The main benefit of Arch Linux to me is that when you do a drive-by patch to some software project, it is not unthinkable that the fix reaches you through upstr

The main benefit of Arch Linux to me is that when you do a drive-by patch to some software project, it is not unthinkable that the fix reaches you through upstream and an Arch package update in a matter of hours. This flow is not possible with distributions that run pretty out of date software and have long release cycles: the version that's included with the distribution is usually too old to be able to check out the source, test and directly apply fixes to the upstream repository, and getting those fixes back would take months. This also applies to security updates, as it's easier to rely on instant upstream project updates than on some distribution package owner to remember and backport those fixes.