Being a leader does not justify being an asshole.
Comparing Knuth to Torvalds and saying "look, you don't have to be an asshole to be a great leader" is like comparing Usain Bolt to Dean Karnazes and saying "look, you don't have to be really muscular to be a great sprinter." The comparison is pointless because Karnazes isn't a sprinter just like Knuth isn't leading major software efforts.
Find a successful leader of a large-scale piece of software who doesn't have a reputation for being an asshole and use them for the comparison.
That makes sense, except that OP said "You don't have to be a jerk to get ahead in life", he didn't mentioned being a leader. The followed commenters brought the leadership point into attention and then subtly implied that there is more correlation between being a jerk and a leader.
Edit: And yes, the conversation pivoted to being a leader because that is a critical difference between Knuth and Torvalds which seems very relevant to this sort of comparison.
So pretty much everyone except for Torvalds and de Raadt? Those guys are the exception and not the rule.
used in large-scale or has a large-scale developer base? for used in large-scale I know some, but they don't have a large-scale developer base.
I agree, still the exception, but I feel like it's extremely unfair to say "everyone except" and forget the devil himself :)
Larry Wall. Tom Lane. Off the top of my head.
Flaming someone on a mailing list takes as much time as being nice to them. If it was about time then Linus could just ignore or dismiss things without going out of his way to type up insults.
Not if you take into account the time saved by (strongly) discouraging people from wasting your time in the future.
> If it was about time then Linus could just ignore or dismiss things
No, you absolutely cannot do that. If you ignore people on software projects, they do not go away. They just get more convinced that they're right, which means getting more shrill and insistent.
Edit: typical -> popular
I mean, sure, you may think that Torvalds provides more value than the people he isolates, but either way people are getting isolated.
You know, if it has to be our decision whom to isolate, why not create a competitive community and vote for it with commits, instead of destroying the original community by removing Linus out of the office?
"In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols."
Cite: http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/25998-the-so-called-paradox-...
So his justification for this was founded on a prevention of violence. We already have this in the USA, for example, in that we forbid incitement to violence, fighting words and the like. So unless you can show some strong nexus between these statements and actual, physical violence of some kind, you can't use Karl Popper as a justification.
It's not a wild west when you call people out because they are unpleasant. In modern world (as I see it) you create a competition and public follows best one.
People confuse directness with being an asshole. If your results suck, saying they suck isn't being an asshole. If you feel that something is horrible, sugar-coating it to make sure you don't hurt someone's feelings is unauthentic.
Here's the difference...
When someone says "your product sucks, throw it away" .. with the INTENT of causing that person to feel bad, thats being an ashhole.
If you tell them that their product sucks because you genuinely feel that way, and you're simply communicating authentically, then you're not being an asshole, you're being authentic.
Here's how you can tell the difference. The former in that example get stuck at best in middle management in low-quality companies... the latter finds themselves at the top.
If someone says I'm an asshole, I don't get to tell them they're wrong. It's how they feel about me, regardless of whatever I or anyone else feels.
The absolute best I could do is say that they're alone in feeling that way.
Lots of folks thought Steve Jobs was an asshole. You can say "well he was just direct" but that doesn't take away how they felt about him, or what their opinions are.
so the stories about him firing people on a whim weren't true ?
Maybe don't deify the guy who worked against you and your interests his whole career.