02nd Apr 2008 by Mark Turansky
Why Linux will never be the world’s primary desktop
Filed under Every year for the past N years has been proclaimed as “The Year of Linux on the Desktop!” It hasn’t happened. It will never happen.
Why?
GNOME vs. KDE? Which distro?
I understand that Linux is the kernel and that GNOME/KDE is the desktop. I am well aware of this distinction. Joe Average User is not. Joe Average User runs Windows because that’s what came installed with his machine from BestBuy. Jane Schmancy User might be using a Mac, but OS X came pre-installed when she bought her machine. In both scenarios, the computers Just Work™ when they brought them home and booted them up. It’s a packaged experience where the value-add of the OEM vendor is the preconfigured-everything-work-out-of-the-box.
Enter Linux.
First, you have to download a distribution. Which one? With this single step, you’ve lost 95% of the people.
Second, you have to install the OS. It’s a well-known fact that 98.87823423% of the people don’t know what an operating system is nor do they care. They want to vote for their favorite American Idol, not worry about what it means to walk through Anaconda’s install process.
The Free Open Source Software community (of which I am a fervent supporter) believes that choice is a good thing. They are wrong. Less is more, particularly when it comes to making choices. This is the paradox of choice.
The group of people in the world who likes more choice when it comes to operating systems is vanishingly small.
I’ve got CentOS on a desktop at home. I’ve installed Ubuntu on a work machine. Damn Small Linux is our OS of choice for our message bus. I’m in the minority of users. It takes one to know one.
The real reason people won’t switch desktops
It’s different.
That’s it. In a nutshell, “it’s different” will keep the vast majority of users from switching desktops. Joe and Jane Average User barely know Windows, I don’t expect them to voluntarily want to be a newbie on another system. No one likes being a newbie, especially when they’ve achieved some level of mastery of something.
One of my teammates (we’ll call him “Dan”) just got a MacBook Pro to replace his aging Windows laptop. Dan is among the technical elite. He chose Damn Small Linux for our server OS. One week later, he’s lamenting the fact that he’s not as productive on his new machine because he has to learn all new ways of doing things. He briefly considering remapping all the Mac hot keys to match the Windows hot keys he was used to.
When a tech master is considering remapping hot keys, Joe Average User is lost!
The average user doesn’t use hot keys, doesn’t know what they are, and certainly doesn’t know how to remap them. If they even manage to install a new OS, they’ll be lost when looking to run their programs; they won’t get the dumb joke in KDE where every app has to start with a K (Kommander? Konquerer? Kalculator? Please.)
The rise of Mac OSX?
If there will be another desktop to challenge Windows — and that’s a pretty big IF — it will be Apple’s wares. They’ve got the iPod and the iPhone leading the way. They’ve got a much cooler brand than Microsoft. They are trickling into the enterprise market (our CEO uses a Mac, for example, as does our creative staff, media department, and several developers).
Still, “Think Different” becomes “it’s different” for the average user. The person switching from Windows to Mac will be on the right side of the bell curve. The billion PCs out there in the world (and growing) will be running Windows for a long time.
I’m writing this from a Windows laptop. Of the 12 people I can see in my immediate field of vision, only Dan has a Mac. One runs Ubuntu in a VM on his Windows laptop. The rest are running straight Windows.
This article isn’t meant to be a comparison of desktops, features, security, reliability or anything else. I’m just calling it like it see it in terms of usage. The word “never” in the title makes my position an absolute. Perhaps I should modify it to say “Why Linux won’t be the world’s primary desktop for a looooooooooong time, if ever.”
I’m sure some will disagree.
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Reasonable arguments, but I think wrong.
Re: #1: Customers currently buy PC’s with Windows pre-installed. So if they bought a PC with a Linux distro and Window manager pre-installed, then this point becomes moot. And - for the first time in years - they can now do that. There’s now a well-known, user-friendly, and mainstream distro (Ubuntu) that you can buy pre-installed on your PC (from Dell, as well as other sources). So this problem is no longer an issue. At this point a user can just buy “a linux PC” without needing to either know or care about these decisions.
Re: #2: True this is an issue, but it’s not an insurmountable one. Just look at how many people have switched to Firefox - a browser that’s “different” from IE. More than anyone would have thought possible upon its initial release. Sure, it’ll take time before a large number of people make the switch. But I’m starting to see more and more people feeling comfortable switching to Linux and other open source s/w.
Re: #3: irrelevant. There’s room for more than 2. People will switch to whatever satisfies their needs. There’s nothing that dictates that people who are looking for an alternative to Windows must choose Apple.
Plus, never underestimate the allure of cheap over expensive. No matter how you slice it, Apple’s stuff ain’t cheap!
Mind you, I’m not a zealot who’s ranting that “this is the year of the Linux desktop”. I’m just pointing out what I think are flaws in your argument - and your conclusion. I do think that Linux desktop adoption will grow - very slowly, but surely. Until one day people will wake up and it’ll be a major factor. Just like with Linux on the server. Linux has too much efficiency in its model of production, and in its cost of production. Think about it: Linux has no need to “rush” its adoption in order to satisfy VC’s. And it will never “go out of business”. It will always remain a player, and keep making itself better and better (and never increase its price!) until eventually more and more people will begin to realize it.
DAR,
You make some good points. You are right that Linux has no need to satisfy VCs by marketing products or providing a “liquidity event” to satisy their investment. Linux will never go out of business. Linux is my preferred server OS.
Windows might not be on top forever, but I do think it will take a long time to displace.
Mark
Linux is not tough to learn. It just takes time. People don’t “continue to buy windows” they are forced to buy it. Personally I’ve never purchased a copy of Windows that didn’t come on a computer I purchased. I believe that Mac has a better product but it costs so much. Microsoft now has a monopoly, people are used to it, even tho they hate Vista they’re still going to use it because they don’t know about anything else. I hope that OSX takes a bigger % of the market share although I can say that OSX is far from perfect.
Anyhow I think thats enough of a rant for now.
Right now I’m guessing that the majority of Windows customers worldwide are
using illegitimate copies of Microsoft’s software. As Microsoft clamps down
on this copyright infringement to improve their revenue stream, they will
drive the 3rd world increasingly towards FOSS. Offering crippleware versions
of Windows for less money isn’t going to help much.
Desktops are increasingly being displaced by laptops, or even small computing
devices like Apple’s iPhone. Laptops are becoming smaller and smaller, and
the small screens require a modified GUI to work well.
In my opinion, the Asus EeePC is the first mainstream Linux “desktop” success.
Dell and other competitors aren’t going to stand by and watch their market
share slip away. Look for more small form factor laptops powered by FOSS in
the near future. As competition builds in this space, intense pricing
competition will drive the “Microsoft Tax” out of the equation.
Besides, Vista has got to be one of the worst pieces of software ever to come
out of Redmond. If this is the best they can do, how hard can it be to take
away significant market share?
Nice, informative and cleansed for the usual “FUD” and “religious” crap, though you forgot the most important thing which is that Windows Vista and Office 2007 are greater changes than both switching to (K)Ubuntu and Mac OSX
Very interesting points by the author but I’d like to say that sooner or later there would be lesser Joe and Jane Average User’s that will have difficulty in using Linux or OSX in their desktops.
Linux is also very serious in training people on basic and advanced linux system administration, which will help this generation’s Average Users.
Dell is also strong on their commitment to provide Linux-ready desktops and laptops.
John Robertson’s comment on third world countries migrating towards FOSS is true and is already happening. The high cost of owning a licensed Microsoft OS will eventually let them choose a better and safer Operating System that is FREE!
I was also an average windows user a few years back, a need to secure my system drove me to use and learn linux because windows just gives me limited options on securing my system.
The Mac made primarily for the Average Joe? They’d have a good chance of gaining considerable market share if it weren’t for the network effect.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_effect
How do you even copy and paste this ancient shit from 1997 into your blog without gagging? Is there some spamhaus that sells article-spinning copies of “Linux will never make it on the desktop” for a nickel apiece for bloggers who’ve run out of ideas after their second post?
Great article, I thought. The arguments were explained really well, and it’s tough to realistically disagree. Good stuff.
Just for the record, I’m a Fedora fan.
@Amazed,
I think you’re providing excellent fodder for my argument. If this kind of stuff was being written in 1997, then it’s amazing how true is still is a decade later.
I’ll predict that Mac OSX will gain some market share from Windows over the next decade. Linux on the desktop will still not happen for the masses. Windows will still be the OS on the large majority of PCs worldwide. By “large majority”, I mean at least 80%.
Note I said “PCs worldwide.” I am not talking about smart phones, hand held devices, or anything else. I’m saying Windows will remain the dominant desktop for PCs for the next decade.
When I write this article again in 2018, please come back and accuse me of cutting and pasting stuff from 1997.
Thanks,
Mark
Mark, congrats it’s a nice written article, you definitely hit it when talking about options, the community need to target efforts at least for a while, overall in those simple things, I’m a developer running Ubuntu for more than a year now (with the help of a co-worker, linux expert) and it’s great, but not for Joe Average User, just to point something really fast,, No MP3 in fresh install, I’ve been unable to install my webcam, no ALT + 69 combinations, and as I’m writing this, if you look my name I was unable to change the keyboard layout to write the ASCII 164. :).
(@Amazed, jajaja seems Mark really shut you up)
You make some interesting points, but it’s the same points that analysts have been making for the past decade. You’re analyzing the market as it is now, but there’s almost no denying that in recent years both Mac and Linux have enjoyed success with modest growth in market share. And at the moment XP is stagnating and Microsoft is struggling to bring anything new to the table.
But who really cares?
At the end of the day both Linux and Mac fill niche, yet expanding markets; their users don’t really care that they don’t have the biggest market share because at the end of the day the computer suits their workflow and is not getting in the way.
It seems to me that the only people really worrying about market-share are Windows users.
Why?
Who knows? Maybe it’s the one thing they can say they do better than anyone else. After all 80% of the computer market can’t be wrong can they???
As Mathew and John mentioned above, a serious flaw in your argument is that you’re looking at the market as it is now, and projecting that situation far into the future (2018?). Windows has the dominant share now, and for (mostly) good reasons, but …
#1 Dell, HP, Asus, Lenovo are all starting to ship Linux pre-installed. Yes, it’s just a niche market now, they’re obviously targeting the early adopters… but the seeds have been planted. That’s a huge change compared to just one year ago.
#2 New form factors are coming into play, especially the sub-notebook (Asus EEE, Everex Cloudbook, HP Mini-Note). Many of the manufacturers behind these products are putting a well-supported Linux distro (Ubuntu, Suse, Fedora) on them to cut costs.
#3 A few powerhouse companies are beginning to port and pay attention to Linux in small ways. Adobe ported Flash and then AIR to Linux, that’s huge. Just 2-3 years ago, Adobe could care less about Linux. Sun opened Java and made it work better with Linux (especially with Java 6). IBM made Lotus Symphony work with Linux.
#4 More and more applications are moving to the web where your OS doesn’t matter. See Photoshop Express for the latest and greatest example (using Flash/Flex which now does run on Linux).
#5 Canonical’s Ubuntu distro has gained such a critical mass of users, that Dell bothered to pre-install it on a laptop. Ubuntu is so popular, well-funded, and well-marketed, it could very well be the one that breaks through the clutter and gains mainstream marketshare.
#6 Most important of all, it is extremely difficult to compete with the price point of free. Especially when your product has as many criticisms and bad press as Windows. Have you read the article in Wired (about free stuff)?
Seeing that you’re writing your posts from a Windows laptop, maybe you just need to admit that you’re on the late adopter side of the curve? I’m writing mine from Ubuntu.
Hi Brian….
A appreciate your points a lot and quite agree with them… Because when it comes to future you can not judge the things in accordance to the current scenarios and projecting them down the line..
But the best part to judge them is to see the real stat’s diversions which are making the curves altogether..
And altogether there is now doubt that future is leading towards open source…