Earlier quoted context omitted.
You've completely missed my point. The hard part is NOT the coding. It's knowing what to code, what features your users want. Symbolics did the hard part, RMS merely copied what they (market) researched. Like the way anyone can make a copy of a DVD once a studio has actually made the film.
Movie studios are in the business of making movies, plural. Just cause I can copy DVDs once and set up a DVD burning shop doesn't mean I can make the next movie. Movie studios have the process and equipment (cameras, sets), contacts (directors, actors) to make movies. If the hardest part of your business can be so easily copied by someone else, then you do have a problem. If it can't be copied then you might not have…
Re: Ask HN: If ideas are worthless, why are some startups in stealth mode?
#91Similarly, as demonstrated by the fact that we aren't all using LispM's today, Stallman could copy features from Symbolics but he couldn't compete per se, as he had no way of doing the hard part, which was figuring out what the end users wanted.