Sasha Levin, who describes himself as a "Linux kernel hacker" at the beast of Redmond, made the application for his employer to join the list,
If Levin is a bona-fide Linux kernel dev whose track record looks relevant (and that would be for the existing Linux kernel dev community to judge), then it makes sense to offer access to private lists.
But that's talking about a person, not a corporation. How is there any question of a corporate entity joining a mailing list? It's people who need to receive security reports and work through fixes, sometimes in private! Maybe if there's a second private list, not to fix issues but to pre-announce fixes once they've been made, corporate membership might be appropriate there?
Microsoft, like any other bigco, can access karma on an open source project by hiring devs who have that karma. Levin's karma should be based on his contributions and track record of constructive engagement, regardless of who employs him! If that's not how it works at Linux then I guess we have an issue of process.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
