> The distro maintainer generally takes significantly longer to push out a fix than the upstream developer.
Of course this is true in a sense, because the distro maintainer has to wait for upstream to push a fix before they can package it.
However, for the upstream developer, "pushing a fix" means "pushing updated source code". For the distro maintainer, "pushing a fix" means "compiling the updated source code and packaging the resulting binaries for all supported versions".
There are some upstream developers who could probably accomplish the latter at least as fast as distros do, but not many. But the latter is what I, as a user, need.
Of course this is true in a sense, because the distro maintainer has to wait for upstream to push a fix before they can package it.
However, for the upstream developer, "pushing a fix" means "pushing updated source code". For the distro maintainer, "pushing a fix" means "compiling the updated source code and packaging the resulting binaries for all supported versions".
There are some upstream developers who could probably accomplish the latter at least as fast as distros do, but not many. But the latter is what I, as a user, need.