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Linus's cult of personality:
 Linus "Kernel" Torvalds became the most popular Finn on the planet (1995-1997)

Starting probably from 1995 WEB provided high visibility to Linux with hundreds of WEB sites of different quality participating in the movement and providing important information redistribution points. At this point Linus Torvalds became Linus "Kernel" Torvalds: almost a symbolic figure of the cult leader. 

This tendency was strengthened in 1996, as a result of trademarking the word "Linux" by somebody who understood the value of such a trademark (actually Linus recollected that he got a letter about his idea, but chose to ignored it). After a legal battle that was settled out of court, Linux became a trademark of Linus Torvalds in the US and some other countries.

Attempt of philosophical/religious justification of Linux movement was undertaken by Eric Raymond in late 1997 in his famous The Cathedral And The Bazaar -- a very nice fairy tale that not only created a alternative to RMS  "free software religion",  but also greatly contributed to the creation of Linus cult of personality.  Several Linux oriented news sources like Slashdot and Linux Today became instantly popular and engaged in a similar "cult of personality" building activities.

I published a couple of papers devoted to the analysis of  "open source" religion and its mythological foundations so I want to avoid unnecessary repetitions here. It's enough to say that Eric Raymond claimed that Linux-style development (that he somewhat incorrectly understand as a free crowd of Internet connected developers forgetting centralizing grip of Linus on the kernel) is radically different from the traditional development and is a new, more efficient from economical standpoint method of software development in general. This is a typical "economism" (Vulgar Marxism) point of view. See also Raymondism FAQ.

Anyway, an explosive mixture of both naive and crooked, cult-style Linux advocacy and cult of Linus Torvalds became very popular in 1998 and really flourished in 1999 and beyond (see below).

"Cult of personality" is characteristic of almost all mass movements (I can't think of any exceptions). It is especially strong in movement with collectivist overtones. Stalinism is the appropriate but extreme example whereby an extremely powerful individual serves as a surrogate for the expression of  individuality by the other members of the society. But it's very important to understand that this is a cult. You don't have to be an idiot to become involved in a cult. Far from it. You should preferably be intelligent, but at a point in your life where you're searching for answers, certainty and direction. A cult might offer you appealing answers to complex questions and problems, the members can be friendly, hospitable, welcoming and have admirable goals.

Paradoxically,  talented individualists pretty easy fall prey to this trap and as an example I would like to mention a mass movement of  egoists is led by the compelling fictional writings of Ayn Rand  that is  pretty similar to a rabbit crowd of zealots inspired by Eric Raymond's  "Cathedral and Bazaar" fairy tail.  It'is interesting to note that Ayn Rand  (Alisa Rosenbaum) was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, in 1905 and barely managed to escape Bolsheviks in 1917. At the same time her deep hatred of anything socialist did not prevent her from building  the theory of "capitalist anarchism" (libertarian philosophy or Great Utopia of Greed) that later developed into a cult.  That's really funny because  ESR is consider himself a follower of Ayn Rand.

What I would like to discuss here is that for Internet-only connected developers deeply divided by their personal preferences and native countries and bound only by a perspective of building the "best open source kernel ever", building unity and consensus was perhaps the major challenge. In the past the worship of saints had served unifying purpose well. And there were conscious and subconscious attempts to extend this to the Linux development ;-). The result was the Linux cult and  Linus's "cult of personality," the deliberate fixation of individual dedication and loyalty on the single all-powerful leader, whose personality exemplified all the best a particular writer can imagine in a human. And as we all know the most effective brainwashing method is one, which the potential member does not recognize as such. The group gives new recruits the impression that they are the elite serving a heroic cause to save the world. Each member sincerely believes that the world is counting on him to fulfill his/her special responsibility. The members of the group share this profound sense of mission with the newcomer.

Smiling Linus looks out from the covers of magazines. Almost every article about Linus was an exercise in flattery. But when we talk about "the cult of personality," we should not be too hasty in accusing all those who, one way or another, were involved in it, debasing themselves with their flattery. There were of course many sycophants who used the situation for their own ends including enrichment. But many people connected with Linux sing Linus's praises more or less sincerely.  How was it possible for gifted and intelligent people to be deceived ? To begin with, Linus was and is a strong and vivid personality. When he wanted to, Linus knew how to charm people. Secondly, in the minds of the many, Linus's name was indissolubly linked with Linux (and BTW implicit association provides him a nice opportunity to became really rich, the fact that he understood pretty early and well).  Founder of the Scientologists L. Ron Hubbard has been quoted as saying that the best way to make money is to start a religion. BTW the Church of Scientology's in-house magazine is called  "Freedom"  and most religions have prominent use of the concept of freedom — usually as a condition free of material limitations and misery. Some sociologists consider open source to be 'para-religions' movement that, while it can not be classified as religion, include some religion-like aspects (e.g. enthusiasm for the cause, recruitment and motivational rituals, positive thinking, etc).

It's very interesting to see what can be done in the area of "cult of personality" in such a technological area as operating systems.  Linus role in Linux cult thus can serve as an interesting human experiment for the new role  that celebrity has become at the end of the XX century.  If politicians are now routinely manufactured in a manner similar to film stars and an intellectual lightweight can became an official leader of the country, why not have technical cults with technical leaders manufactured in the same way? It all seems perfectly reasonable in a world where simply being famous is viewed as an enormous achievement.  Still readers would do well to remember the words of Samuel Johnson: "No man ever yet became great by imitation."

There is also an important problem similar to the separation of church and state in America today. I believe that preserving the American secularism is fundamental to democracy and to the benefit of both religion and government. In this sense we all need to support BSD movement and can all suffer if it is irrevocably weakened by Linux techno-cult. From this point Linus, like other cult leaders can be considered as a hostage of the cult; both a villain and the victim... 

We will return to this important problem later when we discuss publishing of  extremely flattering, uncritical Linus' biography by O'Reilly.