[jitl]

Yes, Linus took some time off to “learn empathy” https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/09/linus-torvalds-apolo...

And I would say on a whole his behavior after 2018 has been less rude although he is still quite frank when necessary. I think it’s a positive change.

I think Linus’s message from 2018 is good perspective here: when someone behaves in a way that harms the mission of the kernel it’s better to try to change that behavior at the expensive of that person’s contributions for a limited time, rather than having the bad behavior negatively impact all other contributors forever.

https://lkml.org/lkml/2018/9/16/167

[KennyBlanken]

There is a huge difference between "frank" and "abusive."

One does not need to be abusive to "tell it like it is" (the most common phrase I heard people utter in defense of Linus's abhorrent behavior toward developers.)

Linus was a bully who let authoring the Linux kernel go to his head and inflate his ego.