KNOWLEDGE COPRODUCTION IN DISCOGS MUSIC DATABASE : A study of the motivations behind a crowdsourced online discography

Abstract: Discogs  is  a crowdsourced  online  discography  that  has  become  one  the  largest music databases   and   marketplace   used   by   collectors   and   enthusiasts. To   learn   about   what motivates Discogs community users to contribute, the answers provided by the respondents(n=135)   to an   online   survey with   Likert-scaled   items   measuring different types   of motivations  and  some  open-ended  questions were analysed.  The  results  suggested that Discogs contributors are primarily driven by altruistic reasons (intrinsic motivation) followed by  pragmatism  (extrinsic  motivation).   While  sellers  contributed to  the  database mostly  to sell in the Marketplace, they were equally motivated by intrinsic factors, with similar rates to respondents who  did  not  have  economic  interests  in  the  website. Open-ended  questions indicated  that  conflicts  with  other  users  could  decrease  the  motivation  to  contribute.  In addition,   respondents   revealed   that during   their   trajectory   ascontributors,   intrinsic motivation increased over time. Also, experience and expertise were the reasons why some contributors had roles recognised by other members in the Discogs community