Even the best of us burnout on the things we love doing

[zridling]

Even when you do something because you love doing it, it doesn't mean that you can't burnout on it. Open source developers talk about the stress of coding in the Linux world.
http://www.datamatio...unity-burnout-1.html
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"Hang around the free and open source software community for any length of time, and you can't help seeing examples of burnout. A colleague takes on too much, and suddenly they're working harder for fewer results. They have a hard time concentrating on their work. They neglect their personal life. When challenged, they become defense and unusually hostile. Eventually, they withdraw -- and, sometimes, they don't come back."

[mwb1100]

I'm a little surprised that the article didn't mention the incident with Alan Cox: https://lkml.org/lkml/2009/7/28/375

... I've had enough. If you think that problem is easy to fix you fix it.

Have fun.

-https://lkml.org/lkml/2009/7/28/375

Maybe because Torvalds is a large part of the burn-out cause in that case (or at least the stick that broke the camel's back).

[40hz]

I think you need to look into the entire story behind that message from Cox and also the context in which that argument came up before identifying Torvalds as a root cause for somebody's burnout.
 

To my mind, there's a big difference between: (a) being burned out (b) giving up on something; and, (c) knowing exactly how much you're willing to put up with. I think Alan Cox's stepping down as TTY maintainer was far more a case of option-c than burnout. Most people that have followed Cox's career doubt somebody as prolific and as much of a character as he is could burn out.