6 ms·

Mark Shuttleworth: Our Goal Is 200 Million Ubuntu Users In 4 Years

50 points by dkd903 15y ago

pbhjpbhj 15y ago
Something sits uneasily with me about this sort of target: will they be sacrificing focus on the "product" in order to focused on marketing to get that number of users. This sort of thing says to me that Canonical no longer want to make something great[er] they just want to be famous.
spot 15y ago
I think it's great that they are actually looking at users. Hopefully that will bring it up to snuff. I think they are within shooting distance, and they are moving fast. The other big problem has always been applications. For example, I need Adobe's tools and Wine has never done it for me. Hopefully the cloud will make this less important. I already find myself popping into pixlr and coming away satisfied. Now I just need After Effects and gigabit broadband...
justincormack 15y ago
I assume he is not counting servers... I thought netbooks a few years back were what was going to get Linux to "normal users", but Canonical barely managed to get anyone to ship netbooks with Ubuntu bundled in the boom year (when I bought an Eee, with their terrible Linux version on it and then installed Ubuntu netbook edition). And then Microsoft managed to push Windows back onto netbooks. Right now there is no touchscreen Ubuntu, the netbook edition is folded into the standard one, and the only vague hope would be ARM based machines (Nettops, or desktop), but these are still not really shipping in any volume, and Microsoft has announced Windows 8 on ARM so that only gives a short window of opportunity, and not likely a 200m one. The tablet option is a lot of work, and up against Android (and Meego), with rather less momentum. So, I think that just leaves the geeks still? There are only in the thousands not millions of Andrroid developers though. Some people (like me) have come back from a few years on Mac to Ubuntu, but not a lot yet. So right now, I am not convinced...
- beaumartinez 15y ago
  Ubuntu is still the most popular Linux distro[1] (and, although I don't have an authorative source, the popularity of Linux is increasing[2]). Touchscreen, netbook, ARM, tablet... These edge-case platforms aren't what Ubuntu targets. Neither do they target "geeks". Ubuntu targets the average user: just install it on your box and have a look at the software it comes with. It truly is "Linux, for human beings". It's never been easier to try and install a different OS: not ten years ago you could only get an OS by buying a physical copy. Have a look at the growth of Google searches for "Ubuntu" alongside other OS[3]. I don't see why Ubuntu won't continue to grow in popularity and users. It has a large and growing community. [1] http://distrowatch.com/stats.php?section=popularity http://distrowatch.com/stats.php?section=popularity [2] http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_os.asp http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_os.asp [3] http://www.google.com/trends?q=ubuntu%2C+%22windows+xp%22%2C+%22windows+7%22%2C+%22os+x%22%2Clinux http://www.google.com/trends?q=ubuntu%2C+%22windows+xp%22%2C...
  - Unseelie 15y ago
    > Have a look at the growth of Google searches for "Ubuntu" alongside other OS[3]. That's actually a slight decline since its apex in 2008...
  - bad_user 15y ago
    Except I never had the pleasure of installing Ubuntu on any computer without lots of problems, either hardware-related or shitty-beta-quality related ... my current Ubuntu installation (10.10) displays my head up-side-down in Skype-video, and there's no way to fix it other than to recompile the kernel with this special-fix mentioned on some obscure forum (no kidding, I'm still perplex about what it's taking so long for them to fix it). Also, Unity? Are you freaking kidding me? I'm all for being bold and innovative in UI/UX, but pushing alpha-quality software in a stable release to unsuspecting users? What the hell were they thinking? It isn't acceptable that the UI in Windows 3.11 (for Workgroups; yes, I still have the license) was more consistent / reliable than Ubuntu 11.04 -- the average user doesn't have the patience to understand UI absurdities, neither the skills / patience to go edit files in /etc or recompile their kernels, just to make their system behave normally. Even I, after several years of struggling on every update, I'm quickly losing my interest in doing that. So I'm sorry, but 200 millions of users won't be dumb enough to switch -- at this point I consider projects like Android/Meego as the only choice for desktop-Linux (simply because tables/mobiles will merge with desktops in the future).
calpaterson 15y ago
Doesn't seem like they're doing real testing, it seems more like they're doing after-the-fact usability tests post-feature freeze: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2449981 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2449981
robryan 15y ago
Pretty hard thing to do, so many of the applications that most regular computer users use everyday are either not present on linux or nowhere near the amount of polish. That's not to mention gaming which makes even the mac a hard sell on the mass market. Even as a developer that interacts with linux on servers every day I still feel no great urge to run a linux desktop.
- forinti 15y ago
  I switched from Windows 2000 to Ubuntu 10 recently and the only thing I miss is TrackaMania (and not that much). Open Office has all the features I need and I can open all my spreadsheets and docs from MS Office. The support for my HP 3-in-1 is great and I found the software a lot easier to use (because its simpler) than HP's. Scanning is a lot simpler. My wireless got working before I noticed it. So I see no reason to return to Windows unless you are a gamer. My parents and in-laws certainly don't need to stick to Windows. What Ubuntu needs is a bit of marketing.
  - AJ007 15y ago
    Win2k to Ubuntu 10 is a huge leap forward. I'm not a huge fan of Windows, but Windows 7 is night and day compared to what came before. I enjoy Ubuntu, but I think OS X is a more likely OS replacement for me. Software compatibility is the real issue. However, I think that the move towards web based platforms over the next decade will pretty much eliminate this issue. For the average computer user, Windows is unnecessary. If you are doing something that requires demanding tools -- be it photography, 3D animation, CAD, etc, then the OS means a lot more and probably will for a while. I would place my money on Google and Apple dominating the OS's of the future. Something is going to replace Windows short of Microsoft undergoing a radical transformation and Windows being free. Seeing the direction of Windows Mobile I am guessing that Microsoft will try something radical and it won't be something that works.
- pimeys 15y ago
  I use Ubuntu as my work OS everyday. There's no competition for Ubuntu with apt, vim and xmonad - even osx feels annoyingly hard compared to my work setup.
ilcavero 15y ago
"However, another fiasco like the one with Ubuntu 11.04 will make 200 million users a distant dream." What is this fiasco that he is talking about? not including wayland on 11.04? talk about confusing writing. I do think 11.04 is immature compared to previous versions, but is in line to what you should expect with such a radical change as Unity.
- acabal 15y ago
  I'm going to guess that surprising users with a buggy, incomplete, and arguably poorly designed rewrite of the desktop experience they've been using for years is the fiasco he's talking about. And yes, only geeks keep up with Ubuntu news--everyone else just clicked upgrade and then stared blankly at their weird new desktop. He's not going to keep regular users around for long if he keeps pulling that kind of crap--and he's done it twice already, with window buttons in the past.
  - jshen 15y ago
    It's always surprising to me that smart people end up learning this lesson the hard way. Users want stability and slow evolutionary change the vast majority of the time. But, I think the motivation here was a bit different, canonical had less control and influence over the desktop than they felt they needed.
  - ilcavero 15y ago
    I would agree with you if it wasn't the case that you can easily switch to "ubuntu classic" which is very similar to previous desktop experiences. Also I'm not sure if upgrading from 10.xx to 11.04 takes you unity or to ubuntu classic, it should be to classic in my opinion. full disclosure: I'm a 10.04 user and plan to stay that way until the next LTS.
    - acabal 15y ago
      But "easy" is relative. To geeks like us who know to search Google with "how to replace Unity" (a phrase that would never, ever come to mind to Grandma) and know that we just have to change a dropdown setting, it's easy. If you tell a "regular Joe" user that by clicking a dropdown you can change how the operating system fundamentally works, they'd probably think you were lying--the thought is that alien to them. There's a slim to none chance they'd discover that option on their own (not in small part because they wouldn't even know the option existed), and an equally slim chance that they'd know how to search for it. To you and me, "Unity" is the "well, duh" search term. To regular people, it's tech gibberish. So again it all comes down to the average user--they don't like change, they don't keep up with Ubuntu news, and they aren't interested in fiddling with configuration options to have a usable desktop. I don't think that you can have both fundamentals-shattering releases and also a ppa-based/milestone-release distro at the same time.
Unseelie 15y ago
As a recent convert to Ubuntu, I seriously doubt it without drastic changes. The problem I have with the system, the problem I see making the masses balk once they've been convinced to give it a try, is that, simply, things don't work out of the box with linux. That's not Cannonical's fault, and indeed, they've put a lot of work into their app repository to build a pile of things that do....but every single time I've tried to go off the farm, install a game from CD, install something from makefile or a tarball..I'm missing repositories. I've the wrong..something. I'm trying to build a massive skillset and understanding of the thing, and I don't have the background to do it. Very few people do. People will install it, browse the web, and then run into walls. They'll be angry, they'll blog about it. They'll leave, and they'll poison the public view.
- reedlaw 15y ago
  I disagree. Things work better out of the box for me running Ubuntu on a Thinkpad than either Windows or OS X. The Ubuntu Software Center works great and doesn't require agreeing to a 56 page license or handing over credit card details.
  - Unseelie 15y ago
    You're agreeing with me. The software center is great...anything outside of it? Furthermore, there is a license applied to open software, and quite a lot of cost free software. But the Software Center is a walled garden, requiring backwards support of the OS to the application.
    - reedlaw 15y ago
      I'm not sure I understand. The software center is just an example of one of the user-friendly features of Ubuntu. I could name a lot of others such as the Unity desktop, OSD, application and system indicators. Licenses applied to open software are usually one of a handful of well-known licenses such as GPL, Apache, MIT, etc. What do you mean "quite a lot of cost free software"? Cost-free as in "free as in beer"? If you want only GPL then there is the GNU operating system. I totally don't understand your 3rd point. An open-source repository is a walled garden? It's about as open as open can get.
cafebabe 15y ago
I upgraded my installation of Ubuntu last weekend (fresh installation). Since then, the window management is broken (including X server crashes). ...... 200 Million users in 4 years? Naah! Never!
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
jpr 15y ago
I have a hard time figuring out how Canonical is going to make money. Most desktop users are not going to pay for support.
- AJ007 15y ago
  Default search engine provider + app store = tons of $$$ with first world users.
- olalonde 15y ago
  They have Ubuntu One, some kind of Dropbox. https://one.ubuntu.com/ https://one.ubuntu.com/
- melling 15y ago
  How much do they need to make? If they made an average of $1/user, would that make them profitable? Having more people download your software, or having additional vendors ship it on netbooks, etc., shouldn't increase your costs by much.
- Keyframe 15y ago
  I always wondered why they didn't put an ad during install process. There could be a google ads type of system where people could buy ads and get served impressions in installations. Or something like that. There are numerous ways to do this.
  - 2muchcoffeeman 15y ago
    Stop putting ads in everything. Ads suck.
pessimist 15y ago
Today there are over 100 million consumers using linux, 99% of them on android. All other linux distros are rounding errors.
gcb 15y ago
good luck with that. I'm back to contributing w debian after three consecutive releases of ubuntu breaking up keyboard shortcuts. if I wanted to use imposed shortcuts I'd be using a mac or windows
- msbarnett 15y ago
  Actually there is a standardized mechanism to re-map every keyboard shortcut in any application in OS X. It's actually one of the little consistencies I miss when using Linux-based desktops.
dstein 15y ago
Good luck with that. I tried installing Ubuntu 11 on a system yesterday and discovered the installer hangs if you try to install it on a hard disk that currently contains Windows 7. If I didn't know how to manually use fdisk to reformat the drive I would not have known how to proceed.
rmason 15y ago
Predictions are news? How about I predict 250 million users in 4 years for React OS http://www.reactos.org/en/index.html http://www.reactos.org/en/index.html I'd be willing to wager that my prediction has a better chance of coming true than Shuttleworth's. But the truth is that neither has a very high chance of happening.
Steko 15y ago
I love these 'founder predicts massive growth in near future' items. If you added up the market share that everyone expected to get in 4 years I would be surprised if the number was under 1000% of the actual market size at that time.
old-gregg 15y ago
The trick to get there is to capture new users without previous computing experience. My wife's sister got her first laptop with Ubuntu installed and after 3 years she can't stand windows/osx and I can't blame her: Gnome 2.3 is years ahead of both of them but it's only apparent to someone who's familiar with it. If you listen to hear arguments, you'll be amazed of how much of your perception of "good UX" is just a series of habits. The roadblock to user adoption isn't the quality of software/ux, it's making people to make an effort and learn something new. Another issue is hardware quality. Trying out Linux on cheap and flimsy netbooks isn't the best way to experience new software. In other words there nothing to be done with Ubuntu itself to reach his goals. The technology is fine.
firefoxman1 15y ago
This article hit the nail on the head when it said good user experience and design is essential to gaining users (then again, when isn't it?). I remember in my n00b days when I first decided to try Linux I would mainly browse through screenshots to pick a distro to try. For me, it used to be all about the feel and eye-candy of the distro and not the underlying software and I assume that's what draws a large amount non-geeks. I think desktop Linux, or at least Ubuntu, is at a point now that most geeks use it or know about it so one would assume Canonical will be targeting the other 90-something percent next.

50 points by dkd903 15y ago

Something sits uneasily with me about this sort of target: will they be sacrificing focus on the "product" in order to focused on marketing to get that number of users. This sort of thing says to me that Canonical no longer want to make something great[er] they just want to be famous.

spot 15y ago

I think it's great that they are actually looking at users. Hopefully that will bring it up to snuff. I think they are within shooting distance, and they are moving fast. The other big problem has always been applications. For example, I need Adobe's tools and Wine has never done it for me. Hopefully the cloud will make this less important. I already find myself popping into pixlr and coming away satisfied. Now I just need After Effects and gigabit broadband...

justincormack 15y ago

I assume he is not counting servers... I thought netbooks a few years back were what was going to get Linux to "normal users", but Canonical barely managed to get anyone to ship netbooks with Ubuntu bundled in the boom year (when I bought an Eee, with their terrible Linux version on it and then installed Ubuntu netbook edition). And then Microsoft managed to push Windows back onto netbooks. Right now there is no touchscreen Ubuntu, the netbook edition is folded into the standard one, and the only vague hope would be ARM based machines (Nettops, or desktop), but these are still not really shipping in any volume, and Microsoft has announced Windows 8 on ARM so that only gives a short window of opportunity, and not likely a 200m one. The tablet option is a lot of work, and up against Android (and Meego), with rather less momentum. So, I think that just leaves the geeks still? There are only in the thousands not millions of Andrroid developers though. Some people (like me) have come back from a few years on Mac to Ubuntu, but not a lot yet. So right now, I am not convinced...

beaumartinez 15y ago
Ubuntu is still the most popular Linux distro[1] (and, although I don't have an authorative source, the popularity of Linux is increasing[2]). Touchscreen, netbook, ARM, tablet... These edge-case platforms aren't what Ubuntu targets. Neither do they target "geeks". Ubuntu targets the average user: just install it on your box and have a look at the software it comes with. It truly is "Linux, for human beings". It's never been easier to try and install a different OS: not ten years ago you could only get an OS by buying a physical copy. Have a look at the growth of Google searches for "Ubuntu" alongside other OS[3]. I don't see why Ubuntu won't continue to grow in popularity and users. It has a large and growing community. [1] http://distrowatch.com/stats.php?section=popularity http://distrowatch.com/stats.php?section=popularity [2] http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_os.asp http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_os.asp [3] http://www.google.com/trends?q=ubuntu%2C+%22windows+xp%22%2C+%22windows+7%22%2C+%22os+x%22%2Clinux http://www.google.com/trends?q=ubuntu%2C+%22windows+xp%22%2C...
- Unseelie 15y ago
  > Have a look at the growth of Google searches for "Ubuntu" alongside other OS[3]. That's actually a slight decline since its apex in 2008...
- bad_user 15y ago
  Except I never had the pleasure of installing Ubuntu on any computer without lots of problems, either hardware-related or shitty-beta-quality related ... my current Ubuntu installation (10.10) displays my head up-side-down in Skype-video, and there's no way to fix it other than to recompile the kernel with this special-fix mentioned on some obscure forum (no kidding, I'm still perplex about what it's taking so long for them to fix it). Also, Unity? Are you freaking kidding me? I'm all for being bold and innovative in UI/UX, but pushing alpha-quality software in a stable release to unsuspecting users? What the hell were they thinking? It isn't acceptable that the UI in Windows 3.11 (for Workgroups; yes, I still have the license) was more consistent / reliable than Ubuntu 11.04 -- the average user doesn't have the patience to understand UI absurdities, neither the skills / patience to go edit files in /etc or recompile their kernels, just to make their system behave normally. Even I, after several years of struggling on every update, I'm quickly losing my interest in doing that. So I'm sorry, but 200 millions of users won't be dumb enough to switch -- at this point I consider projects like Android/Meego as the only choice for desktop-Linux (simply because tables/mobiles will merge with desktops in the future).

calpaterson 15y ago

Doesn't seem like they're doing real testing, it seems more like they're doing after-the-fact usability tests post-feature freeze: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2449981 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2449981

robryan 15y ago

Pretty hard thing to do, so many of the applications that most regular computer users use everyday are either not present on linux or nowhere near the amount of polish. That's not to mention gaming which makes even the mac a hard sell on the mass market. Even as a developer that interacts with linux on servers every day I still feel no great urge to run a linux desktop.

forinti 15y ago
I switched from Windows 2000 to Ubuntu 10 recently and the only thing I miss is TrackaMania (and not that much). Open Office has all the features I need and I can open all my spreadsheets and docs from MS Office. The support for my HP 3-in-1 is great and I found the software a lot easier to use (because its simpler) than HP's. Scanning is a lot simpler. My wireless got working before I noticed it. So I see no reason to return to Windows unless you are a gamer. My parents and in-laws certainly don't need to stick to Windows. What Ubuntu needs is a bit of marketing.
- AJ007 15y ago
  Win2k to Ubuntu 10 is a huge leap forward. I'm not a huge fan of Windows, but Windows 7 is night and day compared to what came before. I enjoy Ubuntu, but I think OS X is a more likely OS replacement for me. Software compatibility is the real issue. However, I think that the move towards web based platforms over the next decade will pretty much eliminate this issue. For the average computer user, Windows is unnecessary. If you are doing something that requires demanding tools -- be it photography, 3D animation, CAD, etc, then the OS means a lot more and probably will for a while. I would place my money on Google and Apple dominating the OS's of the future. Something is going to replace Windows short of Microsoft undergoing a radical transformation and Windows being free. Seeing the direction of Windows Mobile I am guessing that Microsoft will try something radical and it won't be something that works.
pimeys 15y ago
I use Ubuntu as my work OS everyday. There's no competition for Ubuntu with apt, vim and xmonad - even osx feels annoyingly hard compared to my work setup.

ilcavero 15y ago

"However, another fiasco like the one with Ubuntu 11.04 will make 200 million users a distant dream." What is this fiasco that he is talking about? not including wayland on 11.04? talk about confusing writing. I do think 11.04 is immature compared to previous versions, but is in line to what you should expect with such a radical change as Unity.

acabal 15y ago
I'm going to guess that surprising users with a buggy, incomplete, and arguably poorly designed rewrite of the desktop experience they've been using for years is the fiasco he's talking about. And yes, only geeks keep up with Ubuntu news--everyone else just clicked upgrade and then stared blankly at their weird new desktop. He's not going to keep regular users around for long if he keeps pulling that kind of crap--and he's done it twice already, with window buttons in the past.
- jshen 15y ago
  It's always surprising to me that smart people end up learning this lesson the hard way. Users want stability and slow evolutionary change the vast majority of the time. But, I think the motivation here was a bit different, canonical had less control and influence over the desktop than they felt they needed.
- ilcavero 15y ago
  I would agree with you if it wasn't the case that you can easily switch to "ubuntu classic" which is very similar to previous desktop experiences. Also I'm not sure if upgrading from 10.xx to 11.04 takes you unity or to ubuntu classic, it should be to classic in my opinion. full disclosure: I'm a 10.04 user and plan to stay that way until the next LTS.
  - acabal 15y ago
    But "easy" is relative. To geeks like us who know to search Google with "how to replace Unity" (a phrase that would never, ever come to mind to Grandma) and know that we just have to change a dropdown setting, it's easy. If you tell a "regular Joe" user that by clicking a dropdown you can change how the operating system fundamentally works, they'd probably think you were lying--the thought is that alien to them. There's a slim to none chance they'd discover that option on their own (not in small part because they wouldn't even know the option existed), and an equally slim chance that they'd know how to search for it. To you and me, "Unity" is the "well, duh" search term. To regular people, it's tech gibberish. So again it all comes down to the average user--they don't like change, they don't keep up with Ubuntu news, and they aren't interested in fiddling with configuration options to have a usable desktop. I don't think that you can have both fundamentals-shattering releases and also a ppa-based/milestone-release distro at the same time.

Unseelie 15y ago

As a recent convert to Ubuntu, I seriously doubt it without drastic changes. The problem I have with the system, the problem I see making the masses balk once they've been convinced to give it a try, is that, simply, things don't work out of the box with linux. That's not Cannonical's fault, and indeed, they've put a lot of work into their app repository to build a pile of things that do....but every single time I've tried to go off the farm, install a game from CD, install something from makefile or a tarball..I'm missing repositories. I've the wrong..something. I'm trying to build a massive skillset and understanding of the thing, and I don't have the background to do it. Very few people do. People will install it, browse the web, and then run into walls. They'll be angry, they'll blog about it. They'll leave, and they'll poison the public view.

reedlaw 15y ago
I disagree. Things work better out of the box for me running Ubuntu on a Thinkpad than either Windows or OS X. The Ubuntu Software Center works great and doesn't require agreeing to a 56 page license or handing over credit card details.
- Unseelie 15y ago
  You're agreeing with me. The software center is great...anything outside of it? Furthermore, there is a license applied to open software, and quite a lot of cost free software. But the Software Center is a walled garden, requiring backwards support of the OS to the application.
  - reedlaw 15y ago
    I'm not sure I understand. The software center is just an example of one of the user-friendly features of Ubuntu. I could name a lot of others such as the Unity desktop, OSD, application and system indicators. Licenses applied to open software are usually one of a handful of well-known licenses such as GPL, Apache, MIT, etc. What do you mean "quite a lot of cost free software"? Cost-free as in "free as in beer"? If you want only GPL then there is the GNU operating system. I totally don't understand your 3rd point. An open-source repository is a walled garden? It's about as open as open can get.

cafebabe 15y ago

I upgraded my installation of Ubuntu last weekend (fresh installation). Since then, the window management is broken (including X server crashes). ...... 200 Million users in 4 years? Naah! Never!

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

jpr 15y ago

I have a hard time figuring out how Canonical is going to make money. Most desktop users are not going to pay for support.

AJ007 15y ago
Default search engine provider + app store = tons of $$$ with first world users.
olalonde 15y ago
They have Ubuntu One, some kind of Dropbox. https://one.ubuntu.com/ https://one.ubuntu.com/
melling 15y ago
How much do they need to make? If they made an average of $1/user, would that make them profitable? Having more people download your software, or having additional vendors ship it on netbooks, etc., shouldn't increase your costs by much.
Keyframe 15y ago
I always wondered why they didn't put an ad during install process. There could be a google ads type of system where people could buy ads and get served impressions in installations. Or something like that. There are numerous ways to do this.
- 2muchcoffeeman 15y ago
  Stop putting ads in everything. Ads suck.

pessimist 15y ago

Today there are over 100 million consumers using linux, 99% of them on android. All other linux distros are rounding errors.

gcb 15y ago

good luck with that. I'm back to contributing w debian after three consecutive releases of ubuntu breaking up keyboard shortcuts. if I wanted to use imposed shortcuts I'd be using a mac or windows

msbarnett 15y ago
Actually there is a standardized mechanism to re-map every keyboard shortcut in any application in OS X. It's actually one of the little consistencies I miss when using Linux-based desktops.

dstein 15y ago

Good luck with that. I tried installing Ubuntu 11 on a system yesterday and discovered the installer hangs if you try to install it on a hard disk that currently contains Windows 7. If I didn't know how to manually use fdisk to reformat the drive I would not have known how to proceed.

rmason 15y ago

Predictions are news? How about I predict 250 million users in 4 years for React OS http://www.reactos.org/en/index.html http://www.reactos.org/en/index.html I'd be willing to wager that my prediction has a better chance of coming true than Shuttleworth's. But the truth is that neither has a very high chance of happening.

Steko 15y ago

I love these 'founder predicts massive growth in near future' items. If you added up the market share that everyone expected to get in 4 years I would be surprised if the number was under 1000% of the actual market size at that time.

old-gregg 15y ago

The trick to get there is to capture new users without previous computing experience. My wife's sister got her first laptop with Ubuntu installed and after 3 years she can't stand windows/osx and I can't blame her: Gnome 2.3 is years ahead of both of them but it's only apparent to someone who's familiar with it. If you listen to hear arguments, you'll be amazed of how much of your perception of "good UX" is just a series of habits. The roadblock to user adoption isn't the quality of software/ux, it's making people to make an effort and learn something new. Another issue is hardware quality. Trying out Linux on cheap and flimsy netbooks isn't the best way to experience new software. In other words there nothing to be done with Ubuntu itself to reach his goals. The technology is fine.

firefoxman1 15y ago

This article hit the nail on the head when it said good user experience and design is essential to gaining users (then again, when isn't it?). I remember in my n00b days when I first decided to try Linux I would mainly browse through screenshots to pick a distro to try. For me, it used to be all about the feel and eye-candy of the distro and not the underlying software and I assume that's what draws a large amount non-geeks. I think desktop Linux, or at least Ubuntu, is at a point now that most geeks use it or know about it so one would assume Canonical will be targeting the other 90-something percent next.