Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Linux During The .Com Crash

Posted by Hemos on from the following-the-path dept.

freakboy303 writes "ZDNet has a short article that can be found here , It basically talks about what the last couple of year of gloom and doom mean for the linux world in general. It seems to me it would make it more appealing to .coms to use the free software but..."

2 of 243 comments (clear)

  1. I thought that... by AltGrendel · · Score: 2, Flamebait

    ZDNet was owned by M$ anyway. That would give them some bias.

    --
    The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination

    - Douglas Adams

  2. Why Linux Will Not Survive... by cscx · · Score: -1, Flamebait
    Simple. Windows keeps getting better at an exponential rate, much faster than Linux is getting better. For example, take the new crash-report feature in WinXP. If a program happens to crash, you have the option of sending the core dump to Microsoft, to which you will inevitably get an e-mail response back. That's where your $license fee$ for WinXP goes towards, for those of you that whine about it. Also, Linux is directly dependent on the failures/success of Microsoft. Remember that.

    While the Linux community does not seem concerned with money, the sad fact is that we get better service from Microsoft. At least Microsoft products work. And Microsoft products are among the best available. And Microsoft has never released any software that is as unusable as Linux.

    Since about 1999 a lot of people have become interested in Linux simply due to their disgust of Microsoft and/or Windows, not because they want Linux or believe in open source software. This creates a problem for Linux because if the disgust of Microsoft diminishes, or if the disgust of Linux increases, Linux will lose a lot of those particular supporters. It is possible that interest in Linux drops so low that it never goes much beyond the server market.

    Linux is not yet ready to compete with Windows. Nobody can predict whether it will be ready in six months or five years, but during this development time a lot can change. For example, Microsoft could release a Windows that people like, and the Linux community could continue to disappoint us. [quick note: WinXP] It is possible that in six months there will be more people disgusted with Linux than Windows.

    The Linux community portrays Microsoft as greedy and dishonest, and they portray themselves as angels. While I will agree that Microsoft is greedy and dishonest, I would describe the Linux community as naive, unrealistic, and disorganized. So far they have been giving us inferior service and inferior software.