BOUNDARY OBJECTS IN OPEN SOURCE DESIGN: EXPERIENCES FROM OSE COMMUNITY

The open source design (OSD) is an autonomous community dedicated to design new products, peer-to-peer, and with intellectual property copyleft. Boundary Objects (BOs) are objects to aid on the collaboration and they are used as mediators between the proposals and the repertory of each team member. This concept is consolidated on the tangible world of participatory design, but what about the digital world? How the BO had been used in Open Source Design Communities? This study aimed to investigate this aspect in a specific community named Open Source Ecology (OSE). An exploratory research was realized to identify the OSE Design Phases and the main types of boundary objects used, as well the limitations of their utilization. The results identify a gap: the members of OSE indicate low usage of Boundary Objects but considered them as essential for collaboration. The low usage was justified by complexity. The creation of prototypes or mock-ups would require more design skills than is possible for regular user; finally, the study demonstrates an indication that the proposition and use of specific BOs for OSE is a theme that must be addressed by the design management community.