It's another of TPM's historical fictions
Omitting Brian Kernighan from his historical comments on C is only one of a number of goofball assertions in this piece:
"C programming language, arguably the most popular and cursed-at programming language in the history of the world" -- such arguments no doubt employing the classical rhetorical technique of "wild unsupported claims".
"At that moment, the commercial Internet as we know it was inevitable" -- oh, no doubt. Now TPM has invented the theory of Network Protocol Historical Determinism.
"once TCP/IP protocol affiliated with Unix systems took over the ISPs of the world and beat out IBM's SNA and myriad other protocols in the corporate data center, it was no time at all before all systems spoke the same network" -- since this process began in 1983 and has not yet completed (yes, Timmy, there are still SNA networks), "no time at all" is something of an exaggeration. Even in computing, 28 years is considered a bit of a lag.
But at least the prose moves right along. As IT historical fictions go, Morgan isn't Stob, but he's readable. ("Less awkward than a Russinovich thriller!" -- Publisher's Weekly)
But TPM's musings aside, it's nice to see Thompson and Richie get this award. I've worked with many platforms, and though Unix has failings, on the whole it's not a bad environment for many purposes.