The difference is that in a corporate setting, if you're fired that's the end of it. Fortunately or unfortunately, in an open source setting, if you act like a

The difference is that in a corporate setting, if you're fired that's the end of it. Fortunately or unfortunately, in an open source setting, if you act like an asshat you can still contribute and discuss and continue to be an asshat. And then other people ignore you. So you convince people that they're the asshat. And people believe you because you're still there. I'm not sure it's really a flaw. It's just the way it is. I feel as if it's simply one of the tradeoffs that you make with an open source project. People can hang around and be annoying and abusive and there isn't all that much you can do to totally get rid of them if they're determined. On the other hand, you can get brilliant programmers who come out of nowhere and have no qualifications that would never get past the interview stage in a large company.