“Your criticisms are completely wrong”: Stallman on software patents, 20 years inStallman's long hair, shaggy beard, and potbelly make him look like a kind of tech-age guru, a software Buddha. He comes across as eccentric, especially in the context of a legal conference. He is also, those closest to him acknowledge, a genius. He would seem a bit like your crazy uncle—if his accomplishments weren't so well-known. Those include creating key components of the free software system
