Developers have the attention spans of slightly moronic woodland creatures. Linus Torvalds More Quotes by Linus Torvalds More Quotes From Linus Torvalds I'm a technical manager, but I don't have to take care of people. I only have to worry about technology itself. Linus Torvalds technology worry people An individual developer like me cares about writing the new code and making it as interesting and efficient as possible. But very few people want to do the testing. Linus Torvalds writing people interesting I often compare open source to science. To where science took this whole notion of developing ideas in the open and improving on other peoples' ideas and making it into what science is today and the incredible advances that we have had. And I compare that to witchcraft and alchemy, where openness was something you didn't do. Linus Torvalds incredibles today ideas What I find most interesting is how people really have taken Linux and used it in ways and attributes and motivations that I never felt. Linus Torvalds motivation taken people Once you start thinking more about where you want to be than about making the best product, you're screwed. Linus Torvalds products want thinking I actually think that I'm a rather optimistic and happy person; it's just that I'm not a very positive person, if you see the difference. Linus Torvalds optimistic differences thinking No-one has ever called me a cool dude. I'm somewhere between geek and normal. Linus Torvalds geek normal Linux has definitely made a lot of sense even in a purely materialistic sense. Linus Torvalds linux materialistic economy I've never regretted not making Linux shareware: I really don't like the "pay for use" binary shareware programs. Linus Torvalds linux use pay The cyberspace 'earnings' I get from Linux come in the format of having a Network of people that know me and trust me, and that I can depend on in return. Linus Torvalds cyberspace trust people I've been employed by the University of Helsinki, and they've been perfectly happy to keep me employed and doing Linux. Linus Torvalds helsinki linux university I don't think I'm unusual in preferring my laptop to be thin and light. Linus Torvalds laptops light thinking Turtles are very stable and have been around forever. But they have problems adapting. When humans came along, turtles came under serious threat. Biodiversity is good, and I think it is good in technology as well. Linus Torvalds turtles technology thinking I started Linux because I wanted to see it on the desktop... I do hope that the desktop people would try to work together ... and work more on the technology than trying to make the login screen look really nice. Linus Torvalds technology nice people I think of myself as an engineer, not as a visionary or 'big thinker.' I don't have any lofty goals. Linus Torvalds visionaries goal thinking Finnish companies tend to be very traditional, not taking many risks. Silicon Valley is completely different: people here really live on the edge. Linus Torvalds risk different people A lot of people want to have market share numbers, lots of users, because that's how they view their self worth. For me, one of the most important things for Linux is having a big community that is actively testing new kernels; it's the only way to support the absolute insane amount of different hardware we deal with. Linus Torvalds self-worth views numbers Only wimps use tape backup. Real men just upload their important stuff on ftp and let the rest of the world mirror it. Linus Torvalds mirrors real men I've tried it a couple of times over the years, mainly because the thing Ubuntu did so well was make Debian usable. I always felt that Debian was a pointless exercise because to me, the point of a distribution is to make everything easy. Easy to install, to be pretty and to be friendly and Ubuntu did that to Debian. Linus Torvalds ubuntu couple exercise Non-technical questions sometimes don't have an answer at all. Linus Torvalds economy answers sometimes
