Agreed.
> Maybe, just maybe, we should consider a final bug fix release
> (2.0.32) to fix some of the more minor/nagging problems and
> then call it a day.
No, hardware advances will push distributions to 2.1.xx if the
2.0.xx series is not updated. That has happened before.
> Until then, after 2.0.31, would anyone be willing to volunteer
> their time to "replace" David and Linus in that role? I would
> volunteer to do it myself, but really lack the hardcore kernel
> experience and (maybe) the time. It's not that I don't think
> Linus wouldn't do a good job, of course. :)
The experience is only needed for deciding what features are
worthy, creating new patches, and resolving patch conflicts.
Since 2.0.xx is bug fixes and driver updates only, you could
get by with much less experience than Linus has. You'd need to
rely on mailing list surveys to determine what is good. Without
the experience, you'd also need to avoid patches that conflict
with each other.
Within those limitations, I think you could produce good
patches. Fixes would be slower because of the patch conflict
issue, but that is OK for 2.0.xx.