In mid-September of this year, Linux creator Linus Torvalds announced he was taking time off from his day-to-day job leading Linux kernel development efforts to, as he put it, "get some assistance on how to understand people’s emotions and respond appropriately." Torvalds is notoriously abrasive on LKML, the email list that is, in essence, the workplace for Linux kernel development, often unleashing profanity-laden diatribes against code—and people—he deems unhelpful. It's a management style that's been controversial, but it's also been defended over the years, by Torvalds and others, not least because Linux's success can speak for itself.

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