Note that Red Hat, SUSE, and Canonical all don't use them. They maintain their own kernel trees with their modifications. These kernel teams have different priorities:
* stable ABI within a timespan (RH, SUSE)
* feature backports based on customer demand (all three)
* out of tree goop (Canonical)
I've also heard from others (though notably, not folks specifically at these companies) that longterm kernels are iffier than regular stable kernels because people come out of the woodwork to push weird stuff for longterm kernels, which destabilizes things more than with regular stable kernels.
* stable ABI within a timespan (RH, SUSE)
* feature backports based on customer demand (all three)
* out of tree goop (Canonical)
I've also heard from others (though notably, not folks specifically at these companies) that longterm kernels are iffier than regular stable kernels because people come out of the woodwork to push weird stuff for longterm kernels, which destabilizes things more than with regular stable kernels.