...and maybe they'll hatch.

I agree completely. People who want to be all polite and beat around the bush instead of coming forth and communicating what they feel/think, are the reason every day millions of work hours are wasted and millions of mediocrities keep on living in their fantasy world thinking they are awesome at what they do.

Additionally, people whose opinion on this is that "he should be polite regardless of who he is and who he thinks he is", will never understand the argument "Cultural Differences, Bitch" [Pinkman TM] either.

The bottom line: Linus it not the average person. His work speaks for itself. The people who have a problem with his attitude, are those who demand of a genius that he also be modest/low-key/polite/gentle/subtle. But hey, guess what! If i'm a mediocrity, I don't get to demand things from superior people. And yes, sorry to break it to you. We're not all equal. I wouldn't mind it one bit if Feynman was a d*ck and if Einstein was a pr*ck.

Personally, I wish I had someone like Linus around my work place. I'd take his abuse any day of the week as long as I could benefit, even by mere osmosis, from his experience and ideas. Also don't forget: for every 1 person that bitches about his attitude, there are hundreds that benefit, enjoy, grow and flourish around him. And not just due to Stockholm syndrome.

I remember when "they" decided to replace modems for win-modems. Linux users probably remember the frustration and dead ends of trying to make a software modem work under Linux. Hardware is very good at doing its job; at least a lot better than software. Whenever the latter tries to replace the former...we'll probably see a new IT specialty in the horizon soon.

I'm not quite that sure that nowadays Postgres has that many fewer job opportunities than Mysql. I'd say that this is more of a belief from the earlier half of the past decade. And by job opportunity I don't mean "oh! we have a project (i.e. website) that uses MySQL as a backend". Job opportunity should translate to "we have someone to run the thing". And given that Mysql behaves as a DBMS for very loose use of the term (i mean so loose, you wouldn't believe it was a DBMS not even on Xmas eve), you are probably closer to getting it done "quick and dirty" with Postgres exactly because it does it "the right way". Now with respect to the OP's question: Pg is an easy pick over Mysql contribution-wise. If you do indeed have a DB theory background, then barely using each one of the two for a couple of weeks should be more than enough for you understand the difference in quality (features and implementation).

I agree with that. Speaking 4 foreign languages, I have the utmost appreciation for people who gladly assume the role of correcting me in real-time and in real-life conditions. Unfortunately, as the OP states, usually it's just the girlfriend that assumes this role consistently and that only after I make it clear multiple times that "I am not offended by it. If you really want to help me improve, please correct me all the time". And yes, the girlfriend is real and doesn't get paid for it or other services rendered.

Could be right, but then again McD's doesn't gain anything clogging a junkeater's arteries. It doesn't increase their chances of more revenues; on the contrary it kills a good customer. Whereas the parasite makes the rat go where it shouldn't want to, because in the long run it increases the parasite's chances of reproduction. If only McD's could find a way to make a small commission our of each one they send to the hospital/morgue, it would all make so much more sense.

Your way of thinking probably explains as well why the US is #1 in prisoners-per-capita.

Imprisonment removes your freedom. This should be punishment enough. Once you are in there, the idea is not to get you even more agitated or depressed. Rehabilitation comes with providing perhaps even things to which you didn't have access in the first place and led you to crime.

Of course in theory it's easy to generalize and philosofize. But still, trying to make a troubled individual's environment troubling, really has poor chances of solving the trouble.

What really bedazzles me is how one could possibly write such a long and imaginative post on /. and still be the first poster! Been preparing for years for this to happen, haven't you? Admit it...

You are joking, right? Just because you don't see marching tanks in the streets, doesn't mean it's not a form of war. Let alone Germany that would under no circumstances allow it's name be blemished with YAW. But don't kid yourself; that's the new form of warfare: absolute and transparent financial control.

No. What was really crazy was him having to speak for 9h+ non-stop to say the obvious.

Year: 1972
Location: Munich Olympic games
Act: terrorist attack with Israeli hostages

Or maybe the quality of his pr0n differs radically from yours.

Why expect from an exceptional person to be modest? If a big ego is the price to pay for enjoying the works of a genius, so be it. The point is that J is maintaining a balance. And that's priceless regardless of which of the two sides you support. If your subjectivity gets in the way of understanding that balance in more important than right&wrong per se (which only exist in your mind anyway) then it's understandable that J's ego is a problem and not an insignificant side-effect.

It's convenient to rationalise the destruction caused by the iraq war on the basis of we-are-leaving-so-many-things-behind, when in reality:

1. you are leaving more than you left to Japan because you didn't invade Japan for profit but to experiment with a new WMD
2. you are not leaving anything behind in Iraq, because you simply invaded with the intention to colonise
3. the term "free elections" can only be used loosely in a country under foreign occupation; i'm guessing you feel fine using it because you compare to what they had under Saddam