[afridi]

Author here. As I mentioned previously, I'm just a student and have no ties to any administration so I'm just speaking from my experience.

UIUC suing (or almost suing?) Andreessen is definitely a terrible step, but that was one event 21 years ago. In fact it happened before I was born (I'm a senior at UIUC now). Definitely a dark chapter of entrepreneurship on campus, but the goal of this post is to highlight the current ecosystem.

The university and the ecosystem is continuously evolving and hopefully we can tailor it to learn from other schools that have done a good job.

[rmason]

I never went to IU but I was at a conference there right after Netscape launched. The Dean spoke and he laid it on real thick about being the place where the web browser was invented. He said that IU was 'ground zero for the upcoming Internet revolution'.

Then I found out much later that they had refused to let Andreessen use the Mosaic name for his company. They also turned down equity in the company that became Netscape. They also Andreessen later said burned any bridge to receiving alumni support from him. But the Dean told us at the time that IU had a 'close relationship' with Andreessen and the rest of the alums creating Netscape.

Then they licensed the Mosaic source code to Microsoft which proceeded to use it to bludgeon Netscape.