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As a Scandinavian I'd like to think that the culture Linus was brought up in influences what he personally sees as "success". Considering he grew up under the b

As a Scandinavian I'd like to think that the culture Linus was brought up in influences what he personally sees as "success". Considering he grew up under the belt of the Nordic model, he might consider success completely different from someone brought up in the US for example, where the American Dream™ has long been the status-quo where amount of money equals amount of success. I'm sure Linus is living a very comfy, happy life - even though his Net Worth isn't greater than the guy who made Instagram.

anjc 10y ago
I've always assumed this about him. Again, I admire him greatly and I don't think that money trumps everything. I used the Instagram and Whatsapp examples just to demonstrate Linus' almost ridiculous lack of work->earnings. I mean if a world-renowned workaholic genius can't automatically generate a fair amount of wealth from decades of creating some of the most used and influential software in the world, what does that imply for the rest of us?
- Svenskunganka 10y ago
  I don't think it is because he couldn't generate a fair amount of wealth from his work, but rather that he chose not to, and I believe that is what lead to the success of the project. I also don't see him as a world-renowned genius (as you put it), because he isn't one and from what I've understood from watching his talks & reading the mailing list he himself does not want to be refered to as one either. I think that people should keep that in mind when they read articles about Linus, because most articles tries to portray him as some kind of higher form of being among the likes of Steve Jobs & Gabe Newell, which I believe is not the way he'd like to be perceived when you read a sentence he spoke.
  - anjc 10y ago
    Oh I see your point now, in that he chose not to. Yeah you're probably right. Tech-world renowned I should've said. And he may not be a self-proclaimed genius but he has a level of talent which is surely rare, at least.
oscargrouch 10y ago
And its cool to hear you saying that. Because if you measure great software, and divides that by population, Nordic countries proves that their culture are the best one, to make great and influential technology (and let's not forget all the influential tech achievers working for US companies now). And i think, a lot of that has to do with your culture.. people should take this kind of thing more into consideration, try to understand what the "secret ingredient", and try to replicate the things that work somewhere else.

anjc 10y ago

I've always assumed this about him. Again, I admire him greatly and I don't think that money trumps everything. I used the Instagram and Whatsapp examples just to demonstrate Linus' almost ridiculous lack of work->earnings. I mean if a world-renowned workaholic genius can't automatically generate a fair amount of wealth from decades of creating some of the most used and influential software in the world, what does that imply for the rest of us?

Svenskunganka 10y ago
I don't think it is because he couldn't generate a fair amount of wealth from his work, but rather that he chose not to, and I believe that is what lead to the success of the project. I also don't see him as a world-renowned genius (as you put it), because he isn't one and from what I've understood from watching his talks & reading the mailing list he himself does not want to be refered to as one either. I think that people should keep that in mind when they read articles about Linus, because most articles tries to portray him as some kind of higher form of being among the likes of Steve Jobs & Gabe Newell, which I believe is not the way he'd like to be perceived when you read a sentence he spoke.
- anjc 10y ago
  Oh I see your point now, in that he chose not to. Yeah you're probably right. Tech-world renowned I should've said. And he may not be a self-proclaimed genius but he has a level of talent which is surely rare, at least.

oscargrouch 10y ago

And its cool to hear you saying that. Because if you measure great software, and divides that by population, Nordic countries proves that their culture are the best one, to make great and influential technology (and let's not forget all the influential tech achievers working for US companies now). And i think, a lot of that has to do with your culture.. people should take this kind of thing more into consideration, try to understand what the "secret ingredient", and try to replicate the things that work somewhere else.