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This research investigates how the value creation interests and activities of different stakeholder groups within one open source software (OSS) project influence the project's development over time.

The authors conducted a case study of OpenSimulator using textual and thematic analyses of the initial four years of OpenSimulator developer mailing list to identify each stakeholder group and guide our analysis of their interests and value creation activities over time.

The analysis revealed that while each stakeholder group was active within the OSS project's development, the different groups possessed complementary interests that enabled the project to evolve. In the formative period, entrepreneurs were interested in the software's strategic direction in the market, academics and SMEs in software functionality and large firms and hobbyists in software testing. Each group retained its primary interest in the maturing period with academics and SMEs separating into server- and client-side usability. The analysis shed light on how the different stakeholder groups overcame tensions amongst themselves and took specific actions to sustain the project.

The authors extend stakeholder theory by reconceptualizing the focal organization and its stakeholders for OSS projects. To date, OSS research has primarily focused on examining one project relative to its marketplace. Using stakeholder theory, we identified stakeholder groups within a single OSS project to demonstrate their distinct interests and how these interests influence their value creation activities over time. Collectively, these interests enable the project's long-term development.

This study aims to investigate the effect of risk tolerance on the individual choice of adopting Bitcoin in the form of making and receiving payment and receiving compensation.

The study uses data collected from an anonymous survey of 225 undergraduate and graduate students to measure their risk attitude using the general risk-taking propensity scale proposed by Zhang et al. (2018) and the risk-taking index, proposed by Nicholson et al. (2018). After controlling for a variety of personal traits, the study uses logistic regression to identify the predicted probabilities and marginal effects on individual choice of adopting Bitcoin.

The findings of this study suggest that individuals with a higher risk-seeking attitude are more likely to choose to receive payment for goods they sell in Bitcoin and more likely to choose to receive a portion of their compensation in cryptocurrency. Individuals in the higher-income groups are more likely to adopt Bitcoin 46% and 65% than their lower 14% and 45% and middle income 4% and 18% counterparts. While there was no statistically significant difference between males and females in adopting Bitcoin, respondents between the age of 26 and 29 were more likely to adopt Bitcoin. The effect on receiving gold was slightly smaller but highly comparable to that of receiving Bitcoin, which highlights a similar perception of risk toward the Bitcoin and gold.

The study uses a new data set collected by surveying 225 individuals and two different risk measurements to identify the relationship between perceived risk and Bitcoin adoption.