“Why” Microsoft has more desktop installs than Linux — Network World pontification

I think the real reason Linux does not have more Desktop presence is advertising. The majority of people (80% of the population) are “salesmen” so far as their personality is concerned, and they respond to promotions: if you don’t promote it they don’t know about it. According to our web server honeypots, Microsoft is down to about 60% market share, Linux is about 30%. This has happened without promotion. With a small amount of commercial promotion, another Linux incarnation, Android, dominated the mobile device market (from 20% to at least 51% in FY2011) — Linux on the desktop would have a similar change in market share with similar promotions. The real deal however is that OS manufacturer is becoming irrelevant with OS agnostic Cloud-based communications and apps that run in browsers, so eventually a for-pay OS that achieves nothing more than a free OS will fall away.

–Kubulai

Hmm. Not sure about some points this writer proffers: http://www.networkworld.com/news/2012/043012-linux-desktop-258724.html

Linux distros do not force you to upgrade every few months whereas you can continue to use Windoze longer. Ubuntu LTS is supported for at least five years. Other versions have been supported for free for at least two years. Upgrades are available so you can easily get the newest technology but not forced upon you.

That there are fewer Microsoft apps for Linux? Well, yeah. If a bigger percentage of the market (currently about 30% of desktops and 50.9% of mobile devices) was Linux, then more companies would write apps for Linux, and if there were more commercial apps for Linux there would be more Linux desktops. I garf at this problem every time I want to play LOTRO or Fallout. The way Micro$oft solves this problem is money, money, money — promotions, incentives, and, uh, occasionally extortion. If Adobe would come on board that would be a plus, but Cloud-based apps do run on anything and could well lead to more Linux. Or Android devices that double as a PC with keyboard, etc. http://jdnash.com/2012/04/heads-up/.

So far as the idea that Windows is better because of forced “policy” that restricts users: the Windows on the 10 computers in our lab must be wiped and re-installed from scratch at lest once a year because the users slowly trash them — videos, music downloads, changing browser homepages, viruses, malware, and more: that is all part of allowing a Microsoft OS in your organization. As to Linux, however, we have had no such policy problems: if the users do not have the root password they can’t break the systems. I feel that the article is wrong on that topic: Microsoft “policies” can handcuff employees so they can’t get work done, but they do very little to stop rascals from working their mischief.