9 ms·

That may be so but I'm pretty sure that pretty much every study that's been done on this says insulting people is demotivating and generally destructive behavio

That may be so but I'm pretty sure that pretty much every study that's been done on this says insulting people is demotivating and generally destructive behaviour. Linus can believe what he likes but the evidence contradicts him.

riquito 12y ago
> Linus can believe what he likes but the evidence contradicts him. The evidence shows that his way works to lead the people working at Linux.
- nathanb 12y ago
  Only in a tautological sense. His way works to lead the people working on Linux because only the people who can deal with his way will work on Linux. Whether Linux would be more successful with a more benevolent dictator remains to be seen.
  - mden 12y ago
    That's not a tautology. There's a non-circular flow to the reasoning.
    - manicdee 12y ago
      The Dead Sea Effect is all about non-circular flows.
mh_ 12y ago
(just to play devils advocate) How do you figure "the evidence contradicts him" ? His attitude: launched & maintains the largest free collaborative dev known to man (?) which has generated squillions as a by-product. Yours/My attitude: makes some friends seems to me he has some runs on the scoreboard (and some facts on the ground)
- themartorana 12y ago
  I didn't realize certain accomplishments allowed someone to be a total and utter dick - to ignore all decorum, respect, and human kindness to others. The more you know...
  - philh 12y ago
    That's not what's being discussed. Tyrannosaurs made a descriptive claim, mh_ questioned it. You're acting like mh_ made a normative claim. (And you're using the shitty rhetorical tactic of sarcasm, which allows you to tell someone that they're wrong without making any claims of your own, or even understanding what they're saying.)
    - themartorana 12y ago
      Your adding the modifier "shitty tactic" to the use of sarcasm gives away your inability to understand that tone is notoriously difficult to infer from online comments, and predisposition to try to prove how smart you are. But you're unable to see the irony in placing rules around the decorum of conversation in a topic about the lack of that very thing. But that's just supposition, not a normative claim. Edit: I wonder if I'd be down-voted so harshly if I was Linus Torvalds.
      - nkurz 12y ago
        I wonder if I'd be down-voted so harshly if I was Linus Torvalds. From me, the answer is yes, and I hope that is true for others on HN as well. I'm sure it's not always appreciated, but I think it's important for influential people to receive honest feedback. Although in the rare cases when I downvote 'pg' on this board, I do wonder if some 'all-future-downvotes > /dev/null' switch might get flipped. For what it's worth, I downvoted your sarcastic grandparent, and upvoted this somewhat more constructive reply.
  - LunaSea 12y ago
    I think the parent comment meant that his management methods, albeit eclectic, were still effective.
Mithaldu 12y ago
He has not insulted any people though. He has said bad things about the piece of software called gcc-4.9.0, but he has not once in that email adressed a person in a negative way. Plus, the bug report he filed towards gcc is entirely matter-of-fact and polite.
- Pacabel 12y ago
  As I've worked with more and more younger developers ("Millennials" or "hipsters" or whatever you want to call them), I've noticed that many of them consider criticism of somebody's work to be a criticism of the work's creator himself or herself. I don't really know for sure why this is. Maybe they're more attached to what they've created, seeing it more as a work of art or something like that, instead of just a tool?
  - kawsper 12y ago
    Sam Stephenson (Author of Prototype and Rbenv) talks about that here: http://sstephenson.us/posts/you-are-not-your-code http://sstephenson.us/posts/you-are-not-your-code
- xienze 12y ago
  Uh, do you think GCC just spontaneously sprung forth into being? No, it was created by people, and Linus is indirectly insulting them.
  - pdonis 12y ago
    As a number of people have already commented, when Linus posted the bug report to the GCC project, he was careful not to insult them.
    - yohanatan 12y ago
      Do you think those people exist in some sort of vacuum where they don't have access to (or will become aware of) the kernel mailing list thread?
rsynnott 12y ago
I'd be surprised if GCC maintainers take it personally. Software bugs are a fact of life. You should see how angry people get about JVM bugs.
pdonis 12y ago
> the evidence contradicts him The evidence is that the Linux kernel is one of the most successful large-scale coding projects ever. So whatever Linus is doing, it appears to be working.
- Tyrannosaurs 12y ago
  Indeed, but that's not to say it wouldn't work even better if he behaved in the way that studies of organisational behaviour general show result in higher performance.
  - pdonis 12y ago
    Studies of behavior of certain types of organizations, perhaps. I'm extremely skeptical that such studies are applicable to "organizations" like the Linux kernel developers. If you have any specific studies that you think would be applicable, please give some links.

riquito 12y ago

> Linus can believe what he likes but the evidence contradicts him. The evidence shows that his way works to lead the people working at Linux.

nathanb 12y ago
Only in a tautological sense. His way works to lead the people working on Linux because only the people who can deal with his way will work on Linux. Whether Linux would be more successful with a more benevolent dictator remains to be seen.
- mden 12y ago
  That's not a tautology. There's a non-circular flow to the reasoning.
  - manicdee 12y ago
    The Dead Sea Effect is all about non-circular flows.

mh_ 12y ago

(just to play devils advocate) How do you figure "the evidence contradicts him" ? His attitude: launched & maintains the largest free collaborative dev known to man (?) which has generated squillions as a by-product. Yours/My attitude: makes some friends seems to me he has some runs on the scoreboard (and some facts on the ground)

themartorana 12y ago
I didn't realize certain accomplishments allowed someone to be a total and utter dick - to ignore all decorum, respect, and human kindness to others. The more you know...
- philh 12y ago
  That's not what's being discussed. Tyrannosaurs made a descriptive claim, mh_ questioned it. You're acting like mh_ made a normative claim. (And you're using the shitty rhetorical tactic of sarcasm, which allows you to tell someone that they're wrong without making any claims of your own, or even understanding what they're saying.)
  - themartorana 12y ago
    Your adding the modifier "shitty tactic" to the use of sarcasm gives away your inability to understand that tone is notoriously difficult to infer from online comments, and predisposition to try to prove how smart you are. But you're unable to see the irony in placing rules around the decorum of conversation in a topic about the lack of that very thing. But that's just supposition, not a normative claim. Edit: I wonder if I'd be down-voted so harshly if I was Linus Torvalds.
    - nkurz 12y ago
      I wonder if I'd be down-voted so harshly if I was Linus Torvalds. From me, the answer is yes, and I hope that is true for others on HN as well. I'm sure it's not always appreciated, but I think it's important for influential people to receive honest feedback. Although in the rare cases when I downvote 'pg' on this board, I do wonder if some 'all-future-downvotes > /dev/null' switch might get flipped. For what it's worth, I downvoted your sarcastic grandparent, and upvoted this somewhat more constructive reply.
- LunaSea 12y ago
  I think the parent comment meant that his management methods, albeit eclectic, were still effective.

Mithaldu 12y ago

He has not insulted any people though. He has said bad things about the piece of software called gcc-4.9.0, but he has not once in that email adressed a person in a negative way. Plus, the bug report he filed towards gcc is entirely matter-of-fact and polite.

Pacabel 12y ago
As I've worked with more and more younger developers ("Millennials" or "hipsters" or whatever you want to call them), I've noticed that many of them consider criticism of somebody's work to be a criticism of the work's creator himself or herself. I don't really know for sure why this is. Maybe they're more attached to what they've created, seeing it more as a work of art or something like that, instead of just a tool?
- kawsper 12y ago
  Sam Stephenson (Author of Prototype and Rbenv) talks about that here: http://sstephenson.us/posts/you-are-not-your-code http://sstephenson.us/posts/you-are-not-your-code
xienze 12y ago
Uh, do you think GCC just spontaneously sprung forth into being? No, it was created by people, and Linus is indirectly insulting them.
- pdonis 12y ago
  As a number of people have already commented, when Linus posted the bug report to the GCC project, he was careful not to insult them.
  - yohanatan 12y ago
    Do you think those people exist in some sort of vacuum where they don't have access to (or will become aware of) the kernel mailing list thread?

rsynnott 12y ago

I'd be surprised if GCC maintainers take it personally. Software bugs are a fact of life. You should see how angry people get about JVM bugs.

pdonis 12y ago

> the evidence contradicts him The evidence is that the Linux kernel is one of the most successful large-scale coding projects ever. So whatever Linus is doing, it appears to be working.

Tyrannosaurs 12y ago
Indeed, but that's not to say it wouldn't work even better if he behaved in the way that studies of organisational behaviour general show result in higher performance.
- pdonis 12y ago
  Studies of behavior of certain types of organizations, perhaps. I'm extremely skeptical that such studies are applicable to "organizations" like the Linux kernel developers. If you have any specific studies that you think would be applicable, please give some links.