I got involved in a “Happy Birthday, Linux” thread over at Civfanatics. I had to stop myself before I got too long-winded and argumentative. All because one of the posters asked a simple question, “why should I switch to Linux?” I guess that made me a little extra sensitive to the subject, because I have noticed today a couple of items about switching to Linux, and MS “fighting back”.
First, Datamation has an article about The GNU/Linux Desktop: Nine Myths. He discusses some of the most frequent arguments people have for not using Linux, and basically debunks them all. You know the ones: “You have to use the command line”, “There’s no hardware support”, and the like. He didn’t come right out and say it, but the most common source of these myths (FUD) is MS and their apologists.
While I was musing about that, I found a new blog post from helios, TOYA Boys Fight Linux Flow. And he’s wondering about pretty muchthe same thing: why do apologists for MS fight so hard against Linux? MS-paid astroturfers are one thing. But why does the average “Joe Sixpack” fight so hard against the Linux tide? Read his post. Follow his links. And ask yourself the questions he poses at the end.
“First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win.”
— Mahatma Gandhi
