There has been a huge burst of users switching from Windows to Linux for various reasons, but I have to say… Linux will not get the majority.
There are a lot of reasons and I being a Linux user, feel the Linux community would jump in anger when I say this, but… let me explain my opinion and you can agree/disagree on this.
Introduction
Linux is an amazing operating system. It has customization, variety, privacy, security, stuff which makes Linux, LINUX. And… we also have a lack of support, a smaller community (compared to windows), and Nvidia… Something which ALSO makes up Linux.
Well, in a platform like YouTube itself, we have seen MANY YouTubers switching from windows to Linux(example: LTT). The reasons are pretty obvious. It’s free, does not need anti-virus, and is getting easier to use by day.
First Of All — Understanding The Audience
Before getting started, we need to understand the people whom we want to switch to Linux. Most people who create hype about Linux, or use Linux or just talk about it are just the people who are into some specific field in the computer/tech industry (or similar). The normal users are the people who we should target. I’m talking about users who don’t care about anything like this. Users who are fine if windows data-mine them. Users who are not even interested in Windows 11 but still in Windows 7. Users who could not care more about the operating system they are on…
The Causes — Why Linux will Not be The Most Used
The Hardware — Something which Linux needs help In
Well… I don’t think I have to explain this. At Least 90% of the desktop/laptop PCs (not Macs) have Windows installed in them. Most users usually go with the operating system installed and don’t want to go with another one.
Now, if the big hardware companies, like Dell, HP, Lenovo, etc(depends on your region) at least have a “Linux version” of their computers, it could have made some changes. But of course, they are not gonna do that because even they know, that people are not gonna change what they used to use and so people won’t buy the computers. This is where Linux is stuck. It’s a loop where people won’t change until the hardware changes and the hardware won’t change until the people change. The only hope is the Linux-specific companies like system76, who won’t even reach the casual customers.
The People — Who are gonna Use the Operating System
The thing is, since Linux is not backed up by a corporation, it relies on the community for advertisement and spread of Linux and the community on the other hand can only reach a handful of people through YouTube and other social media platforms. The algorithm makes complete use of this and recommends it to people who are already interested or using Linux. At the end of the day, we won’t reach out to the casual users who, again, do not care.
Even if everyone knows about Linux, they are NOT gonna spend their time changing their operating system. Remember they are not interested in anything like that.
The Confusion — or the variety which we Call
I Love the fact that we have SO MANY Linux distros which we can choose from. Whatever I want, which fits MY workflow and which has enough support for my software… I have it.
This can also be a site of confusion for most people. Linux is just a kernel. If a person is switching to Linux he/she needs to decide what distro they need, what flavor/desktop environment they need, and tons of other choices, not to mention what drivers they need to install(if they are using Nvidia or something else) which can be “too much work” for most people. I mean… it can be easy and fast to do for people like you and me, but it’s just not what everyone is interested in. They just want an operating system that works when switched on and installs drivers automatically when updated/installed.
The Support
Here, there are two points to mention.
The first point is the stage we are in. Again, we are stuck in this loop, where to get more support we need more people and to get more people, we need more support. It is something that we need to break from, but since Linux is not backed by a corporation, the community is not that well controlled.
The second point is important. The Linux community is not really “Linux”. It IS backed by corporations like Red Hat, Canonical, System76, and so on… It’s just that… these companies only support Linux in a way that would profit their company. Let me give an example. There is a problem with the package managers in Linux. We just have too many package managers with the same packages. So, Red Hat once came with a solution to just unify everything and have “unity” within. So, what did they do? Well, they considered the rpm(Red hat Package Manager) to be the universal package manager. Of course, very few came to tie up since this was made clearly to increase their income. This happened a long time ago but it does give you an example of what I meant. Linux is broken into different pieces of community that are backed by companies which value their profit before anything.
The Difficulty in Learning To Use Linux
I’m gonna put it in this way… It is VERY EASY to use Linux. I would argue that it is easier than Windows. Some Linux distros have a faster install process. Some Linux distros like !pop_OS are beginner-friendly, have a well-thought workflow easy has faster performance, and is considered good in gaming. The real problem is… You guessed it, TERMINALS! Even the most beginner-friendly out-of-the-box Linux distributions require terminals at some point. Maybe your system completely uninstalls your desktop environment while installing steam(using LTT videos for example), maybe you are gaming and you need to install a dependency package. Maybe grub stops working, or maybe you just want to clean your system. GUI applications have some limits and the terminal can do the best work at the end of the day.
Considering the audience to be “casual, non-technical” users, it’s not gonna be easy for their fixed “Windows workflow”. Now… Don’t get me wrong Linux, is easy, but it follows a completely different path, which is not even close to what Windows does and the world has to change its complete mindset to get used to Linux.
Many More — Which cannot be covered in an article
Being obvious, there are many more ones which I cannot cover in this article without making this long and boring. These reasons are completely subjective, so feel free to disagree with any of the above.
So How Can Linux Be the Most Used?
Well, Linux can be the most used and can overtake Windows at some time, if most of the companies start using Linux as their default Operating System, which I don’t think will happen anytime soon if magically most people in the world start to be interested in Linux, and every Linux distro unite their communities and stop being selfish which I’m pretty sure, won’t happen. I mean… Sure… Linux will beat Windows, but at that point, there would probably be another operating system, which is gonna take the place of Windows and this will probably take a lot of decades. We are talking about the whole world turning towards another operating system which is… not easy. Simply put, as sad as it sounds, it’s VERY VERY difficult for that to happen.
Conclusion
With that said we finally come to the end. Now, I know that there are gonna be people raging angry with me on this, but, this is completely subjective, you might disagree with me on this, and that’s fine. I am open to changing my mind. I just shared my thoughts and… yeah…
That’s about it in this article, I hope you enjoyed it, check out my YouTube channel “FadinGeek”, and…… I’ll meet you next time.
You’re Awesome :)
FadinGeek
