Why Linux Can't 'Sell' On the Desktop

New submitter VoyagerRadio writes "Recently I found myself struggling with a question I should easily have been able to answer: Why would anyone want to use Linux as their everyday desktop (or laptop) operating system? It's a fair question, and asked often of Linux, but I'm finding it to be a question I can no longer answer with the conviction necessary to 'sell' the platform. In fact, I kind of feel like a car salesman who realizes he no longer believes in the product he's been pitching. It's not that I don't find Linux worthy; I simply don't understand how it's ever going to succeed on the desktop with voluntary marketing efforts. What do Linux users need to do to replicate the marketing efforts of Apple and Microsoft and other corporate operating system vendors? To me, it seems you don't sell Linux at all because there isn't supposed to be one dominant distribution that stands out from the rest. Without a specific product to put on the shelf to sell, what in the world do you focus your efforts on selling? An idea?"

Comments

heh

[stoolpigeon]

What do Linux users need to do to replicate the marketing efforts of Apple and Microsoft and other corporate operating system vendors?
 
Spend millions of dollars on advertising and even more in subsidies to hardware manufacturers (or like Apple make your own hardware.) But I have no idea why anyone would want to do that. Though I confess, I don't really care if Linux gets the kind of broad use that Windows has or even OSX. I used to worry about it, because I had a fear that if not enough people used Linux it might go away. But now Linux is so incredibly successful on the server and phone that I'm not worried about that any more.
 
I really hate Apple - their whole approach but more and more I find myself telling people, "Hey, if you can afford it try out Apple." It seems to work well for normals. They appear to have less issues than the normals running Windows. Frankly, I don't get it, but then again - I don't care. I just want people to be able to do what they want so they can leave me alone so I can focus on doing what I want - which means using Linux. I'm glad I'm not dependent on winning over people that are willing pay extra for devices that are locked down physically and ideologically. (Nobody needs to get their panties in a bunch defending Apple to me. I've heard all the reason people like their stuff. It's not that I don't understand - I just don't agree. I find their products to be aesthetically pleasing as long as I don't actually have to use them.)
 
And of course MS had to break the law to get the install numbers they had. I'm not willing to go that route either for Linux.

Re:Why not

[Black Parrot]

Why would anyone want to use Linux as their everyday desktop (or laptop) operating system?

Why not? It simply works, I can do whatever I want.

And you can do that without having to buy (or steal) 50 expensive software packages to get the complete functionality you expect of a desktop or laptop workstation.

I only keep a Windows box around so I can play commercial games. For me, it's just a glorified game console.

Linux still isn't trouble-free

[mikael_j]

The biggest problem is, IMHO, inertia. In order for Linux to beat the others it has to be clearly superior

And of course, Linux is still far from being trouble-free. I've been a Linux user since the mid-90s (although for a period I mainly used FreeBSD) but switched over to an iMac as my main workstation a few years ago. Was this because I couldn't get Linux to run right? No. Was it because Linux was "too hard"? No. Was is because of marketing? No. It was because it was UNIX and a turnkey solution. I know it's a tired phrase but it just works. I no longer fear software updates (apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade used to terrify me, had a few incidents where it ate its own package database or simply uninstalled necessary packages (like my X server) for no particular reason) and it stays out of my way.

Now, obviously this isn't for everyone. I still have Linux desktops at home, they're just not my main workstation because I still can't quite shake that feeling of "well, it's stable now but it took two days of configuring and god knows what'll happen next time I update some software"...

What about Ubuntu? Well, it's sometimes more user-friendly than Debian but it also breaks in new and exciting ways (for example, for the longest time I couldn't get it to accept the idea of an interface having a static IPv4 address and a dynamic IPv6 address using the GUI tools, and editing config files somehow broke the GUI tools so they would constantly assume that I had no internet connectivity at all).

Re:Not going to happen. Windows is "good enough"

[stoolpigeon]

It will be interesting to see how Win 8 fares. I agree that Windows is not horrific for normal desktop usage at home. Windows 7 has progressed to be close enough to my Linux/KDE setup that I actually don't mind it too much, especially with power shell. But the changes in 8 are rather significant. I've been running the preview in a VM on my Fedora box and there are some huge changes. I think MS may continue pushing more customers to Apple with it. I don't see it being much of a boon for Linux because Linux just isn't on most people's radar.

Hard to sell what is free?

[Anonymous Coward]

I've used Linux as my primary OS for 10 years now and wouldn't consider going back. The things 'people' want in a desktop/laptop PC (YMMV): Stability, reliability, security and speed. But there's another, less tangible aspect. When you're ahead of the curve (or even a little to the left); you're cool. You get that innate smugness when someone proclaims their new Windows x/OS y machine ePeen score that you're just a little bit more awesome than them.

Collaboration and openness; it's the future. First software, then government & enterprise.

Linux's hurdles are different from Windows

[unixisc]

There are 2 answers to this one:

• The risk factor - the fact that for the users existing hardware, a Linux driver may not exist, or that future hardware that intrigues him may not have a Linux driver. More often than not, they'd have to buy more expensive hardware to be ensured of its support. In other words, Linux may be free or cheap, but the things that would support it or work well w/ it ain't, like sound. Also, if the networking doesn't work, the user is SOL, since s/he can't even download the correct drivers.
• The choice ceiling - if someone is going there from Windows, then one has to make sacrifices during the move - it's like when one moves from a bigger house to an apartment. Few software titles in Windows have Linux counterparts. So it only makes sense if one knows what one wants to do under Linux, make a list of what one needs, and then go w/ it, knowing fully well that that fantastic game just released will probably not run under it

I think Linux could be more successful if computer vendors bundled complete Linux solutions w/ their systems. Something like say a laptop or netbook preloaded w/ Linux, along w/ things like printer, wi-fi and so on, working right out of the box. But Linux needs to have as complete a driver model as Windows. Right now, since Windows is the default, if a peripheral doesn't work under Windows, its manufacturer knows that they have a problem. But if it doesn't work under Linux, it doesn't apply, since a manufacturer can credibly claim that they never claimed to support Linux.

The other aspect is the risk factor for any PC vendor who might preload a PC w/ Linux and sell it. Problem being that if the customer buys something else to work w/ that PC, be it a new printer, stereo speaker or so on, and it doesn't work w/ the Linux PC, while it's not a problem for the vendor, the result is an unhappy customer. With Windows, this is never an issue, for what I said above, but for Linux, it very well is. That's why Apple limits what they claim will work w/ it, and explicitly tell their customers to buy only their stuff if they want it to work. Which PC manufacturer can do that, unless we have a re-incarnation of Sun or SGI?

As a result, if a vendor decides to sell Linux, they inherit all the problems that come along w/ it. While Windows support is provided by PC vendors such as Dell, there is an organized chain of command to go to, if it doesn't work. Here, even if one ignores the gazillion distros, the fact remains that support for Linux when things don't work is limited, which is why the scalability is just not there. As a result, Linux continues to be a case of pull rather than push marketing.