merlish

Without getting too deep into it, I think what most people who are upset about the joke are doing is applying their own emotions to someone else who doesn't share them. It's fine if you don't find the joke funny, or if you thought it was in bad taste even if it was more of a jab between friends, but the defensiveness I think comes from the fact that a lot of people straight up accused Linus of being a terrible boss and saying he'd done something wrong when he clearly hasn't.
 
Choosing a side in this kind of situation is kind of a catch-22, because really, you're wrong either way: One side jumped to conclusions, and the other overreacted. The reality of it is that Riley didn't take offense to it, so the whole thing is by definition a non-issue.

The rate at which Linus suffers burns off camera would overwhelm every burn ward in this hemisphere.

Obligatory #FreeRiley
 
Make the shirt. Embrace the hate.

Every one of us has our own niche that works to enrich the content as a whole. I'm the tech guy who's got as big a nerd-on for retro hardware as current, James is a wizard at making input devices and consumer tech interesting and IMO has some of the best humour of all of us, Alex is a mad scientist car nut who knows how to test a laptop with such efficiency he can just churn out reviews, Ivan is a crazy Russian who's not afraid to get his hands dirty with almost any project for twenty bucks, Jake is a millennial water cooling guru who's got a range of talents involving esoteric configurations and especially streaming setup, and Linus is the all-rounder who ties it all together.
 
Of the other writers, Riley is potentially doing LTT videos soon, and he's a great on-screen personality with tons of experience writing exactly the type of show TechLinked is, Jon sometimes does LTT, but mostly his jam is TechQuickie, which involves deep research and fact-checking, and Luke, while rare, handles a lot of straight-up gaming content because he's on new game consoles and stuff faster than Nintendo dropped the Virtual Boy.
 
And then the non-writers with writer credit, like Brandon, Taran, Edzel, and Tyler, all contribute their own expertise when they're tasked to write or co-write a video that none of us regular writers possess, and everyone in the whole organization often provides valuable input regardless of their role, and I mean that in a tangible sense - If I'm stuck on something in a script, or even if I just need opinions on something, getting someone with fresh eyes and a different understanding of the topic at hand allows me to look at things from a different perspective that I otherwise wouldn't have, and everyone is willing to help in whatever capacity they can.
 
TL;DR we're a team with our own strengths and weaknesses. Sometimes we'll take on projects outside of our individual comfort zones in order to learn from each other.

his reaction was like watching something out of the office.
 
i think someone on Twitter said it best
 

Holy shit. Grow up, you tiny child

To be honest, that part was really painful to watch because Linus said it to Riley with a straight face. If he hadn't replied to this topic, and also to folks who replied to his tweet (https://twitter.com/LinusTech/status/1035783121663287296) where some have been following both of them since NCIX days, I would've hated Linus already. And if it's a normal thing for them, then that's fine with me.
 
Now that I think about it, I hope no one else would react or reply to my comment in Youtube because I now cannot bear the negative comments there.
 
If Linus and Riley are good, then I'm good. That's all that matters.