Verily I say unto thee, that bbgruff spake thusly:
> Jason Locklin wrote:
>> I wouldn't at all be surprised if the 1% of people who are "geeky"
>> enough to buy computer magazines are among the 1% of people who
>> have tried Linux.
>
> That's fair comment.
However, it doesn't really explain why an OS with a purportedly 1%
market share, has an 8/11 = 73% print magazine representation.
Presumably /someone/ buys those non-Linux computing magazines. Are they
excluded from this 1% geek demographic?
Also bear in mind the "Freetard" factor. Aren't Free Software users
supposed to prefer getting their content for free? Indeed, aren't /all/
"geeks" predisposed to obtaining their content the hi-tech way (online)
rather than subscribing to dead-trees?
Sorry, but the analysis doesn't bear out the theory.
To me, this seems like a rapid uptick in mainstream adoption.
> However, the interesting thing to me is that this appearance of a
> plethora of magazines specialising in Linux, and general computer
> magazines now featuring Linux very prominently, seems to be quite a
> recent phenomenon in the UK. I "did a double take" myself 3 or 4
> weeks ago when walking past the magazine rack in our own local (and
> quite small) branch of Smiths. There seemed to be quite a lot of
> them.
> Why so suddenly, I wonder?
Short answer: Windows 7.
The long answer is: Vista was the straw that broke the camel's back for
many die-hard/apathetic Windows users, after years (decades) of enduring
insecurity, bloat, instability and extortionate prices.
Microsoft's answer was this steaming pile called Vista, that only
compounded the bloat and extortionate prices, "solved" the security
problem so incompetently that most people just disabled that "solution"
completely, and substituted a portion of instability with the most
chronic incompatibility of any version of Windows so far.
Then along come netbooks, and suddenly the mainstream get to taste an
alternative. Even after Microsoft pull their usual racketeering stunt,
and enforce XP domination on this new platform - too late, the cat's out
of the bag. People know the truth now: There really is a viable
alternative to Windows.
So the market settles back to XP for a while, and Microsoft complacently
sit back and congratulate themselves for having "cut off the air supply"
of yet another threat. But as Ballmer eases back into his leather office
chair, with a evil grin on his face and a Cuban cigar in his foul mouth,
he's blissfully ignorant of the fact that the Windows die-hards' loyalty
is changing to disillusionment, the Windows hoards' apathy is turning to
curiosity, and everyone is turning to at least /look/ at Linux.
The final nail in Microsoft's coffin is Windows 7, the news of which has
been received with about as much enthusiasm as an eviction notice. At
this point, Windows users are wandering around like nomads, looking for
a new home.
Magazine publishers, like any other producers, follow the law of supply
and demand. They must, or face bankruptcy.
So who exactly is "demanding" to read about GNU/Linux?
73% of computer magazine shoppers at WH Smith, apparently.
--
K.
http://slated.org
.----
| "The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep's throat, for which
| the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf
| denounces him for the same act, as the destroyer of liberty.
| Plainly the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of
| the word liberty; and precisely the same difference prevails today
| among human creatures." ~ Abraham Lincoln
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Fedora release 8 (Werewolf) on sky, running kernel 2.6.26.8-57.fc8
02:56:57 up 67 days, 6:55, 5 users, load average: 0.00, 0.01, 0.00
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