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A study on tech literacy (lemmy.world)

submitted 1 day ago by The_Picard_Maneuver@lemmy.world to c/whitepeopletwitter@sh.itjust.works

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[–] Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

I think that's a pretty recent phenomenon and it still requires that there's a good friend or family member who is a Techie to actually happen.

That said, thinking about your post does bring a whole "chicken and the egg" possibility to mind: are Linux users tech savvy because of the open nature of Linux or are Linux users tech savvy because for most people the technical barrier to entry into running Linux is still high enough that they have to be tech savvy to begin with in order to start running Linux?

[–] Aganim@lemmy.world 4 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago)

I think it requires a bit of both.The average user only wants their computer to work and doesn't care if Linux is OSS or exposes the inner workings of the system more. For them there is simply no reason to install a different OS, pre-installed Windows might be a bit annoying at times, but generally it does its job just fine.

For us choosing a distribution, downloading an ISO image, creating a boot disk and going through an installer which asks 'scary stuff' like "do you want to accept our partition suggestion, or do you want to create your own? Oh PS this action may RESULT IN DATA LOSS" is all easy-peasy.

We are able to find alternatives for programs we need, or are able to track down a Linux version. Either in the distro's package repo, Flatpak (or Snap, for the more masochistic minded) or by compiling from source (with all the complications and parameter setting that sometimes requires). Or we run the Windows EXE in Wine.

Most users simply aren't tech savvy and/or don't care enough to go through these kinds of 'hoops'. Acquiring this knowledge requires investment, without motivation (which usually needs to be intrinsic) that simply won't happen.

We hate stuff like Windows being a black box and Microsoft trying to push their MS accounts down our throats enough to not blindly put up with it. Most people I know just create the account, go through with the installation and go along with their days.

It's the painful truth that yes, it requires a certain attitude to want to switch to a different OS.

What also doesn't help is the attitude I sometimes see in the Linux community. For example, I recently posted my experience with gaming on Linux. In short: it sucked, badly. Some responses I got were helpful, but there were also a lot of 'meh, that game publisher sucks anyway, you shouldn't play their games' responses. Fortunately I'm not a novice when it comes to Linux, but I can image a beginner would just say 'screw it', install Windows again and advise everybody they know to stay the fuck away from that elitist cesspool. If we hate that MS dictates what we do with our devices we sure as hell shouldn't start dictating what our (potential) fellow Linux users do with theirs.