[GTALUG] Surveillance Capitalism [was another thread]

[Evan Leibovitch]

On Sat, 3 Apr 2021 at 22:45, Alvin Starr via talk <talk at gtalug.org> wrote:

[much snipped]

> I am really not a fan of Microsoft as just about anybody who knows me will
> attest to but I also don't see them as being run by a Mike Myers Dr. Evil
> kind of character.
>
Ditto.

> Most of the "Windows weenies" I know will run screaming from WSL and I
> expect that the primary uptake will be by Linux users who are forced by
> corporate doctrine to use Windows as a platform.
>
There are many other reasons, some of which I will be going through in my
talk at the next GTALUG.

Preview: There is also simple fatigue with thye Linux desktop, such as
fighting a never-ending battle with its sound subsystem. PulseAudio would
think that my USB microphone is also my default speaker because it has a
headphone jack for monitor mode; so PA reverts to that default at every
bootup. Eventually you just don't want to keep fighting that kind of crap,
and in online community support forums dead ends far outnumber problem
resolutions. There are quite a few other war stories built up over the
years. Windows has improved markedly in stability, I have encountered zero
BSODs in Windows 10. Also, there are too many wonderful programs and
peripherals out there that simply will never support desktop Linux
distributions that collectively haven't risen above 3% of the global
installed base (and are now at 1.85%
<https://www.statista.com/statistics/268237/global-market-share-held-by-operating-systems-since-2009/>
).

Linux-the-OS is but one piece of open source software, while I interact
daily far more with my apps than the OS. One can replace Linux with Windows
and still run a full suite of FOSS applications, quite a few of which
actually run better under Windows than they do under Linux. Video
processing speed can rise significantly when Handbrake (also others) is
able to exploit GPU cycles when the driver enables it. I never have to
worry about that app which insists on looking like GNOME even though I'm
running KDE. And while Steam supports Linux, its experience is optimised
for Windows; Linux will never be a preferred gaming platform.

The Cloud is Linux.
Servers are Linux.
Mobile is Linux.
Education is Linux (Chromebooks, Raspberry Pi, etc).
Playstations and Macs are BSD-based.

I personally have no problem conceding the productivity and gaming desktop
OS to Windows, we've won nearly everywhere else. And thanks to WSL, I can
still run Linux off my desktop when I want it without needing to dual-boot.

> It may be that in the long run WSL will actually erode the dominance of
> Windows and MS.
>
Hard to speculate, but I envision that the experience of the Edge browser
was a dry-run for Windows. Abandon a proprietary platform and evolve to
proprietary pieces on top of an open source core. That means Windows will
become Linux-based in a similar manner to ChromeOS. Developing WSL is
giving MS the expertise in the shims and compatibility layers it will need
if it ever goes in this direction.

As for erosion: consider that this sector that MS dominates is an
ever-shrinking piece of the IT pie. PC gaming has to compete with dedicated
consoles and the looming VR. Much core applications can be run from the
cloud. Mobile devices have far surpassed desktops and laptops for content
consumption and Macs dominate in content creation. There is a temporary
surge in desktop demand because of COVID->WFH but the long-term trend is
down. Who else is going to try to challenge MS for the desktop when the
computing future lies elsewhere? There's no money in it for a conventional
vendor. If Ubuntu, Mint, SUSE and all the current distros between them
can't break 2% now, what reason does anyone have that suggests a
breakthrough in the future? Weyland?

- Evan
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