It does still depends a bit on which direction the 'fork' goes in and whether it remains compatible with upstream's intentions. So a minor feature branch can of

It does still depends a bit on which direction the 'fork' goes in and whether it remains compatible with upstream's intentions. So a minor feature branch can often be merged back into upstream, but significant changes to the core code may not be accepted upstream. What I'm trying to say is that while it is much easier than it was to create a branch and merge all or some of the modifications back into master, the concept of a fork, where development diverges because different parties want to do different things with the project, which can't easily coexist in the same codebase, is still relevant.