Sarah MeiVerified account

They had 1 interesting point to make in the 80s. By the late 90s, it was showing its age. It's laughable to assert it's still relevant now.

Viewing software through the Richard Stallman/GNU/"free as in freedom" lens would have run our industry into the ground.

But it was the only alternative to proprietary software for ~20 years. So lots of folks worked on it despite finding Stallman problematic.

This was the period when women largely declined to be part of computing, despite having pretty reasonable representation through the 80s.

The main faces of software at this point: - terminally-uncool Bill Gates - the dude who keeps saying women aren't interesting colleagues

The "pipeline," as it were, dried up from the middle outwards, as Stallman's attitude normalized those prejudices & attracted more like him.

In the early 2000s, "open source" was a breath of fresh air. All of the usefulness! None of the built-in arrogance, privilege, or misogyny!

Many historians credit this to a group of people lead by corporate interest and ESR, who certainly became a figurehead. I think you might have heard of him. So I'm not sure this is actually an in inflection point in this dimension.