I heard Stallman speak once about FOSS. He struck me as a very interesting person, but not very flexible in his views. Even if he's 100% "right" in the long run about how digital products should be completely free, his views are so polarizing that it'd be hard to interact with him long enough to understand his positions.

I think there is value in people like Stallman existing. I disagree with him in a lot of regards, but I think it's important for people like him to shift the "Overton Window" of software copyright a bit closer to FOSS. He's a disagreeable bastard, I'm not even sure he would dispute that, but a part of me does respect the dedication to the cause.

That said, I almost always use BSD or MIT licenses for my personal stuff; sometimes I use the Eclipse one because that's the default that Leiningen gives me for Clojure and I can't really be bothered.

That captures my sentiment exactly and GPL is always the choice for me.

For the last 30 years a strong belief in anthropogenic global warming has been polarizing too.

Sometimes appeals to moderation are valid, but I think sometimes it is entirely the wrong thing to do.

Idealism retards the growth of most good ideas. I suffer this daily but it is an internal struggle and I structure my idealism to minimize the impact on others.

> He doesnt seem to be liked by some of the more powerful, corporate entities in tech, probably because he pushes some agendas that are somewhat anti-their-profits

I don't think any of those corporate entities care about Stallman in the slightest.

At least 95% of the time you hear talk about him even in technical forums it's the "why is he still around" sort of controversy in various forms. You almost never hear about him doing something that could be described as positive leadership that could make any competition worry.

I highly doubt anybody at those powerful, corporate entities even keep track of what he's doing, let alone has any concerns for their profits because of him.

> I think this was behind the rather unsuccessful attempts to cancel him a few years ago, which cast a shadow over his reputation.

The attempts to get him out I think come mostly from the Free Software community itself who to a large extent wants a better and less embarrassing leadership.