trashbird1240's Profile

Let's make clear a few assumptions before I proceed with my argument. I find these to be true and often take them to be facts, and they line up with my experience well. First: people don't choose Microsoft Windows, they choose to buy a computer, and monopolistically Windows is included. Secondly, as a consequence most people see buying a computer and buying an operating system (plus a lot of other software) as the same act. Since Apple, Inc is a hardware company that sells its software on its own proprietary hardware, people see two alternatives in the market, typically Dell and Apple. The two options are hardware-software bundles, though the former is not inextricably linked to the software it sells with. The important thing is that this is not a choice of quality, it's a choice of aesthetic; it's a choice between "Hi, I'm a Mac, and I'm a [boring] PC." So let's accept that people who are buying new computers are buying either a new computer with Windows or a new computer with OS X. In this scenario are they going to choose Linux? No. Linux is not an option. Most people, including people who consider themselves technically highly knowledgeable do not even know about Linux. Perhaps people who read computer magazines do know about Linux but there are plenty of reasons not to choose Linux. There are the software options that you listed, but most of all there's this: people view OS X and Windows as "user-friendly" and Linux as weird and unusable. The Linux Desktop Myth (http://www.psychocats.net/essays/linuxdesktopmyth) makes the most compelling case for this. Linux may never be big on the desktop because monopolies such as Microsoft are a logical consequence of buying into the idea of proprietary software development (what Eric Raymond calls "the manufacturing delusion"). On top of that, most of the time we're not even talking about technical "power" users. We're talking about people who think Microsoft Office is an operating system. They've never bought a computer that didn't come with Windows pre-installed. If they've ever used another operating system, it was MacOS of one variety or another, and they may have liked it, but it wasn't all that different since it was still loaded up with Microsoft software. They may have even heard about open source or free software because of Firefox, but since they don't understand what an operating system is, they're not going to switch to a different one, even if the idea of free-of-charge software appeals to them. People who switch are people like me. People who were almost successfully brainwashed by the Microsoft monopoly; but for the glaring fact that their software sucks, I was always on they lookout for an alternative. I thought I had one alternative: Macintosh. That's because Apple is a monopoly, too! They struggle to maintain the monopoly over the alternatives to Windows, and of course, they do a pretty good job. They advertise, they use DRM and all the proprietary tricks --- the same ones as Microsoft --- to maintain the Rebel Monopoly. Unfortunately for Apple, there are also people like me: people who don't think OS X is a real alternative, because it's not Unix enough. Luckily I found out about Linux and since I had previous Unix experience, I knew I could use it, and I switched as soon as it became practical. I was astounded at the variety, availability and quality of the free and open source software I found. I repeatedly marvel at how good all this stuff is; whenever I touch a Mac or a Windows computer, I'm reminded of why I switched. And even as technically knowledgeable as I was, I never knew about it; no one ever said anything about it to me. It's that hidden. So your article makes some good points, and is overall correct; however you're yet another prophet of doom for Unix, just another in a long line that stretches back to the beginnings of Unix, almost forty years ago. But Unix will not die, no matter how small its user base, in any market (desktop vs. server) because it appeals to people who think a certain way and it's better than anything else out there. People who proudly use Linux on the desktop are bound to not care. I care about your article because hopefully some Apple cultists will hear about Linux from it. I'm sure there are some among you who feel just like me, and you should try Linux.