The allegory is nonetheless useful. There are other more concrete examples. In the technical world, there's the contrast, say of Linux with other non-free OSes, ranging from BeOS to VMS to WinNT.
There's Wikipedia vs. Brittanica or Encarta. There's free markets vs. command economies (or both ends vs. a mixed social market economy). Many 17th, 18th, and 19th century advances and institutions in both science and letters were founded significantly on the efforts of amateurs.
The deeper point is that the root of "amateur" isn't some connotation of naive, inexperience, or lesser quality, but "amore", literally, love. And love-of-task is a strong motivator for producing high-quality work.
There's Wikipedia vs. Brittanica or Encarta. There's free markets vs. command economies (or both ends vs. a mixed social market economy). Many 17th, 18th, and 19th century advances and institutions in both science and letters were founded significantly on the efforts of amateurs.
The deeper point is that the root of "amateur" isn't some connotation of naive, inexperience, or lesser quality, but "amore", literally, love. And love-of-task is a strong motivator for producing high-quality work.