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On Tone Policing Linus Torvalds

11 points by henrik_w 12y ago

na85 12y ago
I'm not really clear on what the point of this article was.
- akie 12y ago
  That Linus' approach to disagreement over technical matters is counterproductive.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
robot 12y ago
The problem is often Linus is right. He wrote the first version of git which is used by a world of programmers today. I'm sure a ton of smart but subtly less smart programmers would have had a lot of different opinions on its design. Had he compromised from his thoughts in this design, git wouldn't be where it is now. Same can be said for the linux kernel. In a way he is a bit like Steve Jobs, and if he were to compromise, or tried to be nicer or less reactive, the results of projects would be technically lesser. Many people who don't like Linus' personality still use the linux kernel and git most of the time. They don't realize that the very reasons they disagree with him were at the roots of how he managed to get out such tools as the kernel and git. In the discussion referred, Linus is opposing the fact that Mac OS X filesystem was "silently" changing uppercase characters in a filename to lowercase? Behind the back of the user. Now this is a bad design, but if you are not allergic to it as much as Linus is, then you would probably be OK with it. Then numerous technical mediocrities would creep in over time. He is reactive to issues he sees, and this is part of why what he does is at least technically superior.
onion2k 12y ago
The author seems to think that Linus's aggressive tone only has a single effect on the community - to dissuade developers from contributing. It's possible that's true, but it's unlikely[1]. Things rarely have a single isolated effect on the world. It's entirely possible that the way Linus interacts with the community makes people stop and really think before they post lest they be 'flamed'. Or makes people more likely to group together for support from his 'burns'. Or keeps the community small enough to stop Linux becoming bloated (hmm..). It's easy to focus on the downside of the way Linus writes his posts, but that doesn't mean there isn't an upside. [1] This is an interesting example of the Principle of Double Effect - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_double_effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_double_effect - The negative effect of writing aggressively is inseparable from the beneficial effect, consequently making the act good if posting is a good thing, if Linus is acting with good intentions, and if the downside of annoying people is less than the upside of being fiercely opinionated about the way Linux should evolve. Thomas Aquinas writing 800 years ago about the morality of killing people in self-defence applied to whether or not flaming people on message boards is acceptable... This is why I love philosophy.
carsongross 12y ago
Genius computer programmers are often far out on the aspergers continuum. It's not reasonable to expect them to be polished in their social interactions. Once I stopped taking life so seriously, I began to find this charming.

11 points by henrik_w 12y ago

na85 12y ago

I'm not really clear on what the point of this article was.

akie 12y ago
That Linus' approach to disagreement over technical matters is counterproductive.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

robot 12y ago

The problem is often Linus is right. He wrote the first version of git which is used by a world of programmers today. I'm sure a ton of smart but subtly less smart programmers would have had a lot of different opinions on its design. Had he compromised from his thoughts in this design, git wouldn't be where it is now. Same can be said for the linux kernel. In a way he is a bit like Steve Jobs, and if he were to compromise, or tried to be nicer or less reactive, the results of projects would be technically lesser. Many people who don't like Linus' personality still use the linux kernel and git most of the time. They don't realize that the very reasons they disagree with him were at the roots of how he managed to get out such tools as the kernel and git. In the discussion referred, Linus is opposing the fact that Mac OS X filesystem was "silently" changing uppercase characters in a filename to lowercase? Behind the back of the user. Now this is a bad design, but if you are not allergic to it as much as Linus is, then you would probably be OK with it. Then numerous technical mediocrities would creep in over time. He is reactive to issues he sees, and this is part of why what he does is at least technically superior.

onion2k 12y ago

The author seems to think that Linus's aggressive tone only has a single effect on the community - to dissuade developers from contributing. It's possible that's true, but it's unlikely[1]. Things rarely have a single isolated effect on the world. It's entirely possible that the way Linus interacts with the community makes people stop and really think before they post lest they be 'flamed'. Or makes people more likely to group together for support from his 'burns'. Or keeps the community small enough to stop Linux becoming bloated (hmm..). It's easy to focus on the downside of the way Linus writes his posts, but that doesn't mean there isn't an upside. [1] This is an interesting example of the Principle of Double Effect - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_double_effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_double_effect - The negative effect of writing aggressively is inseparable from the beneficial effect, consequently making the act good if posting is a good thing, if Linus is acting with good intentions, and if the downside of annoying people is less than the upside of being fiercely opinionated about the way Linux should evolve. Thomas Aquinas writing 800 years ago about the morality of killing people in self-defence applied to whether or not flaming people on message boards is acceptable... This is why I love philosophy.

carsongross 12y ago

Genius computer programmers are often far out on the aspergers continuum. It's not reasonable to expect them to be polished in their social interactions. Once I stopped taking life so seriously, I began to find this charming.