this post was submitted on 03 Sep 2024
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This is the thing Lemmy nerds don't understand:
For most people, using a PC is a chore.
To most people, using a PC is like mopping a floor, or cleaning a car. It's a boring - even unpleasant - task that you need to do every once in a while. They'd rather be on their phone or their iPad.
When you already view using your PC as a chore, and some Linux user says to you "hey, if you spend a day backing up all your files, creating an install USB, installing Linux, reinstalling your programs (and finding alternatives for those that aren't available), logging back in to everything, moving your data back across, and relearning how to use a PC, it'll be worth it in the long run!", you will just ignore their advice. It's easier just to say "nah, I only occasionally need my PC when I want to update my CV or write a long email anyway. Thanks for the suggestion though!"
They put up with an hour or two of MS's bullshit every few months. They don't like it, but they also don't care enough about putting effort in so that in future, the chore of using a PC only feels half as bad. At the end of the day, either way, it's still a chore, and they'd still rather be on their phone/tablet/doing something else entirely.
In the same way, they also don't care enough about ultimately saving 10 mins every month when they clean their car to go out of their way and do the initial work of claybar-ing, polishing, then waxing it.
I use Linux. I like Linux. But I'm just another Lemmy nerd, not an average PC user.
Yes, small things could quickly put ordinary people off Linux with the current state of software. I'm involved in running an organization that needs to submit reports regularly to the government using their online forms. Unfortunately the forms are PDFs that only seem to work in recent versions of Adobe Acrobat Reader. Any other software results in a more or less broken form. I haven't yet found anything in Linux (even on Wine) that handles these forms properly. So sometimes I have to use Windows.
For me there are still enough benefits to using Linux that I continue with it as my main OS, but for most people they'd quickly get annoyed by obstacles like this. Of course the government shouldn't be using one company's proprietary format that only runs on commercial OSes for their forms, but that's the way it is for now.
The gov and higher education should be forced to use open source software. I would absolutely support that.
Well, the PDF format was created by Adobe and even though they somehow got it to technically be considered an open document format. They are to my knowledge still the only entity with a complete implementation in existence. Just some food for thought.
You are correct, but on the other hand it doesn't hurt to make the average person aware of alternatives.
Can be especially effective when the person buys a new PC and needs to do all the stuff you mention anyway. Yes, it is still a new OS, but honestly, it's not that different - especially if the person remembers older Windows versions, it might just feel like going to familiar places (I know this is something my wife would really apreciate as she hates the constant changes of how things look). Obviously depends on distro, only have experience with Mint.
I'm saying this from a position of a resonably tech savvy, but not your average tech nerd (at least knowledge wise lol). Sure there are differences under hood but I don't think the average user would really notice them that much.