"The dustbin of Past Industrialists" includes Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, R.J. Reynolds, Eli Whitney, and a fair number of others who are in our history books, whose names have entered the common vernacular, or both. I'm playing Devil's Advocate here, but it's still a serious question: is the reason we don't hear about the Stallmans of their eras in similar fashions because there simply weren't any, or because as it turns out, it's not the successful industrialists who end up in the dustbin, historically speaking?
I don't mean to downplay Stallman's contributions, and as maddening as I frequently find him I think he makes some very important points. The software world needs people like him. But I honestly think anyone who imagines that Stallman is going to be a household name in 70 years while Steve Jobs and Bill Gates will be forgotten is engaging in a hell of a lot of wishful thinking. I do hope Stallman is remembered then (and ideally favorably), but Jobs and Gates undoubtedly will be.
(As an aside, I think it's somewhat interesting that Jobs is the current decade's boogeyman, while Gates was the last decade's. Maybe this is because they're both deserving of it, but I suspect it has a whole lot more to do with "tall poppy syndrome" than we care to admit.)
I think Diesel might be a bit more along the lines of Stallman, than Ford.
IIRC he wanted to make sure the Diesel engine remained an open design -- a design that was made to use biofuel -- for the betterment of mankind, basically.
Then someone threw him in the English channel (or so it would seem), and we got gasoline engines.
I don't mean to downplay Stallman's contributions, and as maddening as I frequently find him I think he makes some very important points. The software world needs people like him. But I honestly think anyone who imagines that Stallman is going to be a household name in 70 years while Steve Jobs and Bill Gates will be forgotten is engaging in a hell of a lot of wishful thinking. I do hope Stallman is remembered then (and ideally favorably), but Jobs and Gates undoubtedly will be.
(As an aside, I think it's somewhat interesting that Jobs is the current decade's boogeyman, while Gates was the last decade's. Maybe this is because they're both deserving of it, but I suspect it has a whole lot more to do with "tall poppy syndrome" than we care to admit.)