
Linux Will Regain Lost Market Share, Thanks to Moblin - linuxmag
http://www.linux-mag.com/id/7559
======
pierrefar
Every year since 2000 has been proclaimed that it will be the year for Linux
to break into the mainstream. I don't see how Moblin is going to change this
"winning" streak.

------
SamAtt
I don't see this getting traction with Google entering the market and
Microsoft finally getting it's act together with Windows 7 (which works very
nicely on my 1000He).

I'm not saying it looks bad. But using Linux requires a sacrifice from an
average user and I don't see anything that makes this special enough to
justify that sacrifice.

~~~
seiji
Consumer point of view: Moblin? A new OS? Scary and confusing!

Developer point of view: Moblin? A new OS with all components under the GPL?
Developed by Intel and released to The Linux Foundation [1]? I can now port it
from power hungry and inefficient Intel Atom hardware onto handheld ARM Cortex
powered devices? Sign me up!

[1]: [http://linux-
foundation.org/weblogs/press/2009/04/02/linux-f...](http://linux-
foundation.org/weblogs/press/2009/04/02/linux-foundation-to-host-moblin-
project/)

~~~
willwagner
Not only is a new OS scary, a Linux OS is even scarier.

While I don't believe it's so true these days, Linux as a brand still has has
this negative connotation with average consumers and is associated with
engineers, tinkerers, and geeks. It's largely an unfair stereotype these days
but it's hard changing consumer perceptions.

I'd bet it would be easier for me to convince my in-laws to install Intel
Moblin on their notebook over Linux Moblin, although at this point, my in-laws
know better than trust me with their computers.

~~~
jonny_noog
For better or for worse, There's a significant amount of engineers, tinkerers
and geeks out there who don't wish to see Linux loose its niche appeal with
engineers, tinkerers and geeks. They like that Linux is by developers, for
developers, that is its appeal to them in the first place.

I don't think it will ever go mainstream until non-geeks (or perhaps I should
say designer-geeks as opposed to developer-geeks, if that makes sense) are
heavily involved in at least the user interface aspects of the system. If that
ever happens (and I think that's a big "if") I suspect that the engineers,
tinkerers and geeks will be quite disappointed and go elsewhere.

I didn't vote you down by the way, because I'm not really disagreeing with you
and what's more, I feel this tendency for people to vote down comments based
solely on disagreement rather than voting down only inane/inappropriate/off-
topic comments is a crappy phenomenon. Your comment was none of these things.

