Free software might continue without Stallman, but it doesn't follow that it would have ever existed without him. Read his auto-biography, he lays out in very c

Free software might continue without Stallman, but it doesn't follow that it would have ever existed without him. Read his auto-biography, he lays out in very convincing terms just how bleak the world of software looked when he started the FSF. You don't even have to jump back 30 years to see what that world looked like, it still exists today, inside every large corporation that hates free software, except when they can steal it and not give anything back. That nasty, back-stabbing world is what it all would have looked like without the constant efforts of the FSF to continue to advocate sharing and cooperation. It might have come about anyway, but Stallman accelerated it by at minimum decades. It should also be noted that the timing of the FSF's and GNU's founding was important, if they had tried even five years later when all computers were ensconced behind protective legal walls, they might not have gotten anywhere at all with the effort.