We could do so at any time if the community decided it was for the better. Linux being open source means anyone can fork it if needed be.

China is setting the stage for an actual dictator.

An operating system kernel and the lives and destinies of more than a billion people are very different things to manage.

The problem with dictators is not that they are all bad for their countries, it's that replacing a bad dictator is too difficult.

If Linus were bad at his job, you'd only have to find someone better and start pulling your kernel source from them. No civil war necessary.

It's not so simple - there are implicit institutions in the network of who knows who, and who makes decisions that get executed, vs just having opinions. The revolution would be in the form of a fork that would need to fight for attention, money, allies, etc. - not wholly unlike a real revolution.

that's a matter of 'forking' resource usage... For a nation-state level, it's going to be a lot dirtier (defaming, violence, and possible civil war)...

Really?

Probably, at least from a security point of view.

Given the junk people wanted to merge and Linus shot down, I doubt it.