Social software challenges strategic thinking in important ways: empowering creative, independent individuals implies indeterminate and uncertain reactions and creations in support of, or in opposition to, management's original thinking. We build a framework that organizes research on social software, taking perspectives from both inside and outside companies. We use this framework to introduce the contributions to this special issue in terms of strategy, technology, and community and to ask a series of questions for strategy research that pays particular attention to value creation and appropriation, the role of technology both as tool and mediator between managers and users, and the role that management can play in communities, both as leaders and in shaping boundaries. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.