Until people can buy a computer CHEAPLY and easily at Walmart with a distro preinstalled, Linux isn’t going to make a lot of headway very fast. They are too lazy to be bothered to download a distro, make a bootable iso, wipe and do a fresh install.
And yes, they are that lazy unless really pushed to do it.
For most of them it’s not “laziness” but ignorance. They don’t know it’s an option, they don’t know why you’d want to do it, and the don’t know how to do it.
Whatever comes with the thing is going to be most popular by default. Windows knows this. Apple knows this. Linux simply doesnt have the funds to buy out manufacturers
I guarantee if I sold a normie a KDE laptop theyd have no idea until they needed to run an exe, then theyd review bomb me for selling them a scam laptop
That’s the refusal to learn. People really hate learning anything new these days. And that includes many here.
Still, there is hope. With the common idea of “App Stores” really taking hold with users, thanks to the ubiquity of cell phone ownership and Chromebooks, users are comfortable with a software manager that gets referred to as App Store. And distros are starting to act upon that by simply rename their software management software and adding a colorful friendly UI to it. It’s marketing.
There are 1000’s of programs available that can meet almost every “regular user’s” daily needs. What is lacking is a universal packaging format that is easy to use. Ubuntu has their “we dropped the ball” Snaps and Fedora pushes Flatpaks. AppImages also exist, but not to the extent as Flatpaks and are a bit more of a hassle to use than a Flatpak. And it appears that Flatpaks are currently leading as the universal software management race. If all distros were to agree to one package format, that would remove one of the biggest hurdles and kills the .exe argument. And that seems unlikely at this point in time. Even die hard Linux users will argue against it. But until at least the most common distros hop on that bus, Windows users will resist your KDE laptop.
They dabbled with no commitment. And at that time people were always looking for the next faster machine. We could actually afford to. So low spec machines were not a viable sales point.
Even when I offered my father to do this for him, even picking Zorin OS (since it seems to be decently close to a Windows look and feel). He refused stating that he’s not techsavvy enough to use it.
My conspiracy theory/pattern recognition shows that anyone unironically using the words “Tech Savvy” in 2026 are either well meaning pirates or just straight up ignorant on purpose. Computers have been mainstream at the very least for 2 decades and you havent bothered to learn anything about them??
Your father’s been using computers for some number of years. It’s possible he’s been using computers for longer than he will continue using computers. From his perspective, the current edition of Windows is better than anything that’s come before it, so it’s the rational choice to stick with it until the end.
To get around this, you would basically need to set up a second machine with Zorin so that he can get some context before making a decision. That way, in the very realistic scenario where he decides it’s not for him, he hasn’t lost anything.
Until people can buy a computer CHEAPLY and easily at Walmart with a distro preinstalled, Linux isn’t going to make a lot of headway very fast. They are too lazy to be bothered to download a distro, make a bootable iso, wipe and do a fresh install.
And yes, they are that lazy unless really pushed to do it.
For most of them it’s not “laziness” but ignorance. They don’t know it’s an option, they don’t know why you’d want to do it, and the don’t know how to do it.
Oh, they are at least dimly aware they could do something else. But they choose not to because they resist learning.
We call this “monopolistic behavior”
Whatever comes with the thing is going to be most popular by default. Windows knows this. Apple knows this. Linux simply doesnt have the funds to buy out manufacturers
That’s the link you need to break. Until then, Linux is stuck as an also ran.
I guarantee if I sold a normie a KDE laptop theyd have no idea until they needed to run an exe, then theyd review bomb me for selling them a scam laptop
That’s the refusal to learn. People really hate learning anything new these days. And that includes many here.
Still, there is hope. With the common idea of “App Stores” really taking hold with users, thanks to the ubiquity of cell phone ownership and Chromebooks, users are comfortable with a software manager that gets referred to as App Store. And distros are starting to act upon that by simply rename their software management software and adding a colorful friendly UI to it. It’s marketing.
There are 1000’s of programs available that can meet almost every “regular user’s” daily needs. What is lacking is a universal packaging format that is easy to use. Ubuntu has their “we dropped the ball” Snaps and Fedora pushes Flatpaks. AppImages also exist, but not to the extent as Flatpaks and are a bit more of a hassle to use than a Flatpak. And it appears that Flatpaks are currently leading as the universal software management race. If all distros were to agree to one package format, that would remove one of the biggest hurdles and kills the .exe argument. And that seems unlikely at this point in time. Even die hard Linux users will argue against it. But until at least the most common distros hop on that bus, Windows users will resist your KDE laptop.
they used to sell them, but it was all shit-tier hardware and didn’t sell.
They dabbled with no commitment. And at that time people were always looking for the next faster machine. We could actually afford to. So low spec machines were not a viable sales point.
You mean headway… on the desktop.
Even when I offered my father to do this for him, even picking Zorin OS (since it seems to be decently close to a Windows look and feel). He refused stating that he’s not techsavvy enough to use it.
My conspiracy theory/pattern recognition shows that anyone unironically using the words “Tech Savvy” in 2026 are either well meaning pirates or just straight up ignorant on purpose. Computers have been mainstream at the very least for 2 decades and you havent bothered to learn anything about them??
Do you know the Secretary Problem?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secretary_problem
Your father’s been using computers for some number of years. It’s possible he’s been using computers for longer than he will continue using computers. From his perspective, the current edition of Windows is better than anything that’s come before it, so it’s the rational choice to stick with it until the end.
To get around this, you would basically need to set up a second machine with Zorin so that he can get some context before making a decision. That way, in the very realistic scenario where he decides it’s not for him, he hasn’t lost anything.
Us old people are often adverse to learning new things. It’s not a surprising thing. You are getting the same way yourself about some knowledge.