Rerearch on Github Contributors and LinkedIn
Hello Has anyone completed research on Github contributors? Lets say for example my hypothesis is that the contributors for a particular software project are mostly male, and very few are female. You might say this is a given, but Open Source Software production is notoriously gendered, racialized etc. there is some broad research indicating these imbalances, and I would like to try it on a software project basis to affect real change. The good news: Github provides the list of contributors, number of commits for each project. But, the contributors are listed by username, by itself not useful in determining demographics.
From the username, and some biographical details, I can probably locate most contributors on another open platform LinkedIn to determine demographics of contributors to a particular project on Github. So all analysis will be based on open and publicly available data.
Anyone done any similar analysis on Github or LinkedIn? I know identification of gender and other demographics from social media profiles is fraught with problems. But I also see many activists, doing this type of analysis to gather data on race, gender etc to shine a light on imbalances. And although the initial analysis is flawed and incomplete, the company/organizaion/project eventually responds wih substantial changes (including proper demographic surveys!). So sometimes the ends justify the initial means. Sincerely Ushnish Sengupta -- *Recent Book Chapters:* Monoculturalism, Aculturalism, and Postculturalism: The Exclusionary Culture of Algorithmic Development <https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3621779> Business Process Transformation in Natural Resources Development Using Blockchain: Indigenous Entrepreneurship, Trustless Technology, and Rebuilding Trust <https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783030443368> *White Papers:* Meeting Changing Customer Requirements in Food andAgriculture Through Application of Blockchain Technology <https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3429200> Business in the Front, Crypto in the Back: How to Be a Blockchain Startup in Fintech <https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3423179> *Key Articles:* The Future of Social Economy Leadership and Organizational Composition in Canada: Demand from Demographics, and Difference through Diversity <http://interventionseconomiques.revues.org/2794> Indigenous Cooperatives in Canada: The Complex Relationship Between Cooperatives, Community Economic Development,Colonization, and Culture <http://www.jeodonline.com/sites/jeodonline.com/files/articles/2015/08/13/6sengupta13aug2015.pdf> Indigenous Communities and Social Enterprise in Canada:Incorporating Culture as an Essential Ingredient of Entrepreneurship <http://anserj.ca/anser/index.php/cjnser/article/view/196>
I know that a lot of women use gender neutral or male names on GitHub to avoid problems, so identifying women may be difficult. Regards, Brenda
On 5 Aug 2020, at 11:13 am, Ushnish Sengupta <ushnish.sengupta@gmail.com> wrote:
Hello Has anyone completed research on Github contributors?
Lets say for example my hypothesis is that the contributors for a particular software project are mostly male, and very few are female. You might say this is a given, but Open Source Software production is notoriously gendered, racialized etc. there is some broad research indicating these imbalances, and I would like to try it on a software project basis to affect real change.
The good news: Github provides the list of contributors, number of commits for each project. But, the contributors are listed by username, by itself not useful in determining demographics. From the username, and some biographical details, I can probably locate most contributors on another open platform LinkedIn to determine demographics of contributors to a particular project on Github. So all analysis will be based on open and publicly available data.
Anyone done any similar analysis on Github or LinkedIn?
I know identification of gender and other demographics from social media profiles is fraught with problems. But I also see many activists, doing this type of analysis to gather data on race, gender etc to shine a light on imbalances. And although the initial analysis is flawed and incomplete, the company/organizaion/project eventually responds wih substantial changes (including proper demographic surveys!). So sometimes the ends justify the initial means.
Sincerely Ushnish Sengupta
-- *Recent Book Chapters:* Monoculturalism, Aculturalism, and Postculturalism: The Exclusionary Culture of Algorithmic Development <https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3621779>
Business Process Transformation in Natural Resources Development Using Blockchain: Indigenous Entrepreneurship, Trustless Technology, and Rebuilding Trust <https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783030443368>
*White Papers:*
Meeting Changing Customer Requirements in Food andAgriculture Through Application of Blockchain Technology <https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3429200>
Business in the Front, Crypto in the Back: How to Be a Blockchain Startup in Fintech <https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3423179>
*Key Articles:*
The Future of Social Economy Leadership and Organizational Composition in Canada: Demand from Demographics, and Difference through Diversity <http://interventionseconomiques.revues.org/2794>
Indigenous Cooperatives in Canada: The Complex Relationship Between Cooperatives, Community Economic Development,Colonization, and Culture <http://www.jeodonline.com/sites/jeodonline.com/files/articles/2015/08/13/6sengupta13aug2015.pdf>
Indigenous Communities and Social Enterprise in Canada:Incorporating Culture as an Essential Ingredient of Entrepreneurship <http://anserj.ca/anser/index.php/cjnser/article/view/196> _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
Check out the work of Sian Brooke on gender on Stack overflow. https://www.aclweb.org/anthology/W19-3519/ Her PhD looks at gender on Github and is not public yet, but also well worth the read. https://www.sianbrooke.co.uk/ Kind regards, -- Corinne Cath - Speth Ph.D. Candidate, Oxford Internet Institute & Alan Turing Institute Web: www.oii.ox.ac.uk/people/corinne-cath Email: ccath@turing.ac.uk & corinnecath@gmail.com Twitter: @C_CS On Wed, Aug 5, 2020 at 7:33 AM Brenda Moon <brenda@moon.net.au> wrote:
I know that a lot of women use gender neutral or male names on GitHub to avoid problems, so identifying women may be difficult.
Regards,
Brenda
On 5 Aug 2020, at 11:13 am, Ushnish Sengupta <ushnish.sengupta@gmail.com> wrote:
Hello Has anyone completed research on Github contributors?
Lets say for example my hypothesis is that the contributors for a particular software project are mostly male, and very few are female. You might say this is a given, but Open Source Software production is notoriously gendered, racialized etc. there is some broad research indicating these imbalances, and I would like to try it on a software project basis to affect real change.
The good news: Github provides the list of contributors, number of commits for each project. But, the contributors are listed by username, by itself not useful in determining demographics. From the username, and some biographical details, I can probably locate most contributors on another open platform LinkedIn to determine demographics of contributors to a particular project on Github. So all analysis will be based on open and publicly available data.
Anyone done any similar analysis on Github or LinkedIn?
I know identification of gender and other demographics from social media profiles is fraught with problems. But I also see many activists, doing this type of analysis to gather data on race, gender etc to shine a light on imbalances. And although the initial analysis is flawed and incomplete, the company/organizaion/project eventually responds wih substantial changes (including proper demographic surveys!). So sometimes the ends justify the initial means.
Sincerely Ushnish Sengupta
-- *Recent Book Chapters:* Monoculturalism, Aculturalism, and Postculturalism: The Exclusionary Culture of Algorithmic Development <https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3621779>
Business Process Transformation in Natural Resources Development Using Blockchain: Indigenous Entrepreneurship, Trustless Technology, and Rebuilding Trust <https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783030443368>
*White Papers:*
Meeting Changing Customer Requirements in Food andAgriculture Through Application of Blockchain Technology <https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3429200>
Business in the Front, Crypto in the Back: How to Be a Blockchain Startup in Fintech <https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3423179>
*Key Articles:*
The Future of Social Economy Leadership and Organizational Composition in Canada: Demand from Demographics, and Difference through Diversity <http://interventionseconomiques.revues.org/2794>
Indigenous Cooperatives in Canada: The Complex Relationship Between Cooperatives, Community Economic Development,Colonization, and Culture < http://www.jeodonline.com/sites/jeodonline.com/files/articles/2015/08/13/6se...
Indigenous Communities and Social Enterprise in Canada:Incorporating Culture as an Essential Ingredient of Entrepreneurship <http://anserj.ca/anser/index.php/cjnser/article/view/196> _______________________________________________ The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
The Air-L@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
-- Corinne Cath - Speth Ph.D. Candidate, Oxford Internet Institute & Alan Turing Institute Web: www.oii.ox.ac.uk/people/corinne-cath Email: ccath@turing.ac.uk & corinnecath@gmail.com Twitter: @C_CS
Hi Ushnish, In the Python-based tool BigBang [0] we have an experimental notebook called 'Walkers and Talkers' [1] that operationalizes an analysis about the interrelation between mailinglist activity and Github commits. There is also quite some work in BigBang on gender [2]. Jointly these analysis could help you answer your question through a quantitative approach. Best, Niels [0] http://datactive.github.io/bigbang/ [1] https://github.com/datactive/bigbang/blob/master/examples/experimental_noteb... [2] https://github.com/datactive/bigbang/tree/master/examples/name-and-gender On 8/5/20 10:31 AM, Corinne Cath wrote:
Check out the work of Sian Brooke on gender on Stack overflow. https://www.aclweb.org/anthology/W19-3519/
Her PhD looks at gender on Github and is not public yet, but also well worth the read. https://www.sianbrooke.co.uk/
Kind regards,
-- Niels ten Oever Researcher and PhD Candidate - DATACTIVE Research Group - University of Amsterdam Postdoctoral Scholar (abd) - Communications Department - Texas A&M University Research Fellow - Centre for Internet and Human Rights - European University Viadrina Associated Scholar - Centro de Tecnologia e Sociedade - Fundação Getúlio Vargas W: https://nielstenoever.net E: mail@nielstenoever.net T: @nielstenoever P/S/WA: +31629051853 PGP: 2458 0B70 5C4A FD8A 9488 643A 0ED8 3F3A 468A C8B3
participants (4)
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Brenda Moon -
Corinne Cath -
Niels ten Oever -
Ushnish Sengupta