By unilaterally declaring that other works Suck and that one's work Is Better.
There's a lot of nuance to why a particular (computer) system is popular and dominant, beyond a narrow definition of Programming Goodness, and IMHO he was never willing to recognize that.
djb, while being excellent in some technical domains, doesn't particularly care for how human group dynamics work.
Interesting. I did not read the Usenet thread as "other works Suck". Although there did appear to be some problems people were having; maybe the work did "suck". I read it as a 17-year-old trying, and not in a particularly offensive way, to market what he had written. Not for commercial gain but for public benefit. As I recall many folks uploading their work to Usenet groups like comp.sources.unix tried to market what they submitted. I just cannot see how the thread really tells much of anything about such people. Outside of their comments about software on the internet, we do not know these people. And even we did, who cares. This is about software.
If this "nuanced" notion of "Programming Goodness" is to be taken seriously, then how is Curve5519, not to mention other cryptography by the author, in so much software today. It is probably in the browser or other software we are using to submit our comments to HN. How has it become so "popular and dominant" when its author allegedly "doesn't particularly care for how group dynamics work". That's a present tense statement. He's been running conferences for years now. He's devoted significant portion of his life to being a teacher. Some, maybe not HN commenters, consider this one of life's highest callings.
I have another theory. Maybe some members of groups do not like someone who is smarter than they are, and who can easily spot their shortcomings. They do not like alternatives or competititon. NB. I'm not suggesting this Usenet group was such a group. no one is attcking him here. He definitely had a following by the early 90's and today he arguably has an even more substantial and diverse following. IMHO, that other people attacked and still attack djb for being djb tell us more about themselves than they do about djb. Spiteful, jealous, misguided, incompetent, whatever. I'm definitely not using their software if I can help it, assuming they even have any.^1
I'm grateful that this author has been so generous. It's not only his programming ability but also his sense of ethics that exceeds most folks who have devoted themselves to writing software for the internet. AFAIK, he has never worked for a so-called "tech" company. He's not working for an advertising company whose interests are to convert the internet from a public resource into a 100% commercial medium, to be exploited for commercial surveillance and advertising. Unfortunately, such companies are certainly using his work.
1. Because instead of competing on the technical merits they apparently ignore and seek to have others ignore what is clearly high quality, meticulous work. That's concerning.