Feeling down as Linus call me toxic

[Revioli]

5 hours ago, noitcelfeR said:

As a dev myself, I thought the comment was largely unneeded. Much of the time, people spend their free time developing this, especially the distros they were using. In my day job, I would never use a distro like they are, let alone do the tasks they are doing. However, the community still made the tools available (freely). Sure, there isn't documentation and the UX isn't great, but none of these people are backed by multi billion dollar companies, like Google or Microsoft. 

 

It really upsets me how derogatory the video came towards devs. They are not CSRs. They are tired and, much of the time, burnt out when they are doing this on their free time. These are their passion projects. Yeah, it's not Windows, but all of the bolts are there and they would like to make it better. I thought the approach could have been much better in this respect. I mean, at least show you're contributing by tracking a bug or file a documentation bug.

I wanna preface this by saying; This is from the context of certain members of the Linux community who insist, Linux is "better" than Windows. That's not everyone, not even the majority, but nonetheless it is fairly common to hear. Saying an operating system as a whole is "better" than another operating system is laughable, you could not possibly give every single feature available the amount of attention it would need to outperform it's counterpart. Some aspects of Linux are better (user control, privacy, etc.) others on Windows are better (ease of use for average users, compatibility out of the box, etc.)

 

To an end user, who develops what, and what thier circumstances are, literally doesn't matter when discussing whether the thing in question is well designed. Someone could spend 50 years putting thier heart and soul into something, but if they're are just really incompetent, thier work won't be good at the end of the day. Then someone else could spend a couple months, and due to thier talent, they hit it out the park. Point is, the amount of time and effort doesn't matter at the end of the day, only if the product is useable for the target audience.

[SnowyRVulpix]

8 minutes ago, Revioli said:

Windows are better (ease of use for average users, compatibility out of the box, etc.)

Ease of breakability.

 

... Sorry. My dad has been gone 4 years now and I still can't get over how easily he broke his windows install on a weekly basis!

[Revioli]

13 minutes ago, SnowyRVulpix said:

Ease of breakability.

 

... Sorry. My dad has been gone 4 years now and I still can't get over how easily he broke his windows install on a weekly basis!

Well setting aside how he managed to do that, whatever it is could likely have been made clearer, and been prevented from happening, which would be fair critisism against Windows. Linux isn't exactly the role model of anti-breakablility either, but at least there is an understanding that it's kinda what to expect, if you don't know what you're doing.

[SnowyRVulpix]

24 minutes ago, Revioli said:

Well setting aside how he managed to do that, whatever it is could likely have been made clearer, and been prevented from happening, which would be fair critisism against Windows. Linux isn't exactly the role model of anti-breakablility either, but at least there is an understanding that it's kinda what to expect, if you don't know what you're doing.

TBF, this is offtopic, so I'll keep it brief. I'm not 100% sure how he managed to break it, considering this is a guy that barely knew how to turn a computer on. I had to reinstall Windows for him on a weekly basis... even upgraded him to Windows 7 (yes, that's how old this story is) to try to get it to stop... In the end, I gave up... installed Linux Mint and... he never had a broken computer again.

The only thing he did on the computer is use a web browser. Nothing else.

[Revioli]

4 hours ago, SnowyRVulpix said:

TBF, this is offtopic, so I'll keep it brief. I'm not 100% sure how he managed to break it, considering this is a guy that barely knew how to turn a computer on. I had to reinstall Windows for him on a weekly basis... even upgraded him to Windows 7 (yes, that's how old this story is) to try to get it to stop... In the end, I gave up... installed Linux Mint and... he never had a broken computer again.

The only thing he did on the computer is use a web browser. Nothing else.

Well, if you yourself don't even know what he did wrong, this essentially turns into peak levels of anecdotal evidence, which isn't very useful unfortunately.

[SnowyRVulpix]

38 minutes ago, r821e228 said:

And again, not sure why no one has paid attention to Bryant Gardiner -- to whom in the last Linux challenge video is mentioned as someone supportive from the Linux community -- in his different videos he calls Linus a noob and in the latest one fabricates an intricate way to show how Windows hiddes features -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gzvvvnisf5M / Take into consideration that part 3 of Linux challenge was finished way before Bryant made those videos

I stopped watching that guy a long time ago. He just... I don't want to start throwing names around here, but he was pretty abrasive towards anyone that doesn't agree with his views.

 

41 minutes ago, r821e228 said:

Also, take a look at this thread and pay attention to Jeskspie posts -- I wouldn't call that Linux toxicity but as mentioned before, basically vegetarians https://linustechtips.com/topic/1393194-why-doesnt-the-forum-use-a-open-source-free-forum-ui-template-sollution-instead-of-sticking-to-a-paid-closed-one

I read that one a while ago and TBF I kinda agree with the sentiment.I stopped using IPB a long time ago myself because I found it and the support system behind it to be obnoxious. I've been using Simple Machine Forums for years for that reason.

That said, I'm glad Linus isn't using Discourse (Which is mentioned in that thread)... I find that one annoying.

[Paul Thexton]

20 hours ago, Whiskers said:

Some people seem to find it a genuinely insulting prospect to cater to ex-Windows users in Linux, which is just crazy to me.

Really good example of how Linux distros can cater to Windows users is the snipping tool example Linus gave, “hey, we don’t have that exact tool but here’s something that’ll do the same thing”. He specifically, and correctly, called that out as being a cool feature. 

 

Linux DEs don’t necessarily need completely overhauling to be more friendly to people more familiar with Windows, just more examples of hints when someone tries to run a standard Windows app/command would go a long way to giving them a nurturing hand.

 

As to the OP, you shouldn’t hang your hat on other peoples perceptions of a community you consider yourself to be part of. I’ve been using Linux for 23 years, and I can dispassionately accept that the toxicity Linus describes can bubble to the surface in some online discussion forums.  That itself can be a result of people getting weary of seeing the same queries (or the same type of queries) over and over again.

[finest feck fips]

On 12/4/2021 at 1:46 PM, r821e228 said:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gzvvvnisf5M - I know the video was made beforehand but still, Gardiner Bryant proved the point of Linux's toxicity. 

He's right, and this is not toxic. Being a little sarcastic in a 3-minute video you made to respond to 398431 people who wrote paragraphs ‘correcting’ you about an offhand comment you made in a 30-minute video (‘I dunno, doesn't really seem hidden to me’) is not ‘toxic’.

Y'all are really out to prove that in 2021, ‘toxic’ is an empty buzzword applied to any behavior that can be perceived as mildly annoying or unpleasant. Gentle teasing is not what the word ‘toxic’ is for, good God.

[finest feck fips]

On 12/4/2021 at 2:49 PM, Sauron said:

I have never heard Linus (or any other techtuber for that matter) complain about toxic people blemishing the reputation of the "Windows community".

This is because Windows users coming to Linux (1) absolutely do not know what they're doing and (2) are so used to thinking of themselves as knowing what they're doing when they sit down at a computer that they take great offense to any suggestion that they don't know what they're doing.

If you treat Windows users coming to Linux like they know what they're doing (see: the ‘Yes, do as I say!’ incident, or Linus' complaints about instructions that just just say ‘download and run this script’), Windows users complain that you're

• making things too hard
• being unrealistic about their knowledge level
• being ‘elitist’ by expecting (or just wanting) them to do any research before they come bother you
• letting them do things that ‘should not be possible’

 

If you treat Windows users coming to Linux like they don't know what they're doing (e.g., explain to them how file extensions work on most operating systems, and let them know that Windows' DOS-like behavior is exceptional and outdated), they complain that you're

• treating them like an idiot
• being ‘condescending’
• not respecting their ‘expectations’ for Linux to be Windows-like

 

The main issue is neither ‘elitism’ nor ‘condescension’. The main issue is that Windows users (especially ‘power users’) coming to Linux suddenly find themselves disfluent, clumsy, and clueless. Finding out you've (even subconsciously) overestimated your competency is frustrating and embarrassing. If personal computing is part of your identity, the suggestion that someone else might know better than you how to approach or use your personal computer for a given task can be threatening, if your own competency in the task is the kind of thing you take for granted. Anyone who reminds you in any way of your unfortunate situation will seem like a provocateur to you.

The other problem is that some users do not understand how spoiled and bratty they come across when they ask for help without

1. signaling that they've made any effort to understand the issue themselves by doing prior research,
2. any appreciation of how much work volunteer support is,
3. doing anything to make supporting them easier (clearly describing their use case, dumping info on their hardware and OS configuration, searching the forum for similar threads, etc.)
4. consulting the documentation that was written to answer their exact question, often by the exact same people they're talking to.

Linux newbies who are realistic about what they know (or just try to show a little humility) and show that they have respect for the time of others are generally treated very kindly. If you come in looking demanding, lazy, and helpless, you're gonna annoy people. Users like that are the kind that burn volunteers out. If you're polite and considerate when you ask for help, 99.9% of people will be kind to you no matter how lost you are, and they'll be quick to tell the other 0.1% to shut the fuck up. This is not some secret to navigating the Linux community— just common sense.

[Sauron]

8 hours ago, finest feck fips said:

see: the ‘Yes, do as I say!’ incident

To be fair, in that case he was following official documentation to the letter and he admitted to his mistake at the end of the video. It was just unfortunate timing with PopOS' steam package being broken at the time.

[finest feck fips]

42 minutes ago, Sauron said:

To be fair, in that case he was following official documentation to the letter and he admitted to his mistake at the end of the video.

I agree that Linus has good excuses for making that mistake, and I think the way he handled it in the video was mostly fine. My point is mainly that Windows power users are asking for opposite things when they say ‘don't be an elitist’ and ‘don't condescend to me’, and that makes it difficult for Linux users and developers to navigate how to deal with them without coming across as offensive.

I think some of the problem can be avoided when distro developers or Linux users offering support have detailed knowledge of the expectations and intuitions of Windows users. The Linux challenge video series may actually go some way toward helping with that, at least temporarily (until expectations change) for users who are very similar to Linus or to Luke. But I think when everyone's different, newbies are exploring strange terrain, and longtime Linux users' memories of what was hard and what was easy when they got started may not (for whatever reason) reflect the current difficulties for incoming users from other operating systems, going from Windows power user to Linux newbie is going to feel awkward. As the technology and its community struggle to guess which things new users know and don't know, those new users are going to feel like they've been overestimated sometimes and underestimated at other times. And both will be painful because it will remind them how annoying it is that things are strange and hard and different when they used to feel a greater degree of mastery at their computers.

Similarly, while Windows users are still figuring out how quickly look up reliable information for doing things on Linux, still figuring out which strategies they should default to (e.g., check the distro repos first, then look for external downloads if that doesn't work for you) for that, they're going to sometimes come across as more clueless than they realize, or like they've made less of an effort than they have (because their troubleshooting and searching skills with Linux aren't as strong as they are with Windows yet). The more users on both sides of the Linux newbie divide anticipate that, the smoother and friendlier those interactions will go.

When I'm offering informal tech support and I'm not sure what someone knows, I try to just ask them. When it comes to default behaviors of Linux distros, it's a bit trickier because you can't just constantly interview your users inside the OS.

[maplepants]

On 12/4/2021 at 9:11 PM, Harmsen said:

But every video they extensively call the community toxic and that hurts. Why is that necessary, do you really believe that the community is that toxic, that we're all horrible people

Not to be rude, but have you seen the feedback they've been getting on Twitter, the YouTube comments, or the the huge threads in the LTT official boards? If you haven't obviously you can check it out, but unless you want to feel even sadder about the community it's probably better not to. They've called out the community for being toxic, because it is.

 

Linus found a mainstream guide on page 1 of his google results for "best linux distro for gaming" and it told him to use manjero. There are lots of posts calling him an idiot for this choice, or claiming that he purposely chose a more difficult distro in order to make the community look bad. A noob followed a guide that said it was meant for noobs and many in the community called him an idiot for it. If that's not toxic, what is?

[Sauron]

3 minutes ago, maplepants said:

Not to be rude, but have you seen the feedback they've been getting on Twitter, the YouTube comments, or the the huge threads in the LTT official boards?

I wonder if you've seen the reactions to pretty much any video where they criticize anything...

[SnowyRVulpix]

3 minutes ago, maplepants said:

Linus found a mainstream guide on page 1 of his google results for "best linux distro for gaming" and it told him to use manjero. There are lots of posts calling him an idiot for this choice, or claiming that he purposely chose a more difficult distro in order to make the community look bad. A noob followed a guide that said it was meant for noobs and many in the community called him an idiot for it. If that's not toxic, what is?

Calling him an idiot is definitely toxic, but that guide he found was by definition bad... and maybe toxic itself.

Trouble is, Manjaro is definitely not a good distro for a beginning. By Anthony's own video (Switching to Linux instead of Windows 11), Manjaro is a middle tier distro.

I feel something like half of Linus' problems stem from his distro choice. You'll notice Luke having an easier time, because Mint is designed for newbies.

 

10 hours ago, finest feck fips said:

He's right, and this is not toxic. Being a little sarcastic in a 3-minute video you made to respond to 398431 people who wrote paragraphs ‘correcting’ you about an offhand comment you made in a 30-minute video (‘I dunno, doesn't really seem hidden to me’) is not ‘toxic’.

Y'all are really out to prove that in 2021, ‘toxic’ is an empty buzzword applied to any behavior that can be perceived as mildly annoying or unpleasant. Gentle teasing is not what the word ‘toxic’ is for, good God.

Condescending  isn't gentle teasing.

[maplepants]

3 minutes ago, Sauron said:

I wonder if you've seen the reactions to pretty much any video where they criticize anything...

Exhibit A: Response from this very board to Linus criticising Windows 11

Exhibit B: Response to the Linux Gaming Challenge Part 2

 

How are these even comparable? Are there even any threads on the LTT official board at all that come close to the Linux Gaming Challenge threads?

[SnowyRVulpix]

9 minutes ago, maplepants said:

Exhibit A: Response from this very board to Linus criticising Windows 11

Exhibit B: Response to the Linux Gaming Challenge Part 2

 

How are these even comparable? Are there even any threads on the LTT official board at all that come close to the Linux Gaming Challenge threads?

I have skimmed the first page only, and am not going to go in depth, but most of the Linux challenge first page seem reasonable to me. The only potentially toxic post I can see there is the user that claims Linux is beta software, and is pretty rude and condescending. 

The way I see it though is that the Linus part of Part 2 doesn't really represent Linux, and is making it seem like it is way way way worse than it is. Doesn't justify hostile reactions (not that I see any on Page 1), but I can understand wanting to defend Linux.

[maplepants]

3 minutes ago, SnowyRVulpix said:

Calling him an idiot is definitely toxic, but that guide he found was by definition bad... and maybe toxic itself.

Trouble is, Manjaro is definitely not a good distro for a beginning. By Anthony's own video (Switching to Linux instead of Windows 11), Manjaro is a middle tier distro.

I feel something like half of Linus' problems stem from his distro choice. You'll notice Luke having an easier time, because Mint is designed for newbies.

I'm with you that Manjaro isn't a good choice, and I personally would never have recommend it to Linus. I would have recommended Ubuntu. But I cannot fault his process for choosing the distro. If a guide written for noobs tells them to do something dumb that's really on the guide and not the noob. I'm hoping that this video series causes some new guides to be written that properly rate it as a distro for more experienced Linux users.

[SnowyRVulpix]

2 minutes ago, maplepants said:

I'm hoping that this video series causes some new guides to be written that properly rate it as a distro for more experienced Linux users.

TBF, if I was any good with words, I'd do that myself... but I tend to stumble over words when trying to write a decent guide  But yeah, I share your hope.

[maplepants]

10 minutes ago, SnowyRVulpix said:

I have skimmed the first page only, and am not going to go in depth, but most of the Linux challenge first page seem reasonable to me. The only potentially toxic post I can see there is the user that claims Linux is beta software, and is pretty rude and condescending. 

The way I see it though is that the Linus part of Part 2 doesn't really represent Linux, and is making it seem like it is way way way worse than it is. Doesn't justify hostile reactions (not that I see any on Page 1), but I can understand wanting to defend Linux.

You only checked page 1, and found somebody being hostile and rude. I think that makes my point for me pretty well. There's a reason why Luke talked about being afraid of the Linux community's feedback on WAN Show. 

[Sauron]

51 minutes ago, maplepants said:

Exhibit A: Response from this very board to Linus criticising Windows 11

Exhibit B: Response to the Linux Gaming Challenge Part 2

 

How are these even comparable? Are there even any threads on the LTT official board at all that come close to the Linux Gaming Challenge threads?

I should have said "anything people actually care about". Windows 11 right now is not such a thing, not to mention the prevailing opinion around here seems to be that Windows 11 sucks so any validation is met with agreement... and ironically, looking at the first page from "exhibit B" the only person being rude is the one complaining about Linux. This forum is generally pretty chill, maybe you should look on the other platforms you cited...

 

I refer you to any graphics card review with dozens of complaints about Linus being biased towards one or the other brand, any critical video on MacOS or iPhones, anything regarding consoles...

 

I mean, I looked for the word "macOS" in the ltt official sub and it yielded this fantastic post on the first page of a hackintosh video thread:

 

[whm1974]

11 hours ago, finest feck fips said:

If you treat Windows users coming to Linux like they know what they're doing (see: the ‘Yes, do as I say!’ incident, or Linus' complaints about instructions that just just say ‘download and run this script’), Windows users complain that you're

• making things too hard
• being unrealistic about their knowledge level
• being ‘elitist’ by expecting (or just wanting) them to do any research before they come bother you
• letting them do things that ‘should not be possible’

 

If you treat Windows users coming to Linux like they don't know what they're doing (e.g., explain to them how file extensions work on most operating systems, and let them know that Windows' DOS-like behavior is exceptional and outdated), they complain that you're

• treating them like an idiot
• being ‘condescending’
• not respecting their ‘expectations’ for Linux to be Windows-like

The third bullet point from the first list, annoys Long Term Linux Users to no end. There are good reasons go and RTFM exist to begin with.

 

The last point of the second list, why would should other OSes be like Windows in the first place to begin with? UNIX came out long before any version of Windows even existed. And Linux more or less follows UNIX conventions as it is suppose to do so.

[maplepants]

1 hour ago, Sauron said:

 

I refer you to any graphics card review with dozens of complaints about Linus being biased towards one or the other brand, any critical video on MacOS or iPhones, anything regarding consoles...

 

I mean, I looked for the word "macOS" in the ltt official sub and it yielded this fantastic post on the first page of a hackintosh video thread:

The hardware fanboys do come close to the Linux bad apples, but I don't the feedback (especially across the other social media channels) for the Hack Pro or other macOS content really comes close to the Linux Gaming Challenge response. Maybe that's because the Hackintosh community is so small?

 

Even other Linux content from LTT hasn't managed to touch whatever nerve they've managed to touch here. When LTT did the Pi-Hole video the thread was, obviously, full of jokes about the Pi-Hole blocking LTT videos as well because they contain ads. Nobody was in there writing that the premise of the video was deliberately chosen in order to make Linux or the Pi look bad.

 

Honestly, the call out in Part 3 was warranted. The response to the Linux Gaming Challenge has been a lot meaner and contained many more personal attacks on Linus than even their hardware reviews. 

[Sauron]

4 minutes ago, maplepants said:

Even other Linux content from LTT hasn't managed to touch whatever nerve they've managed to touch here.

I guess it would depend on just how critical the content is...

5 minutes ago, maplepants said:

Honestly, the call out in Part 3 was warranted. The response to the Linux Gaming Challenge has been a lot meaner and contained many more personal attacks on Linus than even their hardware reviews.

Obviously it's fine to call out toxicity when they experience it, I've never argued otherwise. It's just a bit unfair that so much emphasis is placed on this regarding Linux and little else.

[Dat Guy]

On 12/5/2021 at 6:44 AM, Whiskers said:

The Linux community is massive, and full of a great many talented and friendly people.

Most Linux users I meet online or offline behave like kids who just hit puberty, claiming they were 1337 h4x0rz just because they managed to format their "Windoze lol" hard disk with a GUI installer. I wish they wouldn't pretend to care so much about which operating systems other people use. What do they even want to gain - market share? In order to do what? And why?

[Dat Guy]

14 hours ago, finest feck fips said:

Windows users coming to Linux

"What was the goal of the Linux community--to replace Windows? One can imagine higher aspirations."

- Bill Joy, one of the fathers of BSD, Java, vi and Sun Microsystems.