Academic Work

I study online communities and seek to understand the social dynamics that drive collaborative production of digital public goods like Wikipedia and Linux. I am particularly interested in how the design of communication and information technologies shape fundamental social outcomes with broad theoretical and practical implications—like the decision to join or leave a community or to engage in collective action. My research is deeply interdisciplinary, consists primarily of "big data" quantitative analyses, and lies at the intersection of communication, human-computer interaction, and sociology.

I am an Associate Professor in the University of Washington Department of Communication and an Adjunct Associate Professor in the Department of Human-Centered Design & Engineering, the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering, and the Information School. I am a member of Community Data Science Collective which I founded with Aaron Shaw. At UW, I am also Affiliate Faculty in the Center for Statistics and the Social Sciences, the eScience Institute, and the "Design Use Build" (DUB) group that supports research on on human computer interaction. I am also a Faculty Associate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University and an affiliate of the Institute for Quantitative Social Science at Harvard.

I received my PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in an interdepartmental program involving the MIT Sloan School of Management and the MIT Media Lab. My dissertation research was advised by Eric von Hippel, Yochai Benkler, Tom Malone and Mitch Resnick.

Articles in Journals & Conference Proceedings[?]

Book Chapters

  • Dasgupta, Sayamindu, and Benjamin Mako Hill. 2023. “Designing for Critical Algorithmic Literacies.” In Algorithmic Rights and Protections for Children, edited by Mizuko Ito, Remy Cross, Karthik Dinakar, and Candice Odgers, 59–84. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. [Book Homepage] [Preprint/Draft (MIT Press WIP)] [Preprint (Arxiv)]
  • Dasgupta, Sayamindu, Benjamin Mako Hill, and Andrés Monroy-Hernández. 2020. “Engaging Learners in Constructing Constructionist Environments.” In Designing Constructionist Futures: The Art, Theory, and Practice of Learning Designs, edited by Nathan Holbert, Matthew Berland, and Yasmin Kafai. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. [Preprint/Draft] [Book Homepage]
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako, and Aaron Shaw. 2020. “The Most Important Laboratory for Social Scientific and Computing Research in History.” In Wikipedia @ 20: Stories of an Incomplete Revolution, edited by Joseph M. Jr. Reagle and Jackie L. Koerner, 159–74. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. [Book Homepage] [Preprint HTML] [Draft (MIT Press)]
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako, and Aaron Shaw. 2020. “Studying Populations of Online Communities.” In The Oxford Handbook of Networked Communication, edited by Brooke Foucault Welles and Sandra González-Bailón, 174–93. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190460518.013.8. [Official Link $] [Preprint/Draft PDF]
  • Foote, Jeremy D., Aaron Shaw, and Benjamin Mako Hill. 2017. “Computational Insights Into Computational Social Science of Social Media.” In SAGE Handbook of Social Media. London, UK: SAGE Publications. [Preprint/Draft PDF] [Dataset and Software] (Press: Boing Boing)
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako, Dharma Dailey, Richard T. Guy, Ben Lewis, Mika Matsuzaki, and Jonathan T. Morgan. 2017. “Democratizing Data Science: The Community Data Science Workshops and Classes.” In Big Data Factories: Collaborative Approaches, 115–35. Computational Social Sciences. Berlin, Germany: Springer Nature. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-59186-5_9. [Official Link Open Access] [Preprint/Draft PDF]
  • Benkler, Yochai, Aaron Shaw, and Benjamin Mako Hill. 2015. “Peer Production: A Form of Collective Intelligence.” In Handbook of Collective Intelligence, edited by Thomas Malone and Michael Bernstein, 175–204. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press. [Preprint PDF] [Book Homepage]
  • Buechley, Leah, Jennifer Jacobs, and Benjamin Mako Hill. 2013. “Lilypad in the Wild: Technology DIY, E-Textiles, and Gender.” In Textile Messages: Dispatches From the World of E-Textiles and Education, edited by Leah Buechley, Kylie Peppler, Michael Eisenberg, and Yasmin Kafai, 147–57. New York, New York: Peter Lang Publishing. (Based, in part, on the 2010 article.) [PDF (Scans)]
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako. 2014. “Freedom for Users, Not for Software.” In The Wealth of the Commons: A World Beyond Market and State, edited by David Bollier and Silke Helfrich, 305–8. Amherst, Massachusetts: Levellers Press. (Book published in German as Commons: Für eine neue Politik Jenseits von Markt und Staat.) [ Official Link Open Access] [Preprint HTML]
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako. 2010. “Revealing Errors.” In Error: Glitch, Noise, and Jam in New Media Cultures, edited by Mark Nunes, 27–41. New York, New York: Bloomsbury Academic. (An expanded version of the 2007 journal article.) [Book Homepage] [PDF (Scans)]
  • Coleman, E. Gabriella, and Benjamin Mako Hill. 2004. “The Social Production of Ethics in Debian and Free Software Communities: Anthropological Lessons for Vocational Ethics.” In Free/Open Source Software Development, edited by Stefan Koch, 273–95. Hershey, Pennsylvania: Idea Group Inc. (IGI). [Book Homepage] [PDF (Scans)]

Working Papers

These papers are in various stages of preparation, review, and revision. Please do not cite or quote these papers without my permission. Contact me for copies of any papers that are listed here but are not linked directly from this page.

  • Hill, Benjamin Mako. 2013. “Almost Wikipedia: What Eight Early Online Collaborative Encyclopedia Projects Reveal about the Mechanisms of Collective Action.” In Essays on Volunteer Mobilization in Peer Production. Ph.D. dissertation, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. [Draft PDF] [Abstract & Video] (Press: Neiman Journalism Lab, Washington Post)

Other Scholarly Publications

  • [Poster and Extended Abstract] Kiene, Charles, and Benjamin Mako Hill. 2020. “Who Uses Bots? A Statistical Analysis of Bot Usage in Moderation Teams.” In Extended Abstracts of the 2020 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI EA ’20), 1–8. New York, New York: ACM Press. https://doi.org/10.1145/3334480.3382960. [Official Link (Extended Abstract) ACM Authorizer] [Extended Abstract PDF]
  • [Poster and Extended Abstract] TeBlunthuis, Nathan, Aaron Shaw, and Benjamin Mako Hill. 2017. “Density Dependence Without Resource Partitioning: Population Ecology on Change.Org.” In Companion of the 2017 ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW ’17 Companion), 323–326. New York, New York: ACM. https://doi.org/10.1145/3022198.3026358. [Official Link (Extended Abstract) Open Access]
  • [Poster and Extended Abstract] Dasgupta, Sayamindu, and Benjamin Mako Hill. 2017. “Measuring Learning of Code Patterns in Informal Learning Environments.” In Proceedings of the 2017 ACM SIGCSE Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE ’17), 706–706. New York, New York: ACM. https://doi.org/10.1145/3017680.3022437. [Official Link Open Access] [Poster PDF]
  • [Workshop Position Paper] Dasgupta, Sayamindu, and Benjamin Mako Hill. 2016. “Learning With Data: Designing for Community Introspection and Exploration.” In Workshop on Human-Centered Data Science. Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW '16). San Francisco, California. [PDF]
  • [Section Introduction; Section Co-Editor] Hill, Benjamin Mako, and Seth Schoen. 2016. “Free Culture: Introduction.” In The Boy Who Could Change the World: The Writings of Aaron Swartz, 7–9. New York, New York: The New Press. [HTML Open Access] (Press: Truthout)
  • [Invited Article] Shaw, Aaron, Haoqi Zhang, Andrés Monroy-Hernández, Sean Munson, Benjamin Mako Hill, Elizabeth Gerber, Peter Kinnaird, and Patrick Minder. 2014. “Computer Supported Collective Action.” Interactions 21 (2): 74–77. https://doi.org/10.1145/2576875. [Official Link ACM Authorizer] [Preprint PDF]
  • [Panel and Extended Abstract] Bernstein, Michael, Michael Conover, Benjamin Mako Hill, Andres Monroy-Hernandez, Brian Keegan, Aaron Shaw, Sarita Yardi, R. Stuart Geiger, and Amy Bruckman. 2012. “Fail Whaling: Designing from Deviance and Failures in Social Computing.” In CHI ’12 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI EA ’12), 1127–1130. New York, New York: ACM. https://doi.org/10.1145/2212776.2212403. [Official Link Open Access]
  • [Interactive Poster] Monroy-Hernández, Andrés, and Benjamin Mako Hill. 2010. “Cooperation and Attribution in an Online Community of Young Creators.” Interactive Poster presented at the Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW ’10), Savannah, Georgia. [Abstract PDF Open Access]
  • [Panel and Extended Abstract] Morell, Mayo Fuster, and Benjamin Mako Hill. 2010. “Reviewing and Challenging Socio-Political Approaches in the Analysis of Open Collaboration and Collective Action Online.” In Proceedings of the 6th International Symposium on Wikis and Open Collaboration (WikiSym ’10), 1–2. New York, New York: ACM. https://doi.org/10.1145/1832772.1832808. [Official Link Open Access]
  • [Book review] Hill, Benjamin Mako. 2008. “Samir Chopra, Scott D. Dexter, Decoding Liberation: The Promise of Free and Open Source Software.” Minds and Machines 18 (2): 297–99. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11023-008-9101-y. [Official Link $] [Preprint PDF]
  • [Review] Hill, Benjamin Mako. 2005. “Reflections on Free Software Past and Future.” First Monday 10 (10). https://doi.org/10.5210/fm.v0i0.1468. [Official Link Open Access]

Datasets and Code

Theses

  • [Ph.D. Dissertation] Hill, Benjamin Mako. 2013. “Essays on Volunteer Mobilization in Peer Production.” Ph.D. Dissertation, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Advised by Eric von Hippel, Yochai Benkler, Tom Malone and Mitch Resnick. Published as papers: (1) "Almost Wikipedia"; (2) "The Remixing Dilemma"; "Laboratories of Oligarchy" all available on this page. (Recipient of Dordick Award for Best Dissertation from the Communication and Technology Division of the International Communication Association.)
  • [S.M. Thesis] Hill, Benjamin Mako 2007. “Cooperation in Parallel: A Tool for Supporting Collaborative Writing in Diverged Documents.” Masters Thesis, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Program in Media Arts and Sciences. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/41740. Advised by Walter Bender, Chris Csikszentmihályi, and Gabriella Coleman. [PDF Open Access]
  • [B.A. Thesis] Hill, Benjamin Mako. 2003. “Literary Collaboration and Control: A Socio-Historic, Technological and Legal Analysis.” Bachelors Thesis, Amherst, Massachusetts: Hampshire College. Advised by James Miller, James Wald, and David Bollier. [Link Open Access]

Refereed Paper Presentations (Non-Archival)

Presenters are marked with a “*” in the list below

  • TeBlunthuis Nathan*, Benjamin Mako Hill, and Aaron Halfaker. “Algorithmic flags and Identity-Based Signals in Online Community Moderation.” Session on Social Media 2. International Conference on Computational Social Science (IC2S2 2020), July 19, 2020.
  • TeBlunthuis Nathan*, Aaron Shaw, Benjamin Mako Hill. “The Population Ecology of Online Collective Action.” Session on Culture and Fairness. International Conference on Computational Social Science (IC2S2 2020), July 19, 2020.
  • TeBlunthuis Nathan*, Aaron Shaw, and Benjamin Mako Hill. “The Population Ecology of Online Collective Action.” Session on Collective Action, ACM Conference on Collective Intelligence (CI 2020), June 18, 2020.
  • Champion, Kaylea*, and Benjamin Mako Hill. “Writing What They Don’t Read? Production Misalignment in Wikipedia.” Session on Digital Traces and Online Communities. Join Session with Computational Methods and Communication and Technology. International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2020), May 20-26, 2020.
  • Narayan, Sneha, Nathan E. TeBlunthuis*, Wm Salt Hale, Benjamin Mako Hill, and Aaron Shaw. “More Connected But Not More Productive: Analyzing Support for Interpersonal Communication in Wikis.” Session on Computational Approaches to Health Communication. Computational Methods, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2019), Washington, DC, May 27, 2019.
  • Foote, Jeremy D*, Benjamin Mako Hill, and Nathan TeBlunthuis. “An agent-based model of online community joining.” Organizational Communication Mini-Conference (OCMC). New Brunswick, NJ, October 5, 2018.
  • Dasgupta, Sayamindu and Benjamin Mako Hill*. “How `Wide Walls' Can Increase Engagement: Evidence from a Natural Experiment in Scratch.” Session on Online Platforms and Experiments. International Conference on Computational Social Science (IC2S2 2018), Evanston, Illinois, July 15, 2018.
  • Foote, Jeremy D.*, Benjamin Mako Hill, and Nathan TeBlunthuis. “An Agent-Based Model of Online Community Joining.” Session on Collective Behavior. International Conference on Computational Social Science (IC2S2 2018), Evanston, Illinois, July 14, 2018.
  • Shaw, Aaron and Benjamin Mako Hill*. “Theory Building Beyond Communities: Population-Level Research.” Session on Communication in the Networked Age: A Discussion of Theory Building through Data-Driven Research. Computational Methods, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2018), Prague, Czechia, May 28, 2018.
  • Foote, Jeremy D.* and Benjamin Mako Hill. “An Agent-Based Model of Online Community Joining.” Session on Agent-based Modeling for Communication Research. Computational Methods, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2018), Prague, Czechia, May 25, 2018.
  • TeBlunthuis, Nathan*, Aaron Shaw, and Benjamin Mako Hill. “Revisiting ‘The Rise and Decline’ in a Population of Peer Production Projects.” Information Systems, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2018), Prague, Czechia, May 25, 2018.
  • Gan, Emilia F.*, Sayamindu Dasgupta and Benjamin Mako Hill. “Gender Differences in Patterns of Project Sharing on the Scratch Online Programming Community.” Session on Cultivating Computational Thinking: Developing Computational Identities Through Scratch and Apps. Digital Media and Learning (DML 2017), University of California, Irvine, October 6, 2017.
  • TeBlunthuis, Nathan∗, Benjamin Mako Hill and Aaron Shaw. “Density Dependence Without Resource Partitioning: A Population Ecology of Change.org.” Session on Computational Methods for Studying Political Communication, Computational Methods, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2017), San Diego, California, May 29, 2017.
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako and Aaron Shaw∗. “The Hidden Costs of Requiring Accounts Online: Quasiexperimental Evidence From Peer Production.” Session on Semantics and Structure of Online Communication, Computational Methods, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2017), San Diego, California, May 27, 2017.
  • Dasgupta, Sayamindu and Benjamin Mako Hill∗. “Learning to Code in Localized Programming Languages.” Session on Technology and Learning, Instructional & Developmental Communication, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2017), San Diego, California, May 26, 2017.
  • TeBlunthuis, Nathan*, Benjamin Mako Hill and Aaron Shaw. “Resource Partitioning and Density Dependence on a Digital Mobilization Platform.” Internet, Politics, and Policy Conference (IPP 2016), Oxford University, Oxford, UK, September 23, 2016.
  • TeBlunthuis, Nathan*, Benjamin Mako Hill and Aaron Shaw. “Resource Partitioning and Density Dependence on a Digital Mobilization Platform.” Section on Communication, Information Technology, and Media Sociology, American Sociological Association Annual Meeting (ASA 2016), Seattle, Washington, August 23, 2016.
  • Foote, Jeremy D.*, Aaron Shaw and Benjamin Mako Hill. “Wikis and Work Groups: A Social Network Approach to Predicting Community Growth.” Section on Organizations, Occupations, and Work, American Sociological Association Annual Meeting (ASA 2016), Seattle, Washington, August 22, 2016.
  • Narayan, Sneha*, Jake Orlowitz, Jonathan Morgan, Benjamin Mako Hill and Aaron Shaw. “The Wikipedia Adventure: A Field Experiment Evaluating an Interactive Tutorial for Newcomers.” Session on Exploring Online Communities, Communication and Technology, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2016), Fukuoka, Japan, June 13, 2016.
  • Shorey, Samantha*, Samuel Woolley and Benjamin Mako Hill. “From Hanging Out to Geeking Out: Socializing as a Pathway to Computational Thinking.” Session on Learning and Thinking Through/With/By Media, Children, Adolescents and the Media, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2016), Fukuoka, Japan, June 11, 2016.
  • Foote, Jeremy D.*, Aaron Shaw and Benjamin Mako Hill. “Wikis and Work Groups: A Social Network Approach to Predicting Community Growth.” Session on B.E.S.T.: Social and Collaborative Technologies in Organizational Communication, Organizational Communication, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2016), Fukuoka, Japan, June 10, 2016.
  • Shaw, Aaron* and Benjamin Mako Hill. “Learning from Populations of Online Organizations.” Communication Science in the Digital Age Pre-Conference Workshop, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2015), San Juan, Puerto Rico, June 7, 2015.
  • Shaw, Aaron* and Benjamin Mako Hill. “Learning from Populations of Online Organizations.” Computational Approaches to Advance Communication Research Pre-Conference Workshop, International Communication Association Annual Meeting (ICA 2015), San Juan, Puerto Rico, June 6, 2015.
  • Foote, Jeremy D.*, Aaron Shaw and Benjamin Mako Hill. “Social structures of productive online volunteer communities.” International Network for Social Network Analysis Conference (“Sunbelt”), Newport Beach, CA, April 9, 2016.
  • Shaw, Aaron* and Benjamin Mako Hill. “Learning from Populations of Online Organizations.” Computational Social Science Summit (CSSS), Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, May, 2015.
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako* and Aaron Shaw*. “Laboratories Of Oligarchy? How the Iron Law Extends to Peer Production.” Collective Intelligence Conference (CI 2014), MIT, Cambridge, date: invalid date ‘Massachusetts, June 1, 2014.
  • Zhang, Haoqi*, Andrés Monroy-Hernández, Aaron Shaw, Sean A. Munson, Elizabeth Gerber, Peter Kinnaird, Shelly D. Farnham, and Patrick Minder. “WeDo: End-To-End Computer Supported Collective Action.” Collective Intelligence Conference (CI 2014), MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts, June , 2014.
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako* and Aaron Shaw*. “Laboratories Of Oligarchy? How the Iron Law Extends to Peer Production.” Online Collective Action Working Group, ECPR, Mainz, Germany, March 13, 2013.
  • Shaw, Aaron* and Benjamin Mako Hill. “Laboratories of Oligarchy? How the Iron Law Extends to Peer Production.” Annual Midwest Political Science Association Conference (MPSA 2014), Chicago, Illinois, April, 2014.
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako*. “Almost Wikipedia: What Eight Early Online Collaborative Encyclopedia Projects Reveal About the Mechanisms Of Collective Action.” Open and User Innovation Workshop (OUI 2014), Harvard Business School, Cambridge, Massachusetts, July 31, 2012.
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako*, Aaron Shaw*, and Yochai Benkler.“Status, Social Signaling and Collective Action in a Peer Production Community.” American Sociological Association Annual Meeting (ASA 2012), Denver, Colorado, August 17, 2012.
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako*, Aaron Shaw, and Yochai Benkler. “Status, Social Signaling and Collective Action in a Peer Production Community.” Open and User Innovation Workshop (OUI 2011), Vienna, Austria, June 5, 2011.
  • Hill, Benjamin Mako*. “Causal Effects of a Reputation-Based Incentive in a Peer Production Community.” Open and User Innovation Workshop (OUI 2010), MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts, October 2, 2010.

Grants

Other

  • Interdepartmental Degree Proposal (PDF): At MIT, I'm enrolled in an interdepartmental PhD program that involves faculty from both the MIT Sloan School of Management and the MIT Media Lab. The proposal lists the faculty and requirements of my program and lays out the justification, very broadly, of what my degree is about. I wrote this proposal with members of the MIT faculty and had it approved by both departments and the Dean of Graduate Students. The program is overseen by Professors Eric von Hippel, Tom Malone, and Mitch Resnick.
  • General Exams: As part of my PhD program, I had to organize and take a series of examinations that tested my knowledge in three academic areas: (1) technological innovation, entrepreneurship, and strategy with an added emphasis on the study of open and user innovation, (2) organizational and economic sociology and (3) technology design for cooperation, community, and creativity. I created a page for these that includes the proposal, reading list, link to notes, and links to the exam questions and my answers. The generals committee included Eric von Hippel, Jason Davis, and Mitch Resnick
  • Open and User Innovation Conference: I coordinated the program, handled communication, and acted as master of ceremonies for, both the 8th Annual Open and User Innovation conference held at MIT Sloan School of Management on August 2-4, 2010 and the 10th Annual conference held at Harvard Business School. Each conference had 150+ talks and 7 parallel tracks with presentations from researchers from North America, Asia, and Europe.
  • AcaWiki: AcaWiki is a wiki that hosts summaries of academic articles and books. I have written several hundred summaries of scholarly articles and books which I've shared on the site. When time permits, I try to continue summaries of articles that I read in my course of my research.
  • If you like the layout of my curriculum vitæ, thanks go to Kieran Healy for the typographical inspiration. If you'd like to use it yourself, you can help yourself to the LaTeX source code.
© 1999-2023 Benjamin Mako Hill || Last modified: Thu Oct 5 21:17:50 2023