Year: 2008
Type: article
Abstract: Zipf's power law is a ubiquitous empirical regularity found in many systems, thought to result from proportional growth. Here, we establish empirically the usually assumed ingredients of stochastic growth models that have been previously conjectured to be at the origin of Zipf's law. We use exceptionally detailed data on the evolution of open source software projects in Linux distributions, which offer a remarkable example of a growing complex self-organizing adaptive system, exhibiting Zipf's law over four full decades.
Source: Physical Review Letters
Authors: T. Maillart, D. Sornette, S. Spaeth, G. von Krogh
Institution: ETH Zurich
Language: English
Subfield: Economics and Econometrics
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W1990768402