A lot has been said this week about Walmart pulling the Everex gPC and Cloudbook from their stores. Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols has a interesting article on desktoplinux.com regarding his views.
What it boils down to is the people who typically shop at WalMart are probably not even capable of determining what OS their computer is running. All they know is they bought the computer and then bought Quicken and couldn’t get it to run on the gPC.
Linux distros like gOS and Ubuntu aren’t doing enough to educate people by telling them that Linux is another OS, and that they can do all the same things they can do with Windows, Quicken and Microsoft Office, however they won’t be using those programs. They’ll be using Linux, GnuCash and OpenOffice.org and it’s all FREE.
As for gOS, it’s very easy to use and very easy to figure out for new users. So the software design and ease of setup is there, but joe sixpack just wants to run what his friends do and it’s likely not Linux.
What do you think? Have you tried Linux? Tell me what you think. Do you think new users can use Linux? I think they can, but the issue of compatibility will stop them. Linux companies and the rest of the industry needs to push Microsoft to make OOXML the standard file format for Word, Excel, Powerpoint…etc. Until file interchange can be made seamless, everyone will want the defacto standard, which is Microsoft Office. People don’t know that unless your doing something complex, you can write Word files and Excel files on Open Office and send them to each other with no problems. I just got through almost an entire quarter writing papers in Open Office and I didn’t have a single file that was unreadable by my instructor.
So, I implore the readers of Gear Diary to at least try the Ubuntu Live CD for 5 minutes before commenting. It just might surprise you!
Wal-Mart has tons of brand-name stuff. If you want to pay more, there are lots of other choices. Hey, I saw a redneck in a Neiman Marcus once so this cuts both ways. :-O
Yes Lex it does.
The whole WalMart issue is dangerous (off-topic) stuff, so I’ll let this be my last word.
There are many stories about this company and their business practices. Some are generated by union organizers anxious to tap into WalMart’s 1.1 million employees; others have an issue with the aggressive way WalMart negotiates with their suppliers. Like most things, the truth is somewhere in between the competing points of view.
My favorites are the people that don’t want WalMart in their town or neighborhood, like somehow having a retailer where they don’t spend as much for stuff is a bad thing. “Now Martha, don’t you go saving us any money down there at that no-good WallyWorld. You go spend twice as much at that specialty store instead!” Uh, OK.
An on-topic thought: even if they are limiting their in-store selection to Microsoft-powered units, low-priced computers that are reasonably easy to use at thousands of stores brings home computing to people that would not be exposed to it otherwise. That’s good, isn’t it?
So very true. Linux is good and all, but you cannot put some schmuck shopping at Walmart in front of it and expect it to work, much less find software for it.
Personally as president of the ASU Open Source Awareness Association, I took this hit pretty damn hard. I had high hopes when it came to the idea of these products being sold by Wal-Mart. Remember what happened when they started selling CFL lights? I happened to like that, and now my excitement has come crashing down like an outdated space station.