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Wal-Mart Ends Test of Linux in Stores (Associated Press)
This press
release has some mixed messages. On the one hand: "Computers
that run the Linux operating system instead of Microsoft Corp.'s Windows
didn't attract enough attention from Wal-Mart customers, and the chain has
stopped selling them in stores, a spokeswoman said Monday." But
this report goes on to say that "Walmart.com now carries an updated
version, the gPC2, also for $199, without a monitor. The site also sells a
tiny Linux-driven laptop, the Everex CloudBook, for $399."
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Wal-Mart Ends Test of Linux in Stores (Associated Press) Posted Mar 11, 2008 13:43 UTC (Tue) by martinfick (subscriber, #4455) [Link] There's nothing contradictory about the message. Basically it means that although sales were good (good enough for their web site), they weren't good enough to merit shelf space in a retail outlet.
Wal-Mart Ends Test of Linux in Stores (Associated Press) Posted Mar 11, 2008 14:09 UTC (Tue) by ncm (subscriber, #165) [Link] This is a commonplace technique in retail: keep a product out of stock most of the time, and then drop it because it doesn't sell enough units. Maybe its presence was depressing sales of higher-priced products, or maybe carrying it interfered with Wal-mart getting "promotion assistance". Or it could be simple incompetence.
Wal-Mart Ends Test of Linux in Stores (Associated Press) Posted Mar 11, 2008 14:17 UTC (Tue) by martinfick (subscriber, #4455) [Link] Or could it be that Walmart's success is actually driven by incredible attention to details such as cost / profit and the shelf space is better used selling $50 fans or whatever. Don't seek a conspiracy theory when none is needed to explain perfectly rational extremely successful behavior. Walmart has nothing to prove to anybody but themselves, you don't actually believe that they would play silly games with their stock just to "pretend" that they tried to sell linux pcs do you?
Conspiracy theory Posted Mar 11, 2008 15:12 UTC (Tue) by pr1268 (subscriber, #24648) [Link] > you don't actually believe that they would play silly games with their stock just to "pretend" that they tried to sell linux pcs do you? I dunno... It seems that whenever Microsoft has competition (i.e., A [non-Apple] consumer PC running an OS other than Windows), they start to act irrationally. It's not beyond the realm of possibility that MS pressured Wal-Mart to pull the gPCs from their shelves...
Conspiracy theory Posted Mar 11, 2008 15:30 UTC (Tue) by AJWM (subscriber, #15888) [Link] > It's not beyond the realm of possibility that MS pressured Wal-Mart to pull the gPCs from their shelves... Considering that WalMart (at #2 on the Fortune 500 list) has nearly 8 times the revenue of Microsoft (at #48), it sounds like a bit of a stretch. Impossible? No. Unlikely? Yes.
Conspiracy theory Posted Mar 11, 2008 16:16 UTC (Tue) by beoba (guest, #16942) [Link] "Give us a better deal on MS retail software, or we'll start selling Linux PCs."
Promotion Assistance Posted Mar 11, 2008 17:47 UTC (Tue) by ncm (subscriber, #165) [Link] You seem to be suggesting that no one at Microsoft has the responsibility to persuade the biggest retailer in the U.S. to help maintain MS's monopoly. Possible? Yes. Likely? No.
who dominates whom Posted Mar 11, 2008 20:17 UTC (Tue) by grouch (subscriber, #27289) [Link]
Certainly appears to me that Microsoft has considerable influence on Wal-Mart.
who dominates whom Posted Mar 11, 2008 20:37 UTC (Tue) by pr1268 (subscriber, #24648) [Link] Broken hyperlink fixed here - Microsoft filing in 'junk PC' lawsuit is full of holes. > They are extremely disappointed in the fact that standards were lowered and feel like customer confusion will ensure. I think the proper word here is ensue. Thanks for the link. It's interesting how my rant was "shooting from the cuff", yet I am probably closer to the truth than even I realize. It's not like MS doesn't ever give me any reasons to rant to begin with, though... ;-)
who dominates whom Posted Mar 11, 2008 21:27 UTC (Tue) by grouch (subscriber, #27289) [Link] Thanks for fixing the link. :)
"irrational"? Posted Mar 11, 2008 16:12 UTC (Tue) by bersl2 (guest, #34928) [Link] How is trying to defeat one's competition "irrational"? It's not right for them, as a monopoly, to be allowed to do such a thing, but it is most certainly rational of them.
"irrational"? Posted Mar 11, 2008 16:28 UTC (Tue) by martinfick (subscriber, #4455) [Link] How is trying to defeat one's competition "irrational"?Could you please explain this comment and how it ties into the above conversations? It's not right for them, as a monopoly, to be allowed to do such a thing, but it is most certainly rational of them.For whom? To try and defeat whom?
"irrational"? Posted Mar 11, 2008 16:42 UTC (Tue) by martinfick (subscriber, #4455) [Link] Ahh, I get it, you were referring to: I dunno... It seems that whenever Microsoft has competition (i.e., A [non-Apple] consumer PC running an OS other than Windows), they start to act irrationally. It's not beyond the realm of possibility that MS pressured Wal-Mart to pull the gPCs from their shelves...Sometimes it's hard to follow these threads! :)
"irrational"? Posted Mar 12, 2008 23:44 UTC (Wed) by jhs (subscriber, #12429) [Link] You could always try my LWN Greasemonkey plugin. It may not be perfect for your needs, but it does let you track read and unread comments, with a feature to minimize unwanted comments so you can focus on those you care about. It's great for the really long threads, and of course it's free software.
Wal-Mart Ends Test of Linux in Stores (Associated Press) Posted Mar 12, 2008 8:44 UTC (Wed) by dr_lha (guest, #86) [Link] I love it! Cheap Linux PCs failed at Wal-mart because the public didn't want them, not because of some massive conspiracy between Wal-Mart and Microsoft. I find it laughable that you think Wal-mart would try to force people to buy higher priced products - have you been to a Wal-mart recently? Its full of cheap stuff. Also accusing Wal-mart of incompetence when it comes to stocking is laughable. Wal-mart are probably the best in the World at managing stock, they have it down to a fine art, a well oiled machine. Yet somehow for cheap Linux PCs they are incompetent?
Wal-Mart Ends Test of Linux in Stores (Associated Press) Posted Mar 11, 2008 14:33 UTC (Tue) by tjc (guest, #137) [Link] Didn't they sell out in just a few weeks on the original gPC? Putting that PR together with this article, I take it that was mostly Internet sales then. Fooled by a PR... again...
Wal-Mart Ends Test of Linux in Stores (Associated Press) Posted Mar 11, 2008 14:40 UTC (Tue) by martinfick (subscriber, #4455) [Link] Well, it sounds more like they sold out of the 'test quantity.' In other words they sold out, but not quick enough, not as quick as other higher volume similar cost items. Yes, we were probably fooled by pro linux PR last time into believing that Walmart couldn't stock enough of them, when in fact it sounds like they did not plan to stock more than a certain amount unless sales were "good enough".
Wal-Mart Ends Test of Linux in Stores (Associated Press) Posted Mar 12, 2008 8:31 UTC (Wed) by TomcaT (guest, #51035) [Link] The online store seems to be selling them fairly well though. We ordered one to act as a small web / ftp server, and they were on back order at the time (this was about a month ago), so it took a few days to actually ship from Wal-Mart. Just by the nature of the item, I expect it probably does do much better on-line than at store locations: The only buzz generated by this was in on-line circles. The average Wal-Mart consumer isn't going to know about it when there isn't some kind of promotion or in-store push to move the units.
Anti-Linux bias Posted Mar 11, 2008 14:02 UTC (Tue) by pr1268 (subscriber, #24648) [Link] The Wired.com article appears to be heavily biased against Linux. I think the article should better be written to say, "Middle America Rejects the $199 gPC". I've said it before: Consumers may get the wrong impression about Linux's performance, reliability, security, and features if the only retail computers running Linux out-of-the-box are the "el-cheapo" bottom-of-the-barrel performers.
Anti-Linux bias Posted Mar 11, 2008 14:10 UTC (Tue) by martinfick (subscriber, #4455) [Link] Hmm, I disagree, I think that you are correct about the bias, but the conclusion should be more like: "Journalists still reject linux despite great sales of the $199 gPC to Middle America". :)
Wal-Mart Ends Test of Linux in Stores (Associated Press) Posted Mar 11, 2008 16:55 UTC (Tue) by TxtEdMacs (subscriber, #5983) [Link] Was there any follow up to an earlier story that said this group would see how many purchasers kept Linux on their machines vs the implied suspicion that many reloaded with Windows? I remember the initial data was fairly positive regarding the number of users that retained the preloaded Linux version. Nonetheless, the mere loss of contact with buyers alone does not imply that Linux was discarded. It is too easy to substitute another distribution, as some commenters, at the time, suggested. In any case, it would be nice to have some hard data to use instead of rampant speculation.
Running Windows vs. Linux on storebought PCs Posted Mar 11, 2008 20:54 UTC (Tue) by pr1268 (subscriber, #24648) [Link] ...kept Linux on their machines vs the implied suspicion that many reloaded with Windows? Forgive me for being Devil's Advocate here, but if such a survey were conducted, then it might be prudent to include numbers of consumers who purchased Windows-only PCs and then blew away the Windows partition and installed Linux. I'd even be willing to allow the benefit of the doubt and include those who configured dual-boot partition schema. It really wouldn't bother me one bit to imagine all those gPC buyers blowing away Linux and installing Windows. The point is that they'd be doing so based on their choice, not because it was forced upon them by the hardware manufacturer, the retailer, or the influence of some OS vendor already declared guilty of monopoly abuse and predatory business practices.
Implications and innuendo Posted Mar 13, 2008 23:43 UTC (Thu) by AnswerGuy (subscriber, #1256) [Link] The implication that people blew away Linux and replace it with MS Windows is laced with innuendo that they wouldn't be buying the copy of MS Windows that they were installing on it. Some/most might be pirated. Some, perhaps even many, might be old copies of MS Windows that were used on older machines. If those old machines were dead or being discarded then it should be perfectly legal for people to buy a new system and install their old (legally licensed to them, in perpetuity, for use on a single system) software (and their data, etc) on them. (So even if every gPC sold which had its OS replaced with a copy of MS Windows didn't result in a corresponding sale of a copy of MS Windows --- it doesn't mean that they were all pirated copies). JimD
Implications and innuendo Posted Mar 17, 2008 16:35 UTC (Mon) by pr1268 (subscriber, #24648) [Link] The implication that people blew away Linux and replace it with MS Windows is laced with innuendo that they wouldn't be buying the copy of MS Windows that they were installing on it. When posting my earlier comment I wasn't even remotely considering the legitimacy of those copies of Windows with which users were replacing Linux - the point was about (1) users who feel they might've avoided the Microsoft Tax by purchasing a PC that wasn't pre-loaded with Windows, and/or (2) users who wanted a clean install of Windows without the annoying demoware that infests most retail PCs these days. In either situation, the user has control over the PC which he/she wouldn't ordinarily have. But your point is well-taken. Speaking for myself as a consumer, I do prefer to have some control over a PC hardware/software investment instead of being spoon-fed the Microsoft "experience" and all its accompanying adware/demoware/trial software. Assuming a substantial majority of gPC buyers kept Linux (even if it was by wiping the drive and installing a different distro), then that speaks volumes about Linux's market presence.
Wal-Mart Ends Test of Linux in Stores (Associated Press) Posted Mar 11, 2008 21:54 UTC (Tue) by ringerc (guest, #3071) [Link] What'd be fascinating would be to use an EFI firmware that could talk to the NIC, do DHCP, and report on the partition table & boot loader during POST when it had a 'net connection. It'd never happen for privacy reasons. It'd also only provide data on users with DSL/cable routers or on larger networks (ie with DHCP & LAN-based internet access) so there'd be a potential selection/response rate bias influencing the results. Even so, it'd be better than just having the preinstalled distro poke a web server with a unique install ID.
Wal-Mart Ends Test of Linux in Stores (Associated Press) Posted Mar 12, 2008 18:18 UTC (Wed) by clump (subscriber, #27801) [Link] What'd be fascinating would be to use an EFI firmware that could talk to the NIC, do DHCP, and report on the partition table [and] boot loader during POST when it had a 'net connection.I was convinced years back reading discussion about Intel's CPUID that such schemes weren't good ideas. Here in the States, we've had many privacy setbacks recently and plenty of evidence that citizen data collection and monitoring solutions are being abused.
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