We assess whether communities displaying network markers of coordination and social integration are more productive and long-lasting. In this article, we measure communication networks for 999 early-stage peer production wikis. We hypothesize that the conditions in which new peer production communities operate make communication problems common and make coordination and integration more difficult, and that variation in the structure of project communication networks will predict project success. In work groups and teams, coordination and social integration-manifested via dense, integrative communication networks-predict success.
Although peer production has created valuable information goods like Wikipedia, the GNU/Linux operating system, and Reddit, the majority of attempts at peer production achieve very little.
