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Torvalds' written communications are incredibly well-composed, full of information and get his point across well. On the basis of his emails alone, he's a "gif

Torvalds' written communications are incredibly well-composed, full of information and get his point across well. On the basis of his emails alone, he's a "gifted communicator" in my view. Not everyone who is as logically brilliant as him can write like that. Despite that, I'm sure that when he says he's "not a people person" there's something to it. Maybe a certain difficulty reading people or anticipating their responses? That those two things live together side-by-side, that's what I personally meant by "interesting".

blktiger 8y ago
IMO, the thing that he doesn't seem to understand is the difference between criticizing the implementation and criticizing the person. Pointing out flaws in the code is not the same as calling a person stupid. If he could just learn to explain why the code is bad most of his people problems would disappear. Not all, since some people take criticism of their code poorly, but if you aren't committed to the highest quality code possible then you probably shouldn't be working on something like kernel development. There are some ways to reduce problems with those kinds of people though. Asking probing questions to get the person to think through the problems on their own to fix them for example. Or having a standards document that all kernel code is expected to conform to so you can just point out parts that don't conform to the standard.
- maxxxxx 8y ago
  "Asking probing questions to get the person to think through the problems on their own to fix them for example." My impression that most of his blow ups happen after he has tried this approach unsuccessfully. I am just a little tech lead but over the years I have found that with some people you have to yell at them from time to time because they don't understand feedback that was given nicely.
maxxxxx 8y ago
"not a people person" Some people are are task oriented and some people are relationship oriented. I think he cares more about the project than making people happy.
rhencke 8y ago
I highly recommend watching the TED Talk that Torvalds presented. You get a much clearer idea what he means by "not a people person". https://www.ted.com/talks/linus_torvalds_the_mind_behind_linux https://www.ted.com/talks/linus_torvalds_the_mind_behind_lin... This talk is also back in 2016, and even then, he talks about not being proud of the way that he reacts to people sometimes. So, while his recent announcement may come as a surprise to some, it's something he appears to have been giving a good deal of thought for a while now.
asdkhadsj 8y ago
That's a fair point. My comment is mainly in reference to my viewpoint that to be a good communicator, you need to both convey information, and convey a socially acceptable tone to allow people to ingest your view with ease. It's what make heated conversations (ie, politics, sensitive subjects, etc) hard to communicate about - the tone becomes aggressive and communication is less effective. You are very correct, he is very good at conveying information. I think he's poor at placating people and handling people in ways that ease tension, lesson aggressive tones, etc. Great communicators need to do both if they want the information to be conveyed as effectively as possible - even though it stinks to have to placate/etc people, sometimes.

blktiger 8y ago

IMO, the thing that he doesn't seem to understand is the difference between criticizing the implementation and criticizing the person. Pointing out flaws in the code is not the same as calling a person stupid. If he could just learn to explain why the code is bad most of his people problems would disappear. Not all, since some people take criticism of their code poorly, but if you aren't committed to the highest quality code possible then you probably shouldn't be working on something like kernel development. There are some ways to reduce problems with those kinds of people though. Asking probing questions to get the person to think through the problems on their own to fix them for example. Or having a standards document that all kernel code is expected to conform to so you can just point out parts that don't conform to the standard.

maxxxxx 8y ago
"Asking probing questions to get the person to think through the problems on their own to fix them for example." My impression that most of his blow ups happen after he has tried this approach unsuccessfully. I am just a little tech lead but over the years I have found that with some people you have to yell at them from time to time because they don't understand feedback that was given nicely.

maxxxxx 8y ago

"not a people person" Some people are are task oriented and some people are relationship oriented. I think he cares more about the project than making people happy.

rhencke 8y ago

I highly recommend watching the TED Talk that Torvalds presented. You get a much clearer idea what he means by "not a people person". https://www.ted.com/talks/linus_torvalds_the_mind_behind_linux https://www.ted.com/talks/linus_torvalds_the_mind_behind_lin... This talk is also back in 2016, and even then, he talks about not being proud of the way that he reacts to people sometimes. So, while his recent announcement may come as a surprise to some, it's something he appears to have been giving a good deal of thought for a while now.

asdkhadsj 8y ago

That's a fair point. My comment is mainly in reference to my viewpoint that to be a good communicator, you need to both convey information, and convey a socially acceptable tone to allow people to ingest your view with ease. It's what make heated conversations (ie, politics, sensitive subjects, etc) hard to communicate about - the tone becomes aggressive and communication is less effective. You are very correct, he is very good at conveying information. I think he's poor at placating people and handling people in ways that ease tension, lesson aggressive tones, etc. Great communicators need to do both if they want the information to be conveyed as effectively as possible - even though it stinks to have to placate/etc people, sometimes.