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Comment by famousactress | Hacker News Reader

Jeez. The spirit and tone of this comment seem incredibly obnoxious.

Whereas the "OMG, ESR manages to be productive with so little" worship thing wasn't?

How about just answering the question then?

The argument that it's equally obnoxious to assume that someone who's made useful contributions in the past has been productive in the last decade as it is to assume they haven't because you can't recall being told about any, is falling flat with me.

Eric S. Raymond talks a lot about about his importance, but in reality he has produced no software of value, in fact almost no software at all. The arrogant statement he made in the beginning of the interview is a blatant lie:

> You rely on my software every time you use a browser, a smartphone, or a gaming console.

ESR is known for his books, not for his code.

That is because he has been working mostly on infrastructure, http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=4071 , http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=4351 and http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=4335 , for example.

I think he's referring to giflib or pnglib there. Those libraries are fairly widely used in many places and is probably the most widely used code he is associated with. That said, he is fairly egoistical. I don't think even he would deny that.

Well, I checked pnglib for one. He is one of 20+ contributors, not an original project founder, and was only active on it for like 2 years (2000-2002 IIRC):

http://www.libpng.org/pub/png/src/libpng-LICENSE.txt

I wouldn't call that "people depending on MY software everyday".

I wouldn't call that "people depending on MY software everyday".

You and I wouldn't but the person who calls himself "one of the senior cadre who make the internet work" [paraphrasing there] certainly would.

>The argument that it's equally obnoxious to assume that someone who's made useful contributions in the past has been productive in the last decade as it is to assume they haven't because you can't recall being told about any, is falling flat with me.

1) I don't think he made any major useful contributions, ever. He made some marginal contributions, but on the level of major league OSS players. The only exception is his C&tB book.

2) I didn't assume, I asked, hence the question mark at the end of my, er, question. I also added as a informational point that I don't recall anything. And, no, it's not because I don't follow OSS or software developments in general.

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