Correcting Common Linux Misconceptions?

abolishPenguinPhobia asks: "I am a teacher at a comm. college and was looking to install Linux on a couple machines for students to use. I figured since the students have to learn *nix anyway they might as well have access to some Linux machines. Anyhoo...I was told by the network administrator that the linux machines were not to be connected to the network for fear of viri, DoS attacks, and so on. My question for the /. community: Why do people fear Linux? It seems to me that people are misinformed that Linux is only a 'hackers' OS. How can we change this?" This is only one of the common Linux "myths", and there are several more where these came from. Is there a central clearing house of such myths and intelligent efforts at debunking them somewhere online?

Comments

Reasoning?

[JMZero]

Was his fear based on Linux, or on the simple desire to limit the diversity of machines on the network. Security is easier to administrate when you limit yourself to a certain selection of OS's and products. He may even understand that Linux is typically very secure.

I know my company often denies requests like this not out of fear of something, but of fear of _another_ something.