No you can always fork. That's a business they have the right to accept or reject patches however they like.
Of course, some people in this discussion seem to disagree - I've seen a lot of people acting as though it's somehow unfair to nginx for him to point this out to other potential nginx users or to switch to a different server rather thay paying up. It's like people here think the nginx developers have some right to bait people in with the open source version and then charge vast sums for basic features, and that anyone who isn't onboard with this scheme is greedy.
The story is clearly pointing out what appears to be a flaw, that has being patched, but won't be accepted, because of a conflict of interest. It's something to make noise over, and eventually, something to fork over.
People make noise so it doesn't come to that. Very reasonable, if you ask me.
The problem here is that Nginx developers refuse to implement a free patch which already exists for a feature easily found in the competition in order to protect their business model.
Sure, what Nginx devs do is a legitimate practice, as legitimate as the author complaining about it and proposing a change of software or a fork. I don't understand why many get so upset about it.
What are you saying 'no' to? They have a conflict of interest since they are clearly in the business of selling features. It was a statement, and saying 'you can always fork' does not refute that statement.
If you want your patches to be upstream you should make sure they must be compatible with the upstream's goals. If you do not want to obey or play along with upstream you may become an upstream yourself or pay someone to be the upstream with your goals.
Either accept that the Nginx creators can do what they want, or switch to Apache, but don't bitch about it. Whining that "X won't give me a feature for free" is ridiculous.