent’s work on Dot Com Era and technology commercialization has been great inspirations in my study on app entrepreneurs. I am also immensely appreciative of Dr. Erve Chambers for his guidance since I was in the Applied Anthropology program. It is his class and books that introduce me to the world of culture and fieldwork, which I have continued to use till this day in carrying out my dissertation research. I wish Erve all the best after his retirement. I would also like to thank other professors who have been crucial in making my graduate study experience unforgettable. First and foremost is Dr. Kate Stewart. I am thankful to her for recruiting me to the doctoral program in the Smith School, for iii which my life is forever changed. I am indebted to Dr. Kay Bartol for invaluable intellectual stimuli during the research meetings. I am grateful to Dr. Siva Viswanathan for pushing me to work harder on my research and presentation skills, and to Dr. Samer Faraj for his class, which introduced me to the world of IS research. I am extremely grateful to the fellow PhD students in the Smith School, many of whom have become professors in top-tier universities. I would like to especially thank Jie Mein Goh for her time in listening to my struggle and frustrations during the dissertation process and offering her insights, Sherae Daniel for her encouragement, Sri Kudaravalli for his help in polishing my research ideas, and Jiban Khuntia for the many memorable conversations we have had. I am also grateful for the weekly IS student presentation series, from which my research has received tremendously helpful feedback. I am thankful to all the app developers who have agreed to my interview request, the MoDevDC meet-up group organized by Pete Erickson, where I conducted most of my field observations, and ZerionSoftware, for providing me with an internship opportunity from which I gained invaluable experience for my research. Last but not the least, this dissertation would not have been possible without the support of my family: my parents, in-laws and my husband, Tao Shen. Their love, care and tolerance have helped me overcome constant frustrations during my research and the writing process. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Essay 1: On Synthesizing Professional and Market Logics in Nascent Entrepreneurship: A Study of iOS App Entrepreneurs … … … … … … … … … … … … ..1 Essay 2: From invisible hand to visible hand: platform governance and institutional logic of independent Mac developers, 2001-2012… … … … … … … … ...49 v Essay1: On Synthesizing Professional and Market Logics in Nascent Entrepreneurship: A Study of iOS App Entrepreneurs Abstract Research in institutional logics indicates that professional and market logics are two competing institutional logics which often lead to conflict due to differences in their key attributes such as sources of legitimacy, norms and definitions of success. In this paper, we study how these conflicting logics are experienced simultaneously by independent application (app) developer entrepreneurs on the Apple App Store. Subsequently, we investigate how these app entrepreneurs resolve these conflicts through a process of logic reconciliation that we term logic synthesis. Using a practice-based qualitative approach, we identify the logic anchors for a set of app developers on three entrepreneurial areas –app ideation, app execution and app marketing. Subsequently, we identify the key processes by which app developers find ways to resolve the conflict between market and professional logic within these entrepreneurial areas so that they may achieve a balance between the two logics at the level of the entrepreneurial area, i.e., achieving logic synthesis. Since synthesis does not occur in isolation, we also identify and discuss a key set of factors that hinder or encourage the process of synthesis. Using a set of interviews and field work methodology, we provide a nuanced model of logic anchoring and synthesis in the context of the nascent entrepreneur on the App Store, thereby contributing to the literature on institutional logics, platform ecosystems and nascent entrepreneurship. Keywords: independent application developers; institutional logic; qualitative research; nascent entrepreneurship; platform ecosystems 1 1. Introduction The software development industry has undergone many transformational changes in the last decade as platforms and customer needs have evolved. The latest transformation in this industry is the emergence and growth of the app economy, characterized by small applications that are developed specifically to be implemented on mobile or hand-held platforms and sold through virtual retail platforms (MacMillan, Burrows and Ante 2009, Wasserman 2010), the most popular of which is the Apple App Store. The App Store has been credited with revolutionizing the mobile apps consumption and production market by “democratizing” digital innovation (Boudreau 2012, Yoo et