Obviously bullshit, freenode is older than your company, and when it was founded you were not even known. The IRC network freenode was ran by, managed by, developed by and loved by volunteers. You came in like a wrecking ball and destroyed it.

Thank you, self-proclaimed saviour of IRC, for your continuing efforts in destroying it. Fortunately money doesn't buy you communities and doesn't buy you people, so compared to some proprietary solutions and companies, we can and will survive. Your freshly acquired toy, on the other hand, probably won't.

Who, exactly, is "management" here? And in what, exact specific, ways are they involved in freenode operations?

As I said in another comment, the core of freenode is its servers and operators, both of whom have no real ties to freenode limited as they consist of sponsored servers and volunteers, respectively. By that nature alone, freenode limited doesn't seem to have any influence over either aside from owning the name and trademarks.

So who exactly is "management" and what role do they have in the freenode network?

So, how many servers loaned to you by other parties have revoked those loans.... besides the email server you're whining about?

How much of your network is actually left standing and operational after what? two days?

Over ten thousand channels have been recreated on the network that is the successor to yours... in one day.

How does that leave you feeling?

Really? Can you prove that? I've been on freenode since almost 18 years and there was no management, every head of staff after Lilo (so, Christel) was appointed by the staff, just like tomaw was.

This is also simply untrue.