How to Sell Linux?

[Victor Odhner]

Derek Neighbors wrote, Re: Possible project:
> ... they have a KILLER concept.  They are doing FREE CLASSES
> on GNU/Linux.  Where they make REAL course material and
> schedule a semester and require a book etc.

BTW, my son took a course at Paradise Valley Community College
using the textbook, "Guide to UNIX Using Linux".  There is
some decent material out there about using the OS.  But I'm
guessing there is a lot of room for materials on the
applications and how to get results from them.

When the Colleges offer courses on "Image Manipulation
Using the GIMP", or "Home Accounting with GNUCash", or
"Office Computing using Star Office", etc., then you will
know that minds are opening towards Linux.

When doing a demonstration of a computer, we need to "put on
our marketing shoes and our interviewing suits", as it were,
and not mistake Joe Public for someone who cares about issues
of monopoly, copyright restrictions, security, and other things
that we sometimes like to get excited about.  Most people don't
care at all about ANY of these things, and will be turned off
if you bring them up.  Now really, REALLY, I mean it, people
do NOT CARE about these things.

And Linux is not FREE (as in beer) for non-techies, it is just
less expensive.  Your ordinary user has to go to the store and
buy a boxed set of RedHat, and hope that it will install;
or they have to pay someone to install it for them.  But
Windows came pre-installed with the box, so there's a chance
they have already bought it.

So why should they switch?  That's what we need to be ready
to tell them.  I suggest that we practice our answers here
on the list ...

Any demonstration of Linux for the public had better be done
by people who respect people's practical respect for Microsoft,
for that ease of use that allows them to do their jobs without
becoming nerds.  If Linux is being demonstrated for the desktop
or for gaming, its selling points to the public will be ease of
use FIRST -- just to get into the running -- and THEN the
advantages over Microsoft:  lower cost, better stability and
(way in the background) the freedom and antitrust issues.

Of course you can take a different tack with a business person
who knows what a server is.  That's a different application.
Or maybe a business person who is paying license fees for
Microsoft for 10 or 20 office desktops doing more or less the
same things, so that a single Linux setup could cover all of
them for much less cost.  Embedded devices running Linux can
also be much cheaper in quantity since there are no licenses.
Linux is probably the world's most portable operating system,
and is becoming so ubiquitous that the available support skills
will become more and more available and affordable.

All these are things you can say to a business person, but
not to the casual computer user who will just have one
machine for word processing and Internet browsing.
Frankly, Scarlett, ...

And we should be prepared to say cheerfully, to some people,
that they probably should stay with Windows for now.
<ducking in anticipation of brickbats>
<hmmm, what's a brickbat anyway?>

Bottom line:  If we want to increase public awareness of Linux,
we need to make sure we keep our perspective in line with the
potential new users' interests, and work from there.  And the
first step is to LISTEN and understand where the person's
interests and needs lie.

Vic