Re: [Staffslug] Linux Take-Up

Several reasons occur to me. I think you have to separate the personal and business users. For the personal user: As has been stated; by and large a new computer comes with some flavour or other of Windows. But, crucially, punters don't factor in the cost (in terms of money) of the OS when they make their purchase. It's transparent to them so why would they care? Is there any anyone out there saying "What OS would you like with your new computer? Here are the choices / prices". I don't know but I don't think so. MS are clearly far from stupid and massive discounting meas that cost it's not a significant factor. As Dave alludes to, Apple have cleverly maintained the concept in the public mind that MACs are different and cool even post Intel adoption. So yes, in terms of the home market Linux probably does need to significantly differentiate itself on some key point(s) before it will even be considered, let alone demanded by consumers. Frankly even if there is such a point of differentiation (perhaps security and anonymity [dare I say freedom] ), it's not going to change the choices made by consumers without significant advertising investment. As no company of note in the home computer sector that I'm aware of has totally pinned it's colors to the Linux mast I can't see that happening. People go with what they know, they turn to nurse for fear of something worse. GNU/Linux is set to remain a remain a niche OS in the home market. Fear of incompatibility and lack of support from providers of peripherals and ISPs is reason that springs to mind. Ever called your ISP to report a fault and had this conversation: ISP - "click start please", you - "I don't have a start button". It transpires that the call centre can support MAC and Windows users only. Business users. Here's a popular truism; no one ever got fired for buying Microsoft. CTOs etc fear not being able to hire people with the skills to work in support. Cost of training users. Loss of productivity in the period after adoption. Fear of change, cost of managing change. Business to business compatibility fears. Not to be underestimated! Common to both sectors is the fact that MS has massive inertia. If global recession can't drive business toward open source then Linux has to have some other genuine or perceived benefits to achieve greater market penetration. No solutions spring readily to mind! Chris. 2009/8/26 Dave <dave(a)staffslug.org.uk&gt;