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>but I can totally understand that he got fed up with being nice and getting ignored.

Not sure why "being nice" and "getting ignored" seem like they need to be paired. Linus failed at being nice and not being ignored. He wasn't ignored because he was nice.

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Again, I think it's a culture thing. He gets little to no automatic respect for being the maintainer. So either he has to engage in another endless discussion on the merits of the subject matter, or he has to shut the discussion down. He chooses the second option.

>So either he has to engage in another endless discussion on the merits of the subject matter, or he has to shut the discussion down.

My question is now:

Why does it have to be an endless discussion on the merits, vs shutting the discussion down?

You can have a firm discussion on the merits without shutting it down.

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