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> growth and momentum behind Linux and self-hosting as better evidence that change is afoot. Linux is still not user friendly enough. Products from two decades

by echelon 10mo ago

> growth and momentum behind Linux and self-hosting as better evidence that change is afoot. Linux is still not user friendly enough. Products from two decades ago are more user friendly than modern "mainstream" disros. Look at Matrix and other OSS that wants to be mainstream. It's got awful UI/UX. And it's never taken off. Gimp is an ugly beast with a bad name. Nobody's using that unless they're a Linux nerd. I do see lots of people building retro game collections. Analogue 3D was a huge hit. Massive demand. It's sold out instantly five times. Palmer Luckey has a company building a similar product, and that's also sold out. The clothing stores sell cassette tapes and vinyl. iPod and Zune are venerated. My wife is Gen Z and into mainstream culture. She's all about retro. Polaroid, Instax, 2000's era digital cameras. The low end consumer digital camera I bought for $100 or so in 2004 is now selling for more than that. These things are wildly popular. They're even hunting down old disposable one-use film cameras to pop off the lenses. In any case, my wife knows this stuff. She doesn't know what Linux is.

pizza234 10mo ago
> Linux is still not user friendly enough. Products from two decades ago are more user friendly than modern "mainstream" disros. > Gimp is an ugly beast with a bad name. Nobody's using that unless they're a Linux nerd. It depends on the use case. The vast majority of computer users nowadays use only the browser and an office suite. Even email clients are a thing of the past. It's true that Gimp doesn't have a great UX, but who spends time photoretouching on the computer, when one can do it in a few seconds on the phone?
mistrial9 10mo ago
Gimp and on the other side Adobe itself, are a special kind of sad story IMHO
- at1as 10mo ago
  Unless Adobe creates AI models that act as a strong differentiator, I think the accessibility of AI may actually put a lot of pressure on their business model. And the world will be better for it.
8note 9mo ago
> Linux is still not user friendly enough have you not touched a steam deck? it does the job well. when the gabecube comes out, linux as a desktop i think will gain a lot of popularity
- cyberrock 9mo ago
  SD was only successful because most users don't need to do things Linux is still poor at, such as printer compatibility, sound driver compatibility, and specialty software like music and video editing. The stroke of brilliance is having users buy an additional device instead of replacing their daily driver. Its success seems to be about 5 million units (of which 2 were mine, mind you) as of last estimation. Given how reticent they are to reveal the price of Steam Machine, I doubt it would do better. I think they just bought a bunch of junk from AMD because that strategy worked for Switch 1 and Steam Deck. And even if it's successful I think it's odd to frame it as an example of monoculture breaking when Valve/Steam is a veritable monoculture. It's like a modern Apple user still thinking they're the guy throwing the hammer at the screen.
nephihaha 9mo ago
Gimp is alright in my experience. It took a while to play around with and get used to... But I was able to use it to edit some of my photographs for a public art exhibition. I'm not a Linux nerd by the way. I struggle to use it but Gimp did the job, whereas a couple of alternatives wouldn't. (One of them was RawTherapee and I didn't find it user friendly.)

by echelon 10mo ago

pizza234 10mo ago

> Linux is still not user friendly enough. Products from two decades ago are more user friendly than modern "mainstream" disros. > Gimp is an ugly beast with a bad name. Nobody's using that unless they're a Linux nerd. It depends on the use case. The vast majority of computer users nowadays use only the browser and an office suite. Even email clients are a thing of the past. It's true that Gimp doesn't have a great UX, but who spends time photoretouching on the computer, when one can do it in a few seconds on the phone?

mistrial9 10mo ago

Gimp and on the other side Adobe itself, are a special kind of sad story IMHO

at1as 10mo ago
Unless Adobe creates AI models that act as a strong differentiator, I think the accessibility of AI may actually put a lot of pressure on their business model. And the world will be better for it.

8note 9mo ago

> Linux is still not user friendly enough have you not touched a steam deck? it does the job well. when the gabecube comes out, linux as a desktop i think will gain a lot of popularity

cyberrock 9mo ago
SD was only successful because most users don't need to do things Linux is still poor at, such as printer compatibility, sound driver compatibility, and specialty software like music and video editing. The stroke of brilliance is having users buy an additional device instead of replacing their daily driver. Its success seems to be about 5 million units (of which 2 were mine, mind you) as of last estimation. Given how reticent they are to reveal the price of Steam Machine, I doubt it would do better. I think they just bought a bunch of junk from AMD because that strategy worked for Switch 1 and Steam Deck. And even if it's successful I think it's odd to frame it as an example of monoculture breaking when Valve/Steam is a veritable monoculture. It's like a modern Apple user still thinking they're the guy throwing the hammer at the screen.

nephihaha 9mo ago

Gimp is alright in my experience. It took a while to play around with and get used to... But I was able to use it to edit some of my photographs for a public art exhibition. I'm not a Linux nerd by the way. I struggle to use it but Gimp did the job, whereas a couple of alternatives wouldn't. (One of them was RawTherapee and I didn't find it user friendly.)