That's funny, because I haven't managed to find a desktop OS that is up to par with Linux for me. Preferences may vary, but second rate in your book is the only viable contender in mine. Also turns out that Linux does in fact have corporate sponsors, like oracle, red hat, etc. so I'm not sure I follow. Is closed source software top notch without corporate sponsorship?
The sad truth is that most software sucks, regardless of the license, there's just a lower barrier to entry, use, and discoverability with OSS so it's more visible. At least with OSS we can fix the issues instead of just accepting the suckage.