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Linux For Housewives. XP For Geeks.
Talinom writes "ZDNet has an article sure to raise the hackles of any self-respecting geek. They report that housewives buying small laptops like the Asus EE are causing Linux usage for that demographic to spike. A reporter for Tech-On states that 'Retailers and contract manufacturers in Taiwan say that novice PC users there, like students and housewives, tend to buy the Linux version of the Eee PC701, while geeks go for Windows XP.'"
I 4 1 amd welcomming our new script bashing apron wearing apple pie bakeing overlady's!
Will code for new sig.
Taiwan culture is not US culture, of course. I imagine that even Geek culture is different between the two cultures.
If you haven't been down-modded lately, you aren't trying.
Sacred cows make the best hamburger.
Well, I am not sure that housewives can't be geeks. Maybe they confuse geeks that are buying XP with idiots? I wouldn't think that a true 'geek' would give a rat's buttocks about what OS came on the hardware. I put what I want on there when I get home.
The article was short on details (aside from the study being in Taiwan), but my guess would be that the "geeks" are the ones playing video games, and unfortunately most of the big titles are constrained to Windows. On the other hand, a computer you're only using for e-mail and web browsing should opimally be as cheap as possible, and you certainly don't get cheaper on an OS than free.
She loves it because it fits in her hand bag, "it runs linux eh? what's linux? It does what I need it to do and it's cuuuttteee"
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
I didn't know that the day would come, when I would feel more unfamiliar (didn't say uncomfortable - but I guess that's coming, too, with Vista (oh yeah, I don't intend to move to Vista - ever)) in Windows than in Linux. But, alas, that day has come and now I have no clue how to troubleshoot Windows anymore. It's just way too arcane and complicated. In Linux and Solaris I know how to at least start troubleshooting, and then I can search the 'net for specific keywords (error messages, log entries, etc.). Some of this could probably be done with Windows as well, but I just find the "whole experience" of troubleshooting it, more hairy and unsettling.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Housewives are used to getting the products that have the best cost-benefit ratio.
The Eee is a machine that provides wireless web browsing and email, instant messaging, etc.
And it's cheaper without XP.
It's a no-brainer then.
As for why do geeks prefer XP? I can speak for myself and say that I thoroughly know the beast, it is a pleasure to google for the most wild assed software/driver you can think of and find that due to the widespread presence of the thing, pretty sure SOMEONE has gone through the same ordeal as you, and has posted a workaround.
It works, and given current hardware configurations and provided that you configure it properly, it is FAST.
I know it is light years away from an elegant OS from an academic's point of view, but I rather have XP on an Eee and be open to all the possibilities of interaction with other peripherals (oh, how our choice of words reveal one's age) than spending time tweaking linux.
I bough the 701 4G a few months ago. My father in law liked it so much, and after hearing the price, ordered two for his kids: 4yo and 12yo. (Kids from his second wife: I'm not married to a 4yo or 12yo).
Anyway, I'm surprised to hear the geeks take the XP version. I'm actually quite happy with the default Xandros install. It even has perl, ruby and python for crying out loud!
Linux... housewives? Only cheesy pr0n can result. "I'm here to repair your Linux install ma'am. OOohh, I see the problem right here. I just need to $unzip this and $touch that. Now let's $fsck!" ~Bow chica wow wow~
No no, this makes perfect sense.
Housewives don't play video games and download a bajillion "utilities". Geeks do.
Housewives want to browse the web and use e-mail, and have a stable safe system.
Geeks love the chaos and security challenges that is posed by Windows.
Wimins? On computers? What will they try next....
uh... you're supposed to get a Mac if you want to feel like an elitist-asshole... duh. Preferably a Macbook Air with solid state drive... $5000 or so... then install Linux on it.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
My mom's been using it for ages, I don't really get all the hassle now...
My 0.02 cents
I have to say, a stable Linux distro can be pretty boring. I like Fedora though, they throw in little quirks every now and then to make it all interesting.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
the Windows version is cheaper, or so I've heard.
You heard *very* wrong.
When comparing identical hardware, the Windows version is much more expensive. When you look at the model numbers, the Linux and Windows versions are the same price, but the Linux version comes with a much larger SSD.
I have been living this reality for awhile now. My parents and grandparents use Ubuntu (I forced/tricked it onto them), and are getting along just fine. When it comes to basic computer use, Linux has been ready for the Desktop for about a two years. I myself cannot stand using it, since all the weird apps I use only work with Windows. I like Linux, but it is the applications that are important, not the operating system.
Look at the Product Features:
Internal 4GB SSD based Hard Drive
Intel 900Mhz Mobile ULV 512MB DDR2 Memory
Intel 910GML Chipset
7" LCD screen with 800x480 pixels resolution
10/100 LAN WiFi b/g
Built-in 300k pixel webcam
Built-in stereo speaker and microphone
Interfaces include SD card slot, 3x USB 2.0, Mic and Headphone Jack, VGA Out
Ultimate Speed - 10 Sec Bootup, 5 Sec Shutdown
Windows XP compatible
Optional USB Based External Optical Drive
Optional Carry Case
3 hours of battery life
Measures (WxHxD) 225 x 21-35 x 165 mm
Weighs 890g
Who is "video games and download a bajillion 'utilities'", geek or housewife? That is unless your talking about games from 1998.
Spelling and Grammar errors have been added to this post for your enjoyment
Since the Asus EEE mini laptops actually come with a Linux distro pre-installed, I'd have to say your theory is critically flawed. They're buying the LAPTOP not the OS. It's incidental that the laptop has a Linux distro on it.
Have you been a housewife all this time without realizing it?
http://marriedmansexlife.com/
But the fact is, I have two PDAs that are Windows based and for synchronising calendars and emails, for the moment it has to be Outlook and Activesync to do that.
I also spend a lot of time minimising the footprint of XP as much as possible - I truly hate with a passion the default XP UI but I've used "Classic Explorer" for years now & can live with that.
Then I get XPLite, strip out the MS-provided apps that I never use and stick on my favourite free stuff like VLC, Media Player Classic, Firefox, Notepad++, The Gimp and a few others. And once I've thrown PuTTY on, I can SSH to my home server wherever I can get a low bandwidth Internet connection if I need my shell prompt.
To be honest, I've always thought of a geek as someone who just tries to find the best software to do the job he/she needs to and there's plenty of free or Open Source apps on Linux and Windows that are useful tools to have.
Yes, Linux does most of the stuff I need to do with computers and one day it would be nice to be able to just use one OS - but XP fills the gaps quite well and apart from a bit of extra time administrating more OSes on my PCs, I'm pretty happy with my whole computing experience.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.