What’s he getting away with, exactly? The value that we get from him dwarfs whatever you think he’s getting out of us. We don’t have to use his stuff. He’s not charging us for it. The power is entirely in your hands if you don’t want to let him get away with giving you software.

we let really smart or really rich or really famous people get away with that shit anyways.

This. I think people overlook his behavior because despite the fact he was an unrelenting asshole, he also did (and continues to do) a lot of good for the world. He supposedly has also made an attempt to address it via anger management classes, though I’m not up to date on how that went.

Of course, why rich and famous people get away with it is another story, but their supporters ignore the terrible behavior for similar reasons.

And he’s at least attempting to improve, more than we can say for those who use their abilities to exploit others.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/09/linus-torvalds-apologizes-for-years-of-being-a-jerk-takes-time-off-to-learn-empathy/

https://www.zdnet.com/article/linus-torvalds-on-state-of-linux-today-and-how-ai-figures-in-its-future/