I've always found the competition for the "linux desktop" to be somewhat weird. It will never "win" -- and who cares? If you're not sold on the Free Software

I've always found the competition for the "linux desktop" to be somewhat weird. It will never "win" -- and who cares? If you're not sold on the Free Software manifesto or not dirt poor (or just cheap), why bother when the non-free alternatives are radically better (and they are IMO)? If you are, why do you care if your desktop is popular, as long as it's "Free"? If you're cheap, then stop complaining about your free shit. I sort of understand: Most of the success of the free software movement is based on not having to pay for it -- e.g. getting a free compiler. Turns out that's a good way to go for some software for many other reasons, but it has nothing to do with this "us vs them" crap I see when people talk about the linux desktop. You get what you pay for, and the GNOME desktop is pretty damn good for the price of a download. However, it's nowhere near even windows XP, except at the most surface levels, IMO. "The" Office and Steam (its games) run better on windows. Mac Office, iLife and the thousand little accesories (dashboard stuff, writeroom, etc) run better, in a more integratedfashion, on a mac. None of these run well on GNOME. Instead of iTunes, you get 3 music management apps that are supposedly "better", but in truth, they were designed by ADD teenagers (or not designed at all). And iTunes isn't even that great as a target. Oh, and don't forget OpenOffice, which, being completely free, is also completely crap. And if the future of "desktop" linux is web apps, that really isn't any future at all is it? It simply means that Linux may or may not be running under that snazzy Web Terminal you're running. It means you might as well install windows, 'cause at least you'll be able to run good native apps in addition to the marginal web apps. Paradoxically, the linux "desktop" wins in a key area: command line "apps", research and dev. I can literally download ubuntu and with a single click, install whole dev environments, for various different targets, in various different laguages. This is also true for research envs, not particularly related to dev. This has no peer on windows, and mac is better, but still not as good. And the graphical "desktop"? That becomes just an excellent means to visualize my dev or research work. Even here, you get what you pay for. If you have a mac, look into some of the "Instruments" stuff Apple provides for visualizing what programs are doing. Fucking night and day vs. your typical linux fare. And.. yeah... while it's "free" to you, someone was paid to write it, and you did pay them (by buying mac hardware).