[lejoko]

> Have you ever outcompeted a cartel that has 100 years and billions of dollars on you? Me neither. Maybe it's possible, but it's certainly neither easy nor as simple as you suggest.

Been there, done that! In the 90s, very few believed that Free Software / Open Source could ever become what it is today. I was (a super tiny) part of it. It was hard and took long, for sure. But possible it was. I'd love to see a similar movement in the academic world.

[krageon]

While this is cool and sort of topical, in the 90s there for sure was not a software cartel that had existed for hundreds of years. We can know this because it simply wasn't a thing for that long at that time :)

[lejoko]

Strictly speaking you’re right. I mostly intended to highlight the idea that making huge social changes was possible with a lot of collective determination; but still : IBM is only 31 years younger than Elsevier...

[fsckboy]

> I'd love to see a similar movement in the academic world.

but computer science is an academic discipline, and FOSS didn't emerge from the academy. in fact, inasmuch as Stallman started it, though he could be said to have been in the academy, his actions were somewhat anti the academy.