Abstract
This article discusses the status mobility and status stability in a community of free software developers. The open source development process has often been described as elitist. In his influential essay Homesteading the Noosphere, programmer Eric Raymond claimed that reputation is the capital that drives the open source community. According to Raymond, since the open source community lacks much in the way of formal authority or control, the only way in which a programmer can gain status is through peer recognition: ...you become a hacker when other hackers call you a hacker. A hacker in this light, is somebody who has shown (by contributing gifts) that he or she has technical ability and understands how the reputation game works. This judgment is mostly one of awareness and acculturation, and can only be delivered by those already well inside the culture. Having a good reputation can be important for those who want to make key contributions to open source software projects. In a study of contributi...
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