The move was
largely strategic. LMI, the primary competition in the
Lisp Machine marketplace, was essentially using a copy
of the AI Lab Lisp Machine. Rather than subsidize the
development of a market rival, Symbolics executives
elected to enforce the letter of the license. If the AI
Lab wanted its operating system to stay current with
the Symbolics operating system, the lab would have to
switch over to a Symbolics machine and sever its
connection to LMI.
As the person responsible for keeping up the lab's Lisp
Machine, Stallman was incensed. Viewing this
announcement as an "ultimatum," he retaliated by
disconnecting Symbolics' microwave communications link
to the laboratory. He then vowed never to work on a
Symbolics machine and pledged his immediate allegiance
to LMI. "The way I saw it, the AI Lab was a neutral
country, like Belgium in World War I," Stallman says.
"If Germany invades Belgium, Belgium declares war on
Germany and sides with Britain and France."
The circumstances of the so-called "Symbolics War" of
1982-1983 depend heavily on the source doing the
telling.
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