> Many people appreciate beautiful art, films, books, buildings even; but few people appreciate beautiful code. I think it's partly because most people have never seen beautiful code and partly because beautiful code doesn't pay the bills when maintenance work is billed by the hour... Probably why it's rare to begin with; though generally, open source provides a refuge from this by removing (or reducing) the financial incentive.

I think there's a a bit more of fundamental difference. For art, film, and books, the output isn't really intended to be functional as much as aesthetic. Buildings do also have function, but they're also visually striking even to those who aren't architects. Software usually has some functional goal beyond just aesthetics, which for most people makes the code a means to an end rather than the end itself. Most people generally don't spend a lot of time appreciating the individual pigments of a painting or the engineering behind making the skeleton of the building that ensures it stands up either.