@evan The answer is go back to LiveJournal and Alice gets to decide. If her post is fully public, anyone can comment on it. If it's private and Bob is in a group of people she shared it with, only Bob and the people in that group can see the post and comment. Now if Bob wants to make a copy of her post and share it privately this his group of friends, that's his business but then he's probably not a very good friend.

@danirabbit Most of what you're hearing isn't really about the quality of the various distros. It's more about the insecurities of the speaker and their need to feel smart, important, and valuable. It's just weird animal posturing and you'll see it in every aspect of the world, 'My truck is better', 'this popular song/show sucks and everyone is stupid', that sort of thing.

The easiest solution is to guide them into talking about their own projects and accomplishments. They love that.