Is Windows Vista really driving people to Linux?

Sam Varghese
Monday, 01 September 2008 22:22

Opinion and Analysis

And most people who buy a subnotebook don't give a rat's whether it runs GNU/Linux, Windows, any one of the BSDs or even Solaris. In fact, until some earnest nerd informs them of the fact that GNU/Linux is running that little box, they are blissfully unaware of it. They want that little gadget to perform a few functions and they want it to work without giving them headaches. The pricing of the subnotebooks is low enough to make it affordable by quite a number among the workforce.

To postulate that the average person is buying a subnotebook because it runs GNU/Linux will not, I'm afraid, stand up in court.

The uptake of Vista on the business front is low. But what is the alternative? In nearly every case, it is XP. The uptake of Vista on the home front is high. That's because the average buyer is, sorry to be blunt, ignorant. Else he or she would opt for the better of two dogs, and take XP instead.

If we lived in a world where the better technology won out, then no doubt everybody and their aunt Fanny would be using GNU/Linux. (And VHS would never have made the cut over Betamax). But that isn't the case - if you go into Australian homes to service hardware (as I have), you will see people struggling and getting high blood pressure due to a spyware-infested PC. But would they be willing to sacrifice a little functionality in order to get rid of all the muck on their PC? The answer is a swift no.

Big technology companies like Dell and IBM are starting to support Linux. But does this mean that their support for Windows has fallen off? IBM has saved a lot of money by turning to Linux as an operating system for its many lines of servers; now it has announced that it would do something similar on the desktop. But that is in the future - the announcement about delivering Microsoft-free platforms was made in August.

All of this does not mean that the number of GNU/Linux users is not increasing - it is very definitely showing an upward curve. But the same goes for Windows users. And if you look at worldwide percentages, it is extremely unlikely that GNU/Linux has anything more 2 percent of the market. Windows is in the 90s, Apple has the remainder.

So is Windows Vista driving people to GNU/Linux? I can see no solid evidence to back this claim. Anecdotal claims by self-styled open source advocates won't do for me, I'm afraid.