> Hackers nowadays take free software for granted, but without rms, it may well never have happened. Maybe, but this does not mean that Open Source would not h

> Hackers nowadays take free software for granted, but without rms, it may well never have happened. Maybe, but this does not mean that Open Source would not have happend. Project Gutenberg, for example, was already started in 1971 to to archive and digitize cultural works. The Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) started in 1977. The GNU project, however, started in 1983. In other words, the idea of sharing copyrighted works such as literature and software was known before Stallman. Basically, Stallman was quite late in the game. Additionally, other attempts to freely distribute code started after the GNU project, but independently of Stallmans ideas. For example, the Apache project, IIRC. Overall, it's save to say that we'd have some sort of Open Source movement, due to earlier examples of code sharing and independent attempts, even if Stallman would not have done what he did. Maybe, we'd even have a "better" Open Source movement. Also, the ability to have an ideology does not deserve respect, per se. There were quite a few people with ideologies who made millions of people suffer.