You're also free to build your own furniture even though there are regulations on structures. A structure is both life-threatening when it fails and will almost

You're also free to build your own furniture even though there are regulations on structures. A structure is both life-threatening when it fails and will almost inevitably end up in the hands of someone who wasn't the original builder at some point in its life. I should always be free to write software to run my model trains, or even somoene else's model trains however I choose. Making the same argument for real trains (which already have lots of regulation) is much harder. That said, if licensing did happen, there would definitely need to be tiers. Building software in-house is different than one being sold (saas or on-premise). Regulated industries would each end up with their own licenses, probably. That said, I go back and forth on this. Something as bureaucratic as licensing doesn't seem like a great solution, but the industry is definitely lacking something. I'm not quite sure what that something is exactly. Maybe we need a split between engineering and labor, similar to construction. Liscenced engineers design and inspect the bridge, unlicensed labor builds it. Similarly, I can usually build small structures without a license, small non-life-critical projects wouldn't need liscenced engineers either.