{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,2]],"date-time":"2025-08-02T17:28:02Z","timestamp":1754155682316,"version":"3.41.2"},"reference-count":57,"publisher":"Emerald","issue":"2","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2017,6,5]],"date-time":"2017-06-05T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1496620800000},"content-version":"tdm","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/www.emerald.com\/insight\/site-policies"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["ITP"],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2017,6,5]]},"abstract":"<jats:sec>\n<jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Purpose<\/jats:title>\n<jats:p>The idea of \u201cbest practice\u201d is very much built into information systems and the ways in which they organise and structure work. The purpose of this paper is to examine how \u201cbest practice\u201d may be identified (produced) through a community-based evaluation process as opposed to traditional expert-based evaluation frameworks. The paper poses the following research questions: how does \u201cbest practice\u201d (e)valuation in online communities differ depending on whether they are produced by community members or experts? And what role play these two practices of valuation for online community performance?<\/jats:p>\n<\/jats:sec>\n<jats:sec>\n<jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Design\/methodology\/approach<\/jats:title>\n<jats:p>The paper is based on a three-year ethnographic study of a large-scale online community initiative run by the European Commission. Participant observation of online and offline activities (23 events) was complemented with 73 semi-structured interviews with 58 interviewees. The paper draws on Science and Technology Studies, and in particular actor-network theory.<\/jats:p>\n<\/jats:sec>\n<jats:sec>\n<jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Findings<\/jats:title>\n<jats:p>Promoting the idea of \u201cbest practice\u201d is not just an exercise about determining what \u201cbest\u201d is but rather supposes that best is something that can travel across sites and be replicated. The paper argues that it is crucial to understand the work performed to coordinate multiple practices of producing \u201cbest practice\u201d as apparatuses of valuation. Hence if practices are shared or circulate within an online community, this is possible because of material-discursive practices of dissociation and association, through agential cuts. These cuts demarcate what is important \u2013 and foregrounded \u2013 and what is backgrounded. In so doing new \u201cpractice objects\u201d are produced.<\/jats:p>\n<\/jats:sec>\n<jats:sec>\n<jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Research limitations\/implications<\/jats:title>\n<jats:p>The research was conducted in the European public sector where participants are not associated through shared organisational membership (e.g. as employees of the same organisation). An environment for determining \u201cbest practice\u201d that is limited to an organisation\u2019s employees and more homogeneous may reveal further dynamics for \u201cbest practice\u201d production.<\/jats:p>\n<\/jats:sec>\n<jats:sec>\n<jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Practical implications<\/jats:title>\n<jats:p>This paper sheds light on why it is so difficult to reach commensuration in crowd-sourced environments.<\/jats:p>\n<\/jats:sec>\n<jats:sec>\n<jats:title content-type=\"abstract-subheading\">Originality\/value<\/jats:title>\n<jats:p>The paper provides an analysis of how online community members collaborate in order to identify relevant and meaningful user-generated content. It argues that \u201cbest practice\u201d is produced through a process of commensuration.<\/jats:p>\n<\/jats:sec>","DOI":"10.1108\/itp-03-2015-0046","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2017,4,20]],"date-time":"2017-04-20T07:22:55Z","timestamp":1492672975000},"page":"371-395","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":2,"title":["Community-based evaluation in online communities"],"prefix":"10.1108","volume":"30","author":[{"given":"Juliane","family":"Jarke","sequence":"first","affiliation":[]}],"member":"140","reference":[{"volume-title":"Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning","year":"2007","key":"key2020120707313235700_ref001"},{"volume-title":"Critics, Ratings, and Society: The Sociology of Reviews","year":"2007","key":"key2020120707313235700_ref002"},{"issue":"2","key":"key2020120707313235700_ref003","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"47","DOI":"10.1162\/152417302762251336","article-title":"Community knowledge sharing in practice: the Eureka story","volume":"4","year":"2002","journal-title":"Reflections"},{"volume-title":"On Justification: Economies of Worth. 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