> The problem is that "software" and "mathematical algorithm" are two terms for the same thing.

The Knuth quotation in the article, used in support of this position, actually seems to invalidate it in my view. "Algorithms are exactly as basic to programmers as words are to writers." The key being words. The value in a piece of literature has little to do with the individual words it's made from, just as a piece of software is clearly vastly more than the sum of its algorithmic parts.

Footnote: I mean this for multiple dimensions of 'value', not simply some measure of economic worth. Information processing and transformation ability, for one.