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this post was submitted on 07 Dec 2023
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My bugbear is all the Linux circle-jerking. I get that the fediverse has a high nerd-count (I’m one of them), but the “switch to Linux” sentiment is so tedious. Yes, Linux is great for those that have the time or inclination to learn swathes of new terminologies and procedures just to achieve the same level of productivity that the equivalent commercial data-harvesters offer in a more readily-accessible UX, but the vast majority of users simply don’t care.
This old meme couldn’t be less appropriate on Lemmy.
Edit: Not wanting to poke the bear, but the accusatory phrasing in a couple of the responses below (“you obviously haven’t used Linux in 10 years” and “you don’t really understand the motivation behind FOSS”) go some way towards emphasising the point of this comment.
Since when do people need to take into account if anyone else cares when posting to social media? They're not content creators serving an audience.
I get it's obnoxious sometimes but people are going to sound off about the things they care about on social media. That's the whole point.
I genuinely don't understand why people think this is odd. Think for a second about what the fediverse is and what it represents.
Why are we here? Why are we on the fediverse and not reddit or twitter? They both have more content, more intuitive systems, and more mature (if terrible) UXs. So why are we here?
The fediverse represents the same basic thing as a Linux OS for the average consumer: an escape from corporate controlled, locked down, and increasingly bastardized ecosystems. An open source alternative that, while taking a little more effort, rewards the user with relief from the bullshit they want to escape.
Of course it's popular here. How could it not be?
You'll also find early adopters tend to be more willing to put in the effort to learn new systems, and we're barely out of the early adopter stage for the fediverse.
I mean, this whole post is about what content is preferable in this specific community.
IMO it's not the "switch to Linux" sentiment itself that's so tedious, it's that it's just so damn oversaturated. It's like that guy who posted "if buying isn't ownership then piracy isn't stealing" like 20 times in one thread the other day. I 100% agree but OMG we get it, kindly stop saying the same damn thing over and over. It's just annoying that every post even mentioning Microsoft or Google devolves into a sea of privacy complaints and FOSS evangelizing to the point it's difficult to have any real conversations.
Completely agree, hence the reply to lolcatnip’s comment originally. It’s to be expected I guess, given where we are (as deweydecibel said earlier), but that doesn’t make it less annoying.
You obviously haven't tried Linux for at least ten years. It's really not like that.
This is the standard response I’ve heard from Linux advocates for the last 20 years.
I know it’s easy to assume off the back of my initial comment that I might not have, but I assure you, my frustrations with Linux are not borne out of inexperience.
I am not a programmer or anything and I've been using Zorin full time for a while now after trying it as an experiment. I would go so far as to say it's on par with Windows or Mac in many (not quite all) respects. Assuming you're not dependent on some proprietary software the only switching cost these days is... learning to navigate a new system.
Just as an aside, I find it interesting that people using LEMMY of all things for social media would perceive FOSS systems as inferior. I guess that's a testament to how far along ActivityPub development has come.
I wouldn’t disagree, and I’m not saying FOSS is inferior, I’m just whinging about the Linux evangelising.
There is no perfect OS that can have universal approval. However if I’d I said “Windows is a data-harvesting nightmare” or “Being locked in to Apple ecosystems is constricting and expensive” then I’m sure I’d see the upvote button hammered on Lemmy. But to seemingly question the validity of Linux as a silver bullet for the vast majority of desktop users is borderline heresy.
I won't dispute that fanboyism is thing, but also I don't think many evangelists as it were view Linux as a "silver bullet", just as the most ethical option given the alternatives. And they feel very strong feelings about this, that come across as Weird and Scary to people not used to seeing software treated with the same enthusiasm as politics.
Also, I should add that many view open source software as having the potential to one day be the "silver bullet" in a way commercial software can never be due to it's structure.
I’ve been reading about its potential for a long time. Maybe next year will be the year of Linux ;)
If your barometer for "potential" relies on market share, then you don't really understand what motivates a person to contribute effort to a FOSS project in the first place.
What’s your barometer, bearing in mind you said it had the potential to be a silver bullet? Silver bullet for what?
I don’t want to sound defensive, but please don’t assume I’m not invested in FOSS. I’m on Lemmy, Mastodon, Pixelfed and am the developer of half a dozen small FOSS projects on GitHub.
At achieving the task it was designed for. I do not think it's correct to say that Linux can have "market share" in the market of commercial operating systems because it isn't commercial software. By not using proprietary software we are exiting the market.
Linux absolutely does not exist “outside the market”, that’s absurd. Red Hat, Canonical, SUSE etc aren’t charitable organisations. These major contributors to the Linux kernel aren’t doing so out of love for their fellow man.
For you, yes, Linux is “free” if your measurement of cost is purely financial outlay.
There’s a great back and forth here, and the original thread on Mastodon, which nicely covers both the evangelism (my original issue) and the “cost” of Linux. There’s plenty of reactions in there from people talking about the same things, from both sides of the coin.
FOSS
I mean you are trying to poke the bear. And you’re pretending that people don’t constantly make recommendations all the fucking time. They do. Everywhere about everything. That’s how marketing and grass roots campaigning works. What I think is more interesting is why you’re doing these two things - is your shame of being nerdy so deep that you prefer to try and shame others for not being ashamed?
This response couldn’t be a more perfect example of what I’m saying. Thank you.
It really isn’t. I’m not supporting or promoting Linux, I’m not discussing the subject matter at all and I have no skin in the game. What occurred to me is why you needed to identify as a nerd and then drop trow and proceed to shit on nerds.
Your response is precisely the reaction I referenced by the edit. Why is it personal? “You don’t understand FOSS” “You clearly don’t use Linux” and now, beautifully, “You’re ashamed of being a nerd”.
I called out the behaviour you’re exhibiting. That’s not personal, it’s observation. Please clarify why you are allowed to make observations about people but they can’t make observations about you. Calling something “personal” is meaningless.
Nah mate, you can have this one. This is where I drop off. Jumping into a topic with “you must be ashamed of being a nerd“ is never going to provoke a worthwhile discussion.
Pissweak.
My bugbear is people constantly complaining about the Linux circle-jerk. We get it, you're the cool unpopular opinion holder in the place where the foundation of the site we're all utilizing shares the same philosophy as Linux and FOSS. We get it, you're so brave having such a spicy individual opinion.
Which is it? Are you seeing this complaint constantly, or is it a spicy individual opinion?
I’d probably say my preference to have fewer default knee-jerk recommendations for Linux within various tech posts about other systems isn’t particularly unpopular, if only going by the up/downvote count. Even if it was the other way around, I’d stand by it, however antagonistic you might find my “bravery”.