7 ms·

Study explains how retailers stop Linux from entering the market

51 points by sciurus 14y ago

kevinchen 14y ago
I don't think it's the retailers stopping Linux from entering the mainstream. It's the users. A vast majority of people in the market for a new computer will freak out when the see Linux, because they have no idea what it is and it has no Start button.
- rsanchez1 14y ago
  That doesn't explain all the people buying Macs. What it does explain is why cheap Android tablets can't make a dent in the tablet market, while the iPad, among the most expensive options, prints money for Apple every year. It's the disproportionate importance of branding.
  - dmragone 14y ago
    Except people know what a Mac is b/c it has boatloads of marketing behind it. Linux lacks that push.
  - patricklynch 14y ago
    Not to mention how relatively easy Macs and iThings are to use. This is subjective, but I think Apple's better than anyone at making computers that "non computer people" can figure out.
    - werpon 14y ago
      I don't think OS X nor iOS are much easier to use than their free counterparts, it's just that new users have at least two incentives to learn them, and so they do, without thinking too much about it. First, they have a positive reinforcement: Mac is "hip", so you'll look cool by using their products (the fact that everybody and their mother owns one or ten doesn't seem to diminish this perception), and also a negative reinforcement because everybody knows "Apple makes easy-to-use products" so if you don't learn to use them quickly you'll look bad. I'm sure Linux and *BSD have earned more followers by looking different or difficult than by trying to be "easy" (whatever that word means). But that's a discussion for another day...
      - cookiecaper 14y ago
        >"(the fact that everybody and their mother owns one or ten doesn't seem to diminish this perception)" Not thus far, but once there is a viable "underground" replacement suddenly the Apple will become passe and everyone will be on to the Pear. Apple is nearing that tipping point, at least in some markets. Once trends get big enough, they stagnate until something comes along and replaces them; Apple is approaching stagnation. The market is ready for real disruption if someone can put the pieces together correctly.
      - kevinchen 14y ago
        Apple operating systems (and Microsoft operating systems too) are absolutely easier to use than Linux. For example, my Linux box regularly throws up dialog boxes that are nothing more than rehashings of error messages printed out by command-line utilities. My Mac computer and my Windows computer never do that.
    - justincormack 14y ago
      People still get friends to help them out. The support networks in computing are very important.
- jlawer 14y ago
  I actually think its the sales staff. A lot of the linux devices that reach the market are pushed on unknowing users who freak out when it doesn't work as expected. People who adopt Macs know its going to be different. The guy in the shop is often saying how much the same it is, and the user doesn't realize that it is different until they try and put the printer driver disk in and it doesn't work.
- Produce 14y ago
  Except that a) some people did a study on this and published a white paper, it's really difficult to find but I'm sure you will if you look hard enough (hint: under your nose) and b) I've introduced very non-technical people to Ubuntu and they have had no problems with it.
atirip 14y ago
No, retailers do not stop anything. 1) Nothing, absolutely nothing sells in meaningful quantities for reatailer without marketing. 2) For unknown or new products it is not in the retailers best interest to start create market for somebody elses brand/product. There's nothing to gain. 3) The brand/product must market themselves and as nobody owns Linux, nobody will do that, hence it will not sell.
- brudgers 14y ago
  "nobody owns Linux" It's not just marketing, it's service and education, too. Who trains the retailer's staff? What website do customers go to for support (and how does it compare to Microsoft or Apple? The business model for Linux is based on charging a premium for support rather than rolling it into the retail price. There's a good reason that Redhat stores don't exist. The Linux business is incompatible with consumer channels.
yardie 14y ago
What Linux probably needs is to take a page from Apple and set up a brick and mortar store where people can come in, try Linux, buy a PC, and get some advice. Does anyone remember how Macs were sold before the Apple store? You had the mom and pop stores that had the expertise but not the volume to make an impact. You had the online stores that had the volume but if you weren't looking, specifically, for a Mac you wouldn't know there was an alternative. And then you had the B&M stores like Sears, CompUSA, etc. They had Macs, tucked away between the radar detectors and vacuum cleaners. Even if you knew you wanted a Mac the sales staff would try to pass you on a Windows PC. With "friends" like these who needed enemies. Jobs knew he needed to switch things up so worked on retail store concept. Put it in a place with a lot of foot traffic (mall, downtown store, etc.) and make it easy. Want to check email, facebook, etc? Everyone knows you do it at the Apple store, Starbucks wifi costs money. Now you've got everyone in your store using your OS. They might not buy it right away but you've planted the bug in their ear. For retailers it's just business. No one demands a Linux laptop and the few that due aren't a large enough market to keep them in stock and on the sales floor. If desktop Linux wants to have an impact it's going to need a lot more than a website with ISOs.
- cookiecaper 14y ago
  I agree. Desktop Linux must have a patron that operates much like Apple if anyone intends for it to get penetration. Canonical is the best candidate but it's not in Shuttleworth's playbook as far as I know, which imo is a real shame. If you want to push an alternate OS, you can't bundle it like a normal PC and sell it alongside Windows machines. You need to do what Apple did, and make it its own thing: a "Mac" instead of a "PC". Someone needs to box up Ubuntu into 3-6 SKUs, slap some cohesive, trendy branding on it, and get it into sales channels as a "penguin" or whatever and NOT a "PC".
  - TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
    We need "Ubuntu Store". I think it's the only Linux brand strong enough just now to manage it.
doktrin 14y ago
If there really was a strong market demand (and supply!) for preinstalled Linux laptops, why hasn't any reseller stepped up to fill this gaping void? If the conclusions drawn by this paper are true, this is a massive business opportunity. They practically go so far as to imply that close to 10% of the laptop market is up for grabs if only the pesky retail oligopoly would stop sabotaging their own financial interests. Does anyone believe this to be the case? I'll be frank : if I did, I would be investing in a new venture instead of writing this.
- DavidAbrams 14y ago
  This report says essentially nothing concrete.
- ebiester 14y ago
  https://www.system76.com/ https://www.system76.com/
  - cookiecaper 14y ago
    I bought my laptop from System76 and my experience with them has been sub-par. I don't know that I'd recommend them over just buying a widespread commodity model; if it's been out long enough for another kernel release to hit, everything usually works fine.
    - ebiester 14y ago
      That's unfortunate. :( - I almost went with them, but decided I didn't want a Clevo built system. My T420 has served me well, at least until a current odd bug that has me in Windows again until I can figure it out.
- marcusf 14y ago
  I doubt their reasons but not necessarily their conclusions. Breaking in to the laptop market seems fiendishly hard, at least due to economies of scale. Sure, 10% might be willing to buy a Linux laptop, but at what markup? When do you just say sod it and buy a Windows laptop to re-install. And from what I gather, Windows is so highly subsidized for OEM vendors that the cost is really negligible. Further, it seems like the 10% savvy enough to want Linux won't be a perfect subset of the people buying laptops from brick and mortar retailers any way. Breaking in to the market would require a lot of other stuff, not necessarily retail (e.g. an efficient supply chain, direct sales to corporate, quality laptop builds, ...).
lumberjack 14y ago
Three years ago I was going through High School and as you can expect, every single piece of software in the labs was Microsoft branded. Now, I'm with a lot of the same people at University and despite what some people insist, nobody has a problem using GNU/Linux. It is the only option in the labs, but still many people got the hang of it within two to three days. Although mine is just an anecdote it still follows, that both our educational systems and our corporate environments play a big part (I'd even say a much bigger part) in keeping the OS market share as it is.
celticjames 14y ago
Retailers and consumers love Linux! It has has 61% market share. (Source: http://tinyurl.com/ce6t8dk http://tinyurl.com/ce6t8dk). Maybe people just don't like Gnome. (viz. http://tinyurl.com/834bn2j http://tinyurl.com/834bn2j)
bunderbunder 14y ago
Not too long ago, Linux did enter the market. In a fairly big way. When the netbook craze was really ramping up, around about 25% of units sold were running Linux. That wouldn't have been possible if what the study says is true. But the Linux units saw a depressingly high return rate. MSI was reporting it was four times that of the Windows netbooks. So retailers and manufacturers dropped Linux like a hot potato. Not because of some perverse supply chain structure, but because consumers had clearly and emphatically indicated that they were dissatisfied with the product.
- mironathetin 14y ago
  Agreed. I used linux for 8 years on my main development notebook (a Thinkpad). That was a lot of trouble compared to Mac OS now.

51 points by sciurus 14y ago

I don't think it's the retailers stopping Linux from entering the mainstream. It's the users. A vast majority of people in the market for a new computer will freak out when the see Linux, because they have no idea what it is and it has no Start button.

rsanchez1 14y ago
That doesn't explain all the people buying Macs. What it does explain is why cheap Android tablets can't make a dent in the tablet market, while the iPad, among the most expensive options, prints money for Apple every year. It's the disproportionate importance of branding.
- dmragone 14y ago
  Except people know what a Mac is b/c it has boatloads of marketing behind it. Linux lacks that push.
- patricklynch 14y ago
  Not to mention how relatively easy Macs and iThings are to use. This is subjective, but I think Apple's better than anyone at making computers that "non computer people" can figure out.
  - werpon 14y ago
    I don't think OS X nor iOS are much easier to use than their free counterparts, it's just that new users have at least two incentives to learn them, and so they do, without thinking too much about it. First, they have a positive reinforcement: Mac is "hip", so you'll look cool by using their products (the fact that everybody and their mother owns one or ten doesn't seem to diminish this perception), and also a negative reinforcement because everybody knows "Apple makes easy-to-use products" so if you don't learn to use them quickly you'll look bad. I'm sure Linux and *BSD have earned more followers by looking different or difficult than by trying to be "easy" (whatever that word means). But that's a discussion for another day...
    - cookiecaper 14y ago
      >"(the fact that everybody and their mother owns one or ten doesn't seem to diminish this perception)" Not thus far, but once there is a viable "underground" replacement suddenly the Apple will become passe and everyone will be on to the Pear. Apple is nearing that tipping point, at least in some markets. Once trends get big enough, they stagnate until something comes along and replaces them; Apple is approaching stagnation. The market is ready for real disruption if someone can put the pieces together correctly.
    - kevinchen 14y ago
      Apple operating systems (and Microsoft operating systems too) are absolutely easier to use than Linux. For example, my Linux box regularly throws up dialog boxes that are nothing more than rehashings of error messages printed out by command-line utilities. My Mac computer and my Windows computer never do that.
  - justincormack 14y ago
    People still get friends to help them out. The support networks in computing are very important.
jlawer 14y ago
I actually think its the sales staff. A lot of the linux devices that reach the market are pushed on unknowing users who freak out when it doesn't work as expected. People who adopt Macs know its going to be different. The guy in the shop is often saying how much the same it is, and the user doesn't realize that it is different until they try and put the printer driver disk in and it doesn't work.
Produce 14y ago
Except that a) some people did a study on this and published a white paper, it's really difficult to find but I'm sure you will if you look hard enough (hint: under your nose) and b) I've introduced very non-technical people to Ubuntu and they have had no problems with it.

atirip 14y ago

No, retailers do not stop anything. 1) Nothing, absolutely nothing sells in meaningful quantities for reatailer without marketing. 2) For unknown or new products it is not in the retailers best interest to start create market for somebody elses brand/product. There's nothing to gain. 3) The brand/product must market themselves and as nobody owns Linux, nobody will do that, hence it will not sell.

brudgers 14y ago
"nobody owns Linux" It's not just marketing, it's service and education, too. Who trains the retailer's staff? What website do customers go to for support (and how does it compare to Microsoft or Apple? The business model for Linux is based on charging a premium for support rather than rolling it into the retail price. There's a good reason that Redhat stores don't exist. The Linux business is incompatible with consumer channels.

yardie 14y ago

What Linux probably needs is to take a page from Apple and set up a brick and mortar store where people can come in, try Linux, buy a PC, and get some advice. Does anyone remember how Macs were sold before the Apple store? You had the mom and pop stores that had the expertise but not the volume to make an impact. You had the online stores that had the volume but if you weren't looking, specifically, for a Mac you wouldn't know there was an alternative. And then you had the B&M stores like Sears, CompUSA, etc. They had Macs, tucked away between the radar detectors and vacuum cleaners. Even if you knew you wanted a Mac the sales staff would try to pass you on a Windows PC. With "friends" like these who needed enemies. Jobs knew he needed to switch things up so worked on retail store concept. Put it in a place with a lot of foot traffic (mall, downtown store, etc.) and make it easy. Want to check email, facebook, etc? Everyone knows you do it at the Apple store, Starbucks wifi costs money. Now you've got everyone in your store using your OS. They might not buy it right away but you've planted the bug in their ear. For retailers it's just business. No one demands a Linux laptop and the few that due aren't a large enough market to keep them in stock and on the sales floor. If desktop Linux wants to have an impact it's going to need a lot more than a website with ISOs.

cookiecaper 14y ago
I agree. Desktop Linux must have a patron that operates much like Apple if anyone intends for it to get penetration. Canonical is the best candidate but it's not in Shuttleworth's playbook as far as I know, which imo is a real shame. If you want to push an alternate OS, you can't bundle it like a normal PC and sell it alongside Windows machines. You need to do what Apple did, and make it its own thing: a "Mac" instead of a "PC". Someone needs to box up Ubuntu into 3-6 SKUs, slap some cohesive, trendy branding on it, and get it into sales channels as a "penguin" or whatever and NOT a "PC".
- TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
  We need "Ubuntu Store". I think it's the only Linux brand strong enough just now to manage it.

doktrin 14y ago

If there really was a strong market demand (and supply!) for preinstalled Linux laptops, why hasn't any reseller stepped up to fill this gaping void? If the conclusions drawn by this paper are true, this is a massive business opportunity. They practically go so far as to imply that close to 10% of the laptop market is up for grabs if only the pesky retail oligopoly would stop sabotaging their own financial interests. Does anyone believe this to be the case? I'll be frank : if I did, I would be investing in a new venture instead of writing this.

DavidAbrams 14y ago
This report says essentially nothing concrete.
ebiester 14y ago
https://www.system76.com/ https://www.system76.com/
- cookiecaper 14y ago
  I bought my laptop from System76 and my experience with them has been sub-par. I don't know that I'd recommend them over just buying a widespread commodity model; if it's been out long enough for another kernel release to hit, everything usually works fine.
  - ebiester 14y ago
    That's unfortunate. :( - I almost went with them, but decided I didn't want a Clevo built system. My T420 has served me well, at least until a current odd bug that has me in Windows again until I can figure it out.
marcusf 14y ago
I doubt their reasons but not necessarily their conclusions. Breaking in to the laptop market seems fiendishly hard, at least due to economies of scale. Sure, 10% might be willing to buy a Linux laptop, but at what markup? When do you just say sod it and buy a Windows laptop to re-install. And from what I gather, Windows is so highly subsidized for OEM vendors that the cost is really negligible. Further, it seems like the 10% savvy enough to want Linux won't be a perfect subset of the people buying laptops from brick and mortar retailers any way. Breaking in to the market would require a lot of other stuff, not necessarily retail (e.g. an efficient supply chain, direct sales to corporate, quality laptop builds, ...).

lumberjack 14y ago

Three years ago I was going through High School and as you can expect, every single piece of software in the labs was Microsoft branded. Now, I'm with a lot of the same people at University and despite what some people insist, nobody has a problem using GNU/Linux. It is the only option in the labs, but still many people got the hang of it within two to three days. Although mine is just an anecdote it still follows, that both our educational systems and our corporate environments play a big part (I'd even say a much bigger part) in keeping the OS market share as it is.

celticjames 14y ago

Retailers and consumers love Linux! It has has 61% market share. (Source: http://tinyurl.com/ce6t8dk http://tinyurl.com/ce6t8dk). Maybe people just don't like Gnome. (viz. http://tinyurl.com/834bn2j http://tinyurl.com/834bn2j)

bunderbunder 14y ago

Not too long ago, Linux did enter the market. In a fairly big way. When the netbook craze was really ramping up, around about 25% of units sold were running Linux. That wouldn't have been possible if what the study says is true. But the Linux units saw a depressingly high return rate. MSI was reporting it was four times that of the Windows netbooks. So retailers and manufacturers dropped Linux like a hot potato. Not because of some perverse supply chain structure, but because consumers had clearly and emphatically indicated that they were dissatisfied with the product.

mironathetin 14y ago
Agreed. I used linux for 8 years on my main development notebook (a Thinkpad). That was a lot of trouble compared to Mac OS now.