Promoting Linux before release of vista

[Evan Leibovitch]

Paul Sutton wrote:

> Hi
>
> What has the group got planned to promote GNU/Linux before MS release 
> vista,  as that is going to get a massive publicity push for vista 
> Just thoujght we should do something similar at around the time.

Personally, I'm not sure if it's useful to put a lot of energy into 
something that is simply reactive.

What I do think needs stressing at a more general level is that "upgrade 
time" for a company is one of the best opportunities to introduce FOSS. 
It makes little economic sense to upgrade something that is already 
working (reasonably) well; a company that has already spent money on its 
proprietary software doesn't realize a huge cost benefit moving to FOSS 
in mid-lifespan.

But at upgrade time, the rules change. At that time companies need to 
consider the cost of not just the upgraded software but also related 
training, migration and (especially in the MS world) the required 
hardware upgrades necessary to run the new software. This is the point 
at which consideration of FOSS makes most sense on purely economic 
grounds. The other points (such as reduced vendor lock-in) also become 
issues which don't matter at other times.

Most of the Microsoft "MS is cheaper than Linux arguments" compare the 
cost of moving to Linux (retraining, integration, etc) compared to doing 
nothing and staying with Windows. At upgrade time, there's no comparison.

The release of Vista is the perfect opportunity IMO for Linux support 
companies to make a strong campaign, to keep in companies' minds the 
potential benefits of a "more complete upgrade". That is likely beyond 
the capabilities of a user group. Personally, I don't think that 
demonstrating in front of FutureShop on Vista release day is going to 
gain any real positive publicity for the FOSS community, unless we have 
some really good CDs to give out. (Before you upgrade, try this live CD 
first...)

- Evan

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