From the 'Preface' part: "I know and rather like some of the authors, so it actually makes me a little sad to report that fourteen years later, writing them off

From the 'Preface' part: "I know and rather like some of the authors, so it actually makes me a little sad to report that fourteen years later, writing them off this way is easier than ever." He knows who they are and what they were about. His point was not that it was a 'polemic' against Unix. It was that their wordplay was ineffective and is now dated and shortsighted, when they could have delivered a directed and informed critique that might have inspired more.