I think the two biggest contributions would be RepRap giving the world open access to FDM printing, which was the catalyst for modern 3D printing, and microcontrollers like the RasberryPi and Arduino (again open).

But it's true that Europe doesn't produce massive advertisement or tech companies, largely because our consumer laws would frankly make it impossible to grow by monetizing privacy data if you also had to respect European law. The real question, is why we allow foreign companies to do so, but I'm not sure anyone really wants to discuss that in earnest.

What has anyone done apart from extract more money from thick people with addictive technology?

Spotify to name one.

Spotify who set up shop in the US at the first indication of viability? Not very promising for the EU when the majority of their employees are in the US.

They were in Europe for years before moving to the States.

Also Siemens then. The European tech scene isn't as sexy, they tend to make things that are useful, not just things that get VC hype.

And now compare how many employees they have in the US vs EU.

Pretty sure they also trade on the NYSE?

Cookie banners, GDPR, bans on sharing news. Is that not enough for you?

Linux

And what was Linus's next move, as soon as it became clear that he had done something important...?

Not really the point, it came from Europe.