As an aside, this is one of the least charitable ways you could have responded to that comment. It's probably why you're getting downvoted. This is why what you wrote is dismissive:

1. They quoted the portion of your comment relevant to their response,

2. They explained in a straightforward and neutral way why what you said in the quoted portion doesn't really make sense,

3. You responded without any specifics about what you're not following,

4. You assumed they simply failed to understand you.

Now, I think the part you didn't follow is this: you tried to preempt noncompete "apologists" working at large tech companies in California. However as a rule, such companies generally do not (and cannot) rely on noncompetes, which means what you're saying isn't applicable. Further, the merits of your original point notwithstanding, it's also kind of dismissive to call those on the other side of the argument "apologists" in the way you did.

The part where trying to enforce a non-compete in California will get you laughed (literally!) out of a lawyers office.

Unless the employee in question is unable to use Google and search for "non compete california", which, I'd hope every tech worker is able to use Google, the zeroth (meaning, it's right on the search results page, and not a link away, it states "In the state of California, non-compete agreements that seek to prohibit employees from obtaining gainful employment are null and void."

The Silicon Valley companies you railed against for abusing noncompete agreements don't actually use noncompete agreements.

I've never been asked to sign a noncompete when working in California for any company, including Google. I have not worked at the others so I can't say what their practices are, but most CA-based companies will never even try to get you to sign a non-compete agreement because they know it cannot be enforced.

The response has now been edited and explains more fully as a result of that. Just FYI. Charitable, yes. We should all be more so.