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Another 'problem' with the Linux desktop was that it was entrepreneur hostile due to the culture. The kind of folks that YC might have funded a decade ago.. P

Another 'problem' with the Linux desktop was that it was entrepreneur hostile due to the culture. The kind of folks that YC might have funded a decade ago.. Pre-mobile, pre-'fast internet', there wasn't really a home in Linux land for paid-for apps, there were a few, but not many. And devs flocked to Windows, and to a lesser extent Macs. Fortunately, in 2025, people are developing software as a service, and that can be successfully achieved using Linux as your buyers aren't other Linux users. Paid-for (native/desktop) apps are still a rarity and probably will continue to be.

spauldo 1y ago
I suspect this was a minor issue. Sure, Linux users are generally more open to using free software, but in cases where there is no free alternative you still didn't see many companies targeting Linux. Most of the software used in my field (industrial automation) is commercial. Our engineers use AutoCAD. I use Control Expert, Kepware, and Aveva System Platform. Our techs use software that's specifically designed to interface with field equipment, such as flow computers, VFDs, and valve actuators. There are no real alternatives to these; we'd use them regardless of what OS they run on. They're all Windows-only because all the other industrial software is Windows-only. It's a massive chicken-and-egg problem. (And before someone brings up FreeCAD and the like - no, those aren't real alternatives for an existing engineering company. We have lots of stuff we've developed for the tools we have. We're locked in.)