I think on most well-managed teams in the US software industry, if you were a staff programmer, you could get away with a rant like this just once; you'd be warned, and if you did it again, you'd be dismissed.

Obviously, if you were the manager, you could rant like this as much as you wanted. But then that's the point, right? Even on a team managed by a raving asshole, if you were lower-status and tried to get away with a rant like this, you'd get in trouble.

I'm pretty sensitive to it because candidly it's a struggle for me not to be ranty like this particular Linus rant (thankfully, I am nowhere nearly as bad as the worst Linus rants) and I've had to work hard to suppress it.

I think you would be surprised what happens in boardrooms and how bad heated discussions between CTO or CEO can look for outsiders.

I understand that if you are managing code monkeys whose lifehood is in your hands, you must behave differently because there is huge power imbalance. But workplace where everyone is competitive individual (top level corporate, professional sports teams, hacker culture) can work well with people who test each other constantly.

But if you're talking about the board of, like, AB InBev, I dunno!

There are people who get away with it, and there are cultures that are fine with it, but my guess is that about 80% of the time, your ability to rant like this is a function of the social status hierarchy. In a Lord Of The Flies sense.

I'd be uncomfortable working on a team that allowed it, because my thought would be: we're not really allowed to talk to each other this way, and the day I piss someone higher-status off will be the day one of my rants is used as an excuse to manage me out of the team.