Linux Advocacy

On Nov 2, 2003, at 11:25 PM, Alan Dayley wrote:

> Let's see if I can put this in writing without rambling too much.

I'm very impressed with what you wrote. I tend to agree with most of it
because it addresses the organization. The advantages of Linux for
organizations are undisputed, certainly by me. I think there are big
problems with getting Linux into lots of organizations but that
doesn't have anything to do with any flaws in Linux. It has everything
to do with people in those organizations who owe there positions,
formally or informally, to their ability to cope with the quirks of
Windows.

My original questioning of the value of advocacy was aimed at the
individual user simply because that is where our advocacy is being
aimed. And while some of the responses here have opened, or at least
cracked, my mind, I'm not totally convinced.

Let's consider a simplified taxonomy of home users:

User A: She bought a Gateway at the Big Box store. It came with Win 98
and Office Home edition. She uses it for surfing email and writing
letters. Maybe once in a great while she brings home a spreadsheet from
work, also a Windows only shop. She has added a few games for the kids
and a program that prints out cross stitch patterns. She used to run
Software Update religiously but then her computer started telling her
when it needed updating.

She has never had a problem with her computer except that the
supposedly plug and play digital camera she got has never worked. She
doesn't care enough to pursue it. She hates to tweak with things.

User B: Lets his daughter play on the net with Kazaa. She also likes to
DL that thing with the monkey. Every few weeks the computer stops
working completely and his daughter bugs him to fix it. He has learned
how to boot from the CD, wipe the drive, and re-install Windows. His
daughter is happy and he is a hero.

Some on this list have asserted there is a third type who behaves like
A but suffers like B. I don't disbelieve them but I have yet to meet
one. I suspect they may have cheap e-Machines that are just wearing
out.

Now I think that User A is the ideal person for Joe's approach. She can
be persuaded of the superiority of Mozilla to IE/Outlook with one
glance. She can be persuaded to stop sending out .doc files by simply
pointing out that it is impolite in the same way that it is impolite to
hold a conversation in German in a group where only some people speak
that language. Suggest plain text or rtf. On the other hand, she
probably emailed a document in any form twice in her life.

Please don't talk to her about 'freedom.'

User B really wants his computer to be a mess. His daughter enjoys
screwing it up and he enjoys 'fixing' it. Linux has nothing to offer
him and we really don't want him on our side.