[Virax]

Jamie Zawinski is not "hard at work building the future". According to his own website, he is managing the DNA lounge, and the last thing of any substance he worked on was a program to delete silence from mp3 streams (see http://www.dnalounge.com/backstage/src/archiver/). He claims a copyright date of 2001-2006 for this program, which, after a quick skim, appears to be high quality. In my opinion, he is a talented programmer who has this to say about the software industry:

    (1999+) But now I've taken my leave of that whole sick,
            navel-gazing mess we called the software
            industry. Now I'm in a more honest line of
            work: now I sell beer. 

So, I suppose, Joel is right, in a roundabout way:

Selling beer => flirtation => sex => sperm + egg = Building a future human being!

But seriously, Joel is on crack.

[eugenejen]

Jamie also worked under Peter Norvig, and this is what Peter said about Jamie:

". One of the best programmers I ever hired had only a High School degree; he's produced a lot of great software, has his own news group, and made enough in stock options to buy his own nightclub. "

-- from http://norvig.com/21-days.html

[tsally]

Once you build something as important as Netscape Navigator and cash out for a good chunk of money, I think it's ok to do whatever you want. Building something for the future doesn't have to be a lifelong thing.