Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Linus on "acting professionally"

marc.info

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

291–300 of 505 posts

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#291

Post by jeltz »

rachelbythebay wrote: post #147

I only have one Linus story. Way back in 2007, he was supposed to come and give a talk on git. I had to do an on-site interview with a candidate immediately beforehand, but managed to get it done and got there in time to see the talk start. I had never seen him in person and figured it might be interesting, particularly since I had actually used git on some projects prior to that point. This wound up being recorded,…

Interesting how different people can see the same thing. To me Linus seems to be mostly pleasant during that talk and to the point. I have heard ranty talks and this is not one of them.

I assume it must be cultural difference, since I also checked with my colleagues and they do not think Linus was rude either during that talk.

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#292

Post by nknighthb »

Tyrannosaurs wrote: post #240
nknighthb wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I much prefer being publicly berated. There's no question of what was said, and there is pressure on the one doing the berating to get it right and not be unreasonable in their expectations. It further urges consistency -- if one person is dressed down for doing X in Y circumstances, failure to do the same to the next person who makes the same error will either reveal obvious bias, or make clear that the original ber…

Research shows that you're not typical - most people find it massively demotivating. There seems to be a thing here with a lot of people saying "I work like this and like it". That's fine but the worst mistake you can make with others is often assuming that everyone else is like you. a lot of management science is bullshit but alongside the nonsense there is actual quantitative research about how people behave and so…

> Research shows that you're not typical - most people find it massively demotivating

What is "it", exactly? Any public criticism? Public belittling (which is severely different from a proper dressing down)? Swearing? There's a lot mixed in here.

And does research conclusively establish a significantly different reaction to otherwise identical acts in public vs private?

> I'd rather go with programmers behave broadly as other people do.

Even if programmers behave broadly as other people do, that doesn't mean they'd have the same reaction to the same behavior in two very different scenarios.

Our dressing-downs[1] are as likely to come from our peers as our management. And even when they come from managers, we have a much different relationship with them. We are in positions of relative power and economic security, as well as positions of trust. A manager is more peer or patron than overlord, and we are more agent than minion. This is a very different dynamic than most jobs.

I question the relevance of any research on this that doesn't specifically target highly-skilled fields with economically-secure workers.

[1] Dressings down? Can you make bandages out of soft feathers?

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#293

Post by agentultra »

The one thing that annoys me about posts like this is the lack of context. We get one post from Linus trying to rationalize his outbursts. And we end up with a debate about whether we have the right to swear and call unsatisfactory commits, "stupid."

It's not about this LKML thread. The discussion is about justifying a certain set of behaviours that a certain group identifies with. Posts like this polarize the discussion. No one wins when there are only two options.

Personally I think losing your temper in public is a weakness. Swearing is a rude form of language. And I don't take people very seriously who are too quick to point out how stupid other people are (it's a sign of insecurity).

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#294

Post by podperson »

DodgyEggplant wrote: post #223
columbo wrote: post #200

This is another great example of why you can't take successful people and distil them down to their base components and say "ah, this is what made him great!" I believe being a loud-abrasive-dictator works for Linus because he is famous for being a loud-abrasive-dictator. That's not important. What is important is the reader. Let's be clear on a few things #1 - Linus doesn't run a business. He's the kernel admin, he'…

Linus manages combined efforts of hundreds of people for years, probably leading the most successful open source project ever. Without salaries, without command and rule authority, without perks, without shared office space, even without HR. He probably knows something about what it takes to manage people

Or maybe he's just so talented that he can carry a huge interpersonal handicap.

Actually, this email is pretty polite and to-the-point. I don't know exactly what it is that he said that was offensive in private, but he's actually being pretty reasonable here.

The thing is, some people spend a lot of effort when writing to check that they don't accidentally leave "sharp edges" in their writing (and then they still fail to find them all) while others write the way they would talk and assume that their tone of voice is "obvious" when of course it isn't. I expect if you knew Linus personally (I do not) his most outrageous written comments would seem just fine.

There's a ton of research on how written communications (especially with relative anonymity, etc.) can lead to cascading flamewars and so forth without anyone setting out to troll or be outrageous. Linus lives in that world, so he probably offends a lot of people accidentally just as a matter of percentages.

> most successful open source project ever

Surely that would be BSD which, without Linux, would probably be Linux (and was Linux before Linux), and with Linux is still most of Linux and a good deal of Mac OS X and iOS, and without which Linux would be irrelevant.

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#296

Post by mhd »

I think that apart from Linux specific peculiarities (cf. 'git'), I guess that part of this might be due to European/American differences. My personal impression is that overseas work environments tend to be rather non-confrontational, with even raised voices often being seen as a persona attack, instead of a temporary "airing of grievances". In places I've worked in Europe (Germany/Ireland), this often was treated as the same reaction you have when you hit your finger with a hammer -- meant as a stress relief, not as attacking someone's core values and competences.

Anecdatal, sure, but I've heard people tell of similar experiences. And my US data points included blue collar workers in Jersey, not exactly the pinnacle of PC, I'd say.

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#297

Post by pmelendez »

arkades wrote: post #203
pmelendez wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "He has led one of the most important human endeavours of the last hundred years" Yes, Linux has remarkable importance mostly because its installed base (IMHO it doesn't offer any innovation from an OS perspective, other that being stable enough and free) However, that doesn't give Linus a free card to be abusive and rude. Yes, not being polite and being insulting is indeed being unprofessional, there are ways to s…

People criticizing Linus in this thread really seem to act like their arms are being twisted to work with him. I mean you literally compared him to a slaver . You know what the key difference is? He's running a voluntary programming project, which people are welcome to voluntarily join if the project and its other members suit them, and are welcome to leave (with all of its work-product at this time) if they want to,…

>"I mean you literally compared him to a slaver."

No, I didn't. OP implied that because Linus knows how to get things done his behaviour is excusable, then I gave a counter-example in which that statement is false (at least in my opinion, there exists people who believe in slavery)

>"You have absolutely NO right to demand that volunteer organizations began, ran, and maintained by other people change their behavior to suit you."

"I" have no right to demand that (and that's the reason why I didn't). However, email's author has the right to ask for respect if he is feeling offended by his lead. Your phrase seems to imply that because is a volunteer group is OK if his leader is abusing, but for the people affected is actually worse because they are giving up their time and they are being offended by the project lead.

>"This is some of the most entitled whining I've ever seen on HN."

Well apparently if you don't like something you are free to go away, that was your argument right? In any case I think whining is acceptable in a discussion (which I think is this part of the site about but you are free to prove me wrong)

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#298

Post by 14113 »

columbo wrote: post #200

This is another great example of why you can't take successful people and distil them down to their base components and say "ah, this is what made him great!" I believe being a loud-abrasive-dictator works for Linus because he is famous for being a loud-abrasive-dictator. That's not important. What is important is the reader. Let's be clear on a few things #1 - Linus doesn't run a business. He's the kernel admin, he'…

I want to find some mailing list archives from near the start of the linux project, say 3-4 years in, when it's starting to take off, but is still small. Was linus as abrasive then? Or had he realised how big it might become, and was actively trying to get people on board.

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#299

Post by thejsjunky »

Karn wrote: post #46

I'm glad Linus isn't budging on this one. As soon as you start considering how not to hurt someone's feelings, you're putting speed bumps in the paths of your thoughts. If something is fucking stupid, then someone needs to say exactly that, not "That's a good idea, but it seems to me and my mealy mouth that such and such may be another way of doing it...?" The fact that the hacker community is full of mean gits is no…

> you're putting speed bumps in the paths of your thoughts.

I would argue that for many of the people I have met in my life, this would be a good thing. I don't we need to coddle each other all the time, but neither is the opposite workable or desirable - a little consideration is important.

Re: Linus on "acting professionally"

#300

Post by 14113 »

bad_user wrote: post #255
columbo wrote: post #200

This is another great example of why you can't take successful people and distil them down to their base components and say "ah, this is what made him great!" I believe being a loud-abrasive-dictator works for Linus because he is famous for being a loud-abrasive-dictator. That's not important. What is important is the reader. Let's be clear on a few things #1 - Linus doesn't run a business. He's the kernel admin, he'…

I do not think managing an open-source project is so different than running a company. > Linus doesn't run a business. He's the kernel admin He's also the original author. And he still is an awesome developer and the Linux kernel is not his only accomplishment. Git is another one. Linus is one of those people that can change the face of our industry over night and he has done so at least twice. Not only that, but if…

The point about users reminds me of some of the better quotes about steve jobs, and his insistence on getting the feel, and user experience right.
Post reply on HN