We didn’t “hate” proprietary code (it often came off that way, I’ll admit). We did think it was morally wrong to make money off it. We thought it was like patenting the Pythagorean theorem.

So really, you think “building things in general” required . . . what? Calm acceptance of restrictive licensing and software patents? Or maybe we should have been nicer about it? Again, it’s like “building things” must be properly done the way we currently do it. With lots of lawyers and lots of EULAs.

This strikes me as a profoundly conservative position. How rude those Jacobins were! If only they were more polite. If only they had recognized that we live in the best of all possible worlds . . .