[antiRepublicrat]

I don't know any System Admins who have invented or written operating systems or network protocols etc etc.

Vint Cerf was an admin, then a programmer when he started working on the ARPANET host protocols, although he did finish up with TCP/IP while he was an assistant professor at Stanford.

But personally I know a sysadmin who wrote an OS.

[KwasiOwusu]

"Vint Cerf was an admin, then a programmer when he started working on the ARPANET host protocols, although he did finish up with TCP/IP while he was an assistant professor at Stanford."

I'd say Vint Cerf was a university professor.
Its like saying a doctor who used to work at Burger King while at medical school, them invented some new kind of surgery after becoming a doctor, had that invention done by a Burger King attendant.

Vint Cerf was able to do sys admin, but he sure was not a sys admin when he was inventing TCP/IP.
Your example just won't wash.