Why it matters
It gives democratic organizations a warning: participation can become unequal as groups grow unless governance is intentionally designed.
Best for
Researchers and operators studying the risks of informal power in large peer-led communities.
The linked free arXiv manuscript is version 1, submitted June 30, 2014. The same study was peer reviewed and published earlier that year in the Journal of Communication, volume 64, issue 2, pages 215–238 (DOI 10.1111/jcom.12082), so it should not be treated as unpublished research.
The study tests participation and leadership patterns across 683 wikis and challenges the assumption that open contribution prevents concentrated influence. Its observational evidence is about a particular population of peer-production communities; it identifies a scaling risk rather than proving that every democratic organization becomes oligarchic or prescribing one governance solution.
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