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New Contest Will Seek the Best "I'm Linux" Video
LinuxScribe writes "From Apple's ubiquitous 'I'm a Mac,' to Jerry Seinfeld, to Microsoft's 'I'm a PC' retort, operating system commercials have been flooding the airways. Except that Linux is the one OS that has been notably absent. Now the Linux Foundation is launching a video contest on their new video site to fill this void. The winner gets a trip to Tokyo next year to participate in the Linux Foundation Japan Linux Symposium, and some serious geek cred."
The contest doesn't officially open until late January; the blog post has an email address to contact if you want to get a head start.
Novell has already done this in several viral videos, just do a youtube search. The Linux foundation no doubt has less funding than Novell, so they should partner up on this and get a commercial out together, since Novell not only has experience/material on this, but a viable pitch as well what with the woman being Linux and more creative/better than the PC/Mac representatives.
And honestly, why are they still beating this whole "I'm a $PLATFORM" bit death rather than creating a new pitch, as Apple will undoubtably do once everyone has parodied their commercial to death.
I'm sorry, that was just terrible.
If it had been done right about the time the Microsoft Ads came out, it would have been okay. Doing it now sends the message that Linux is behind the times and unoriginal. Much like using Jerry Seinfeld years after his TV show was a hit.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Why can't we just pick a hot nekkid chick?
I admit that unlike with these guys I don't easily work with the hardware you already have...
Oh come on, that's needlessly harsh, and not funny. It's not even correct. Does OS X work with the hardware I already own? Does Windows Vista?
Take an Ubuntu 8.04 install CD, and try booting it on "the hardware you already have". In my experience, it will Just Work on just about any computer from the past few years. (An Ubuntu 8.10 install CD will probably work also, but I have seen that fail to work on a laptop... some drivers issue. 8.04 is the "Long Term Support" version, and extra care was taken to make it stable, so that's slightly better for Just Working.)
Ubuntu will do a better job of Just Working on "the hardware you already have" than Windows Vista! 1 GB of RAM is plenty for Ubuntu, and while it might be enough for Vista, I have heard that it's not "plenty". (Supposedly you really want to have at least 2 GB.) Semi-lame graphics cards are fine for Ubuntu, including the desktop bling, where Vista will run in some kind of fallback mode unless your card supports programmable shaders.
If a user can be happy with just a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation program, email program, web browser (with Flash support), instant messenger, photo viewer, photo editor, music player, and a few light games such as a minesweeper game, then that user can be happy with Ubuntu, nearly out of the box. (For the music player, you will probably want to install the extra codecs such as MP3 that are not installed by default.)
An average user might not be able to install Ubuntu, but will be able to use it if an expert sets it up correctly. An average user might not be able to install Windows, either.
steveha
lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely
Walk up to somebody in your local [insert supermarket here]. Ask them if they use Linux. Ask them if they've HEARD of Linux.
The chances of those two answers being "yes" is going to be low, lower than if you ask about Windows or Mac. Why? Because Microsoft and Apple put their names out there! What does the Linux community do? We make blogs. And give out free CDs. Guess who else gives out free CDs? AOL. Guess what they turn in to? Coasters.
Not everybody cares about their computer as much as you do. Furthermore, non-technical people don't have the time or desire to search the internet and learn all about Linux. Why? Because their Windows/Mac computers work for them and they don't see a need to change. So we need to actively show them why Linux is so great, and do it through the same channels as Microsoft and Apple.
The least effective way to get somebody to do something is to make them go out of their way to do it.
I'd like to be the first to say - get a sense of humour? For all the fun poked at everything else around here (especially Vista), it makes it really sad to see somebody taking a joke against Linux way too seriously.
Lighten up.
"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." - Tolkien
Can we nominate just Kaylee instead?
"Common sense will be the death of us all"
The best contribution won't be a single person, but this huge contribution of several people. Linux isn't one OS for one person. It is embedded. It is desktop. It is server. It runs the cloud. It runs your phone. It runs your coffee maker. Ir runs the web. It runs super-computers. It is the unspoken hero. It is a rock-star.
The only video representation of one character that fits Linux is a representation of all these characters.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
Actually, no. The vast majority of computer users that do not read /. on a regular basis equate "doing Y" with "program X." If you suddenly drop them in front of a completely unfamiliar interface and say, "But you can still do Y, you just have to adapt to a new interface & way of doing some/many/all things you used to do," you will meet with resistance, irritation, and frustration.
Reasonably sophisticated, computer-savvy users can adapt to new programs pretty quickly, and will even go out in search of a program that does things the way they want. The vast majority of users do not fall in this category. They have their status quo that they've learned to use, and they don't want it to change.
It's this fundamental misunderstanding of the willingness of an "average" computer user to change that fuels so much of Linux's struggle on the desktop.
Stallman would never say "I'm Linux". ;-)
Script suggestion: Have someone saying "I'm Linux", yelling starts off-camera, camera pans over sort of haphazardly, and Stallman launches into a rant about how it's GNU/Linux.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Linux is a pretty good trademark. Ubuntu is getting some recognition, but, you know, Microsoft presents itself by saying "I'm a PC". "Linux" is accurate enough for me.
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.