I think, fundamentally, open source does tend to be more stable software. It's the right way to do things.

There's innovation in Linux. There are some really good technical features that I'm proud of. There are capabilities in Linux that aren't in other operating systems.

It's what I call "mental masturbation", when you engage is some pointless intellectual exercise that has no possible meaning.

It just makes it even harder for people to even approach the (open source) side, when they then end up having to worry about public humiliation.

I never felt that the naming issue was all that important, but I was obviously wrong, judging by how many people felt. I tell people to call it just plain Linux and nothing more.

Software patents, in particular, are very ripe for abuse. The whole system encourages big corporations getting thousands and thousands of patents. Individuals almost never get them.

While we ended up having several core maintainers use BitKeeper - it was free to use for open source projects - it never got ubiquitous. So it helped kernel development, but there were still pain points.