I agree that Linux crushed it on the server platforms, but it got better for Linux on the desktop, too: Linux users now have multiple companies specializing in

I agree that Linux crushed it on the server platforms, but it got better for Linux on the desktop, too: Linux users now have multiple companies specializing in selling computers with Linux pre-installed, staking their brands on the idea that Linux will work well on those systems, as opposed to "it runs but don't expect hibernation to function and you'll need NDISWrapper for WiFi" or some similar list of caveats which always seemed to accompany Linux on most systems where the hardware wasn't hand-picked. Even Office formats have gotten friendlier, going from explicitly MS-specific stuff like .doc to the Office Open XML file formats, which are, if not easy to parse, at least not the serialization format of a proprietary program. And, of course, every web browser that's worth a damn treats Linux as a first-class platform. That matters more now than it did in the past. The world could definitely improve. However, compared to the darkest fantasies someone could reasonably entertain during Ballmer-era Microsoft, we're doing pretty damn good.