Stigmergy-Based Construction of Internetware Artifacts

A proposed approach supports the continual construction and evolution of model-based Internetware artifacts by a collective of Internet-connected stakeholders. The key mechanism is incremental graph superimposition (IGS), a refinement of stigmergy, the process that produces collective intelligence in social insects. Employing IGS, a collective of individuals collaboratively and continually construct a collective-level graph by incrementally aggregating the individuals' working results. Each individual can work independently without direct interaction with others, facilitating mass collaboration among a large number of individuals. A conceptual model illustrates the effects of IGS. A Web environment supports IGS-based conceptual-model construction and ongoing case studies. © 1984-2012 IEEE.