Programming? Nerds? Open Source Software? People running businesses? Hacker News?

I dunno, what do you think is common to all of these situations? :P

(point being, zed surely could stir the pot less, but he's not changing what's in the pot. And if two pots happen to be similar, i don't know that that's his fault)

"but he's not changing what's in the pot"

Exactly, being an asshole all the time isn't changing anything for the better.

It sheds light on incompetence and disingenuousness, which possibly creates an environment where things will start solving themselves.....possibly.

being an asshole doesn't have that affect. It's very easy to find flaws in anyone's work. For instance, almighty zed didn't implement chunked encoding in mongrel. You don't see me running around calling him names and putting down the work he's given to the community to boost my ego. It wouldn't have any positive affect at all.

"It wouldn't have any positive affect at all." Really? You mean you are saying it is impossible that because someone high profile like zed shaw pointed out some factual deficiencies in a product, that it would never light a fire under their ass to fix them....because the manner in which he did it was rude? But, if he was polite about it, it might get fixed?

I can see how politeness would be more successful, but I am comparing causing visible public scrutiny while being an asshole vs no public scrutiny.....and you say this approach never could and never has worked?

Think about what you said for a second. You start by saying that zed is "high profile". You then assert that if he were polite there would be no public scrutiny.

The truth is that one must create these false hypotheticals in order to justify zed being an asshole.

"You start by saying that zed is "high profile". You then assert that if he were polite there would be no public scrutiny."

Huh? Maybe try a re-read of my post.

I'm not justifying him being an asshole, I am countering your assertion that if you are an asshole while pointing out legitimate shortcomings, that it will have no positive affect.

I re-read, here is what you said "but I am comparing causing visible public scrutiny while being an asshole vs no public scrutiny"

This is a false choice as is clear by your statement that zed is high profile. If he were polite there would still be public scrutiny so your binary hypothetical is meaningless.