@aspragg @brettk @timnitGebru I never said the founders were billionaires; I said the billionaires have significant influence and benefits from the movement in our present day.

Because how exactly did those founders think that making it more friendly to corporations would help? By getting them more money to develop the code! That's my whole point, they sacrificed the principles of free, democratic, user-controlled software for the promise of cold, hard cash. And now here we are a few decades later seeing that all the remaining principles have *also* been sacrificed in exchange for that cash. Because that is the logical outcome when you build a movement around prioritizing commercial success.

And that was *absolutely* the reason. Look at essays and interviews from people like ESR. I've seen multiple interviews where he starts literally screaming that it's not just about sharing the code, that they aren't "communists" who just want to give things away for free, and insisting that he supports the capitalists. Maybe not *everyone* involved in the movement was doing it to benefit corporate interests but a lot of people who were very influential were extremely clear about that being their motivation.