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All the software you cited is basically server infrastructure software. I suppose that depending on your definition of important, you could say that this is the majority of important software. Perhaps if important includes only what is needed to develop web properties. But there are a lot of people who use software besides web developers. I don't really buy that your list names even close to the majority of important software by most folks' reckoning of what's important.

Some important (to me and many other people) software you didn't mention:

    * Everything besides generic infrastructure that makes
      any web property work (Google, Bing, Netflix, Facebook,
      Amazon, DropBox, Personal Capital, etc.).
    * Microsoft Windows
    * Microsoft Office
    * Mac OS X
    * Nearly all games
    * Nearly everything that makes any given bank work
    * The Adobe Creative Suite
    * Any popular Android or iOS app
I'd guess that the number of people working on the pieces of software I mention here exceeds those working on your list by at least one if not two or three orders of magnitude. I doubt much of it would be economically viable except for government protection of intellectual property.

Anyway, fortunately, the government will likely to continue to protect IP in the foreseeable future. It's working pretty well so far.




Just for reference.

XNU powers every Mac, every iPhone, every i*...it’s the most important software on over 1B client machines.

Linux powers all Android devices. Most important software on over 3B machines.

SQLite is also on all those machines, and integrated in most software you mention.

Almost all the software you mention uses git for VC, including windows.

Thanks for the discussion though, the parent topic is one I’m curious about so good to hear different points of view.




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