The state of Linux at the retail store (NewsForge) [LWN.net]

NewsForge examines the difficulties in selling Linux systems in computer stores. "We are used to paying for almost every single service and product we use, and our bills are steadily increasing every year. To expect someone to suddenly accept the idea that they can have a reliable and powerful tool to control their expensive, high-tech hardware for no cost at all is quite an assumption. 'Free software' flies in the face of everything the customer would expect. It simply doesn't make sense to them."

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The state of Linux at the retail store (NewsForge)

Posted Sep 1, 2003 17:37 UTC (Mon) by mmarq (guest, #2332) [Link]

"It simply doesn't make sense to them..."

Not quite !

"It simply dosen't have mass commercial propaganda( and never will)"

It's much better... and i can tell it from my own experience. General Public dont buy Linux Systems in supermarkets, because cheaper confuses them, but because those systems dont have mass commercial propaganda and dont support the generality of those mouses and keyboards full of lights and buttons, as also the majority of "flash" brand new hardware and Games.

IMHO, in the first place computers should never had been sould as a toaster or a rádio... So Linux will end up winning if it not worries about the big low end of toaster buyers, pardon PC buyers, a focus instead in the faster growing more matured user. The low end will always exist, and big, in a foreseeable future, but more "thecnical" requiring users will grow bigger, simply by the fact that Machines and OSes are growing still very fast more and more complex.

IMHO, we have a "PC" starving market, because M$ is holding the low end "toasters", taxing it(at the expense of hardware industry) for their own benefit, and by telling all BSODs are faults of the users and if not, of the technicians that manipulated the systems,...

AND MOST OF ALL BECAUSE THERE ISN'T A ALTERNATIVE OS FOR ALL THOSE "FLASH" BRAND NEW HARDWARE, GAMES, MOUSES AND KEYBOARDS FULL OF LIGHTS AND BUTTONS

... i've been crying my mind out, for to long, for a far better Driver support and model, that would put defenitly Linux as a alternative to M$ in all market segments...

Free Standards is the way, or M$ will lock everything under DRM/Paladium , including servers, starting with the LOW/GAMES PC world, and with the help of those "corporate" C*Os that belive that buing into M# never fired anyone.