[Wftl-lug] Dreaming about desktop Linux: The first community TuxZine wiki article?

[Christian Einfeldt]

hi,

This is a topic I think about.  A lot.  Desktop Linux.  The end of the
Microsoft monopoly.  A truly free market in desktop software.

But will it ever happen?

I would really enjoy seeing if we could, as a WFTL-LUG community, write an
extensive and article about what it would take for Linux (or GNU/Linux, for
those who like to call it that) to reach parity with Microsoft Windows in
the desktop market.  I'm talking 50% market share.

IMHO, there will be lots of challenges to achieving Desktop Linux parity.
The article that I'm proposing could be broken down as follows.  The bolded
items are section headings.  The one liners below them are section
headings.  Of course, all of these things are just suggestions, and I don't
want to take over the conversation.  These ideas are just one possible
framework to start one possible article.  I just wanted to get the ball
rolling, to see how a community driven magazine might work.

By the way, we all know about Wikipedia, which is incredible, but are there
any similar wiki magazines already out there in the world?

For the time being, I have pasted the topics below to the TuxZine wiki page.

Have fun!

The way it is now
The Microsoft monopoly
Apple and the famous BMW analogy
BMW is certainly NOT Toyota (not disruptive)
Apple as a content company
Firefox
Linux and servers

Why desktop Linux matters
content: access to our own data and to the content created by our culture
open Internet:  The fight for Internet neutrality
Innovation:  Freedom is a pre-condition to creativity
Quality:  monopolies result in stagnation of thought

Microsoft's strengths
The inefficiencies of highly networked markets: once a standard is
established, everyone places big money bets on it.  Stability sets in.
Cash, cash, cash
Name brand acceptance
Microsoft owns the distribution channels
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Tux's strengths
Stable
secure
reliable
Given enough eyes, all bugs are shallow
The coolness factor: Tux has cache
Open source collaboration highly distributed, no single point of failure
servers, servers, servers
God (goddess, etc.) bless Apache

The digital tipping point: what will it take?
Kevin Kelley's 2 step analysis: 1) the threshold of significance; 2) the
tipping point (point of no return)
The chicken and egg question
Money, money, money: how will we eat open source?
The institutional big guys on our side:  Google; IBM; Sun; Novell;
The big migrators:  Extremadura; Munich; Brazil

Breaking it down by niches
Education
Government
IT infrastructure
Defense departments (United States; Israel)

The key role of price sensitive consumers
Clayton Christensen: price sensitive consumers drive change
historical context: disruption has happened before
market leader is chased up market
How commoditization happens
How Microsoft is working to stop commoditization of Windows and Microsof
Office

The content quadry: what to do about DRM
Why DRM matters
Big content companies demand DRM
Consumers seem to be accepting it in SOME areas
The 900 lb gorilla:  YouTube
The importance of open source content production
Conversation, not content (Doc Searls' favorite rant)

Conclusion:  Freedom in cyberspace, but when?
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