[Linux-aus] Windows Is Free, The impact of pirated software on free software

Thu Aug 16 23:29:23 UTC 2007

Dear Paul,

Market inertia is an interesting thing. It only usually occurs around 
consolidation in the market place. Windows has mostly been one product. 
You buy that one product and use it. Linux can be seen as many, many 
products which confuses many people. When one person talks to someone 
about Ubuntu and another talks about Mandrake and then a third talks 
about Freebsd the person in the street has the right to be confused and 
not sure of what they should select or even if they should select any of 
them. Then Microsoft comes along and says have Windows. The person goes 
"Oh I can understand that. My friends have it, they talk about Windows 
that makes sense". As Human Beings when we are presented with too much 
choice we usually select to maintain the status quo. It becomes the only 
easy choice we feel we can make. That means stick with Windows.

As an opposing example think about DVD. We all know what a DVD is. There 
is no uncertainty when I talk about a DVD to anyone in the world. I am 
sure people here can say what about +/-RW etc, and they would be right. 
However if you think about your local Video (Showing my age) shop then 
what we all go down to get is a DVD. What works in every player is a 
DVD. People understand this. They take it for granted. That is how we 
should want Linux to be for the masses. Something they all understand 
and take for granted that it will work easily, simply and reproducibly 
for them.

To increase market acceptance and inertia the Linux market place needs 
to consolidate if it wants real market penetration. By this I do not 
mean we need less distros but we do need to start getting behind only 1 
or 2 as the main people friendly distros that are discussed with the 
masses (Which I must admit will in turn probably lead to their only 
being a few distros when I think about it). This has already happened in 
some ways in business areas. You are either a Red Hat shop or a SuSE 
shop. Business likes this. It is less confusing than which of dozens of 
distros does my IT Guru like this week. Just to set things straight I am 
talking about management people and not technical people again. 
Technical people get these things, management people and the masses do 
not. They just get confused with too much choice and so maintain the 
status quo.

By getting behind only a few distros the populatation will see a 
consolidated and less confusing view of what they should be selecting. 
This then may lead to them selecting something rather than maintaining 
the status quo. As more people selected it and discussed it with their 
friends. "Oh I am using X (A Linux Distro), I dont worry about viruses 
and it doesn't crash so much". Then you would get the market inertia.

Just some thoughts right or wrong.

Yours sincerely

David Ruwoldt

Paul Antoine wrote:
> Maddog makes a great point (as he always does) about market inertia and 
> the adoption of Linux.
> 
> Odd, but I seem to remember commercial Unix (in it's various flavours) 
> also suffering from this inertia when it was introduced.  In that case 
> it was IBM's MVS, DECs TOPS10, VMS and other proprietary OS's on 
> mainframes and minicomputers from a variety of manufacturers against 
> which it was pushing!  Many of those manufacturers no longer exist and 
> their software is now unknown to more modern computer users.
> 
> Borrowing a line from my French ancestors: Plus ça change, plus c'est la 
> même chose!!
> 
> Paul Antoine
> 
> Jon 'maddog' Hall wrote:
>> On Thu, 2007-08-16 at 10:38 +0930, Andrew Pam wrote:
>>> "A recent column on Zdnet, by Adrian Kingsley-Hughes, discussed the 
>>> reasons why people won't change from a retail operating system to a free 
>>> one. The implication is that Linux can't even give away their software.
>>>
>>> That sounds pretty dire. Windows retails for around 200 US dollars, give 
>>> or take depending on which version and where you buy. If the above 
>>> statement by Mr Kingsley-Hughes was true, it means that Linux is so bad 
>>> that people would gladly pay 200 dollars to avoid it. Do users really 
>>> think Linux is that lame?"
>>>
>>> http://tlug.jp/articles/Windows_Is_Free
>>>
>>> Share and enjoy,
>>> 		Andrew
>> According to the BSA (and I am not talking about the Boy Scouts of
>> America), the piracy rate of commercial software is lowest in the
>> countries that can (for the most part) afford to pay for it, and highest
>> in the countries that can not afford to pay for it.  No surprise here.
>>
>> Their report shows that 29% of all the commercial software in Australia
>> is pirated (down from 31% a few years ago), whereas in countries like
>> Vietnam and China (where the average person makes 2-3 USD per day) the
>> piracy rate is 88-82% (down from 92% a few years ago).  The United
>> States has a 21% piracy rate.  I will note that these numbers are
>> actually lower than I have seen before.
>>
>> Yes, in most of the "emerging countries", the Microsoft software *IS*,
>> in effect, gratis.  And I have had Microsoft Product Managers tell me
>> that they do "turn their backs" on software piracy in certain cases,
>> giving bug fixes and training on software they know is pirated, just so
>> the people will not use Free Software instead.
>>
>> And there is the corruption, the fact that Microsoft can pay
>> governments, institutions and even people to use their software ,
>> advertise their software, and insist on their software rather than use
>> Free Software.  Where do they get the money to do this?  From the people
>> who DO pay for the software.
>>
>> So why doesn't Free Software just expand like crazy?  Well, the article
>> hit on a couple of issues that still do exist.  But the real reason at
>> this point is just "inertia".  Market demand for Microsoft, the fact
>> that your brother/uncle/sister/mother uses Microsoft, most devices can
>> run some version of Microsoft, most applications run on Microsoft, and
>> those applications are pirated also, etc. etc.
>>
>> But what Adrian Kingsley-Hughes is missing in his article is that Linux
>> *IS* winning.  Just because it has not taken over every desktop in the
>> past five years does not mean it is not making good progress.  And just
>> like you push against a large object in the vacuum of space and you do
>> not see it moving at first, eventually it starts to move, then gather
>> speed, then heaven help you if you get caught between it and some really
>> unmovable object....
>>
>> Linux also does not need to have 100% or even 50% of the desktop market
>> to succeed either.  I will have considered Linux successful after only
>> 20% of the desktop market, because that is when all the controller
>> vendors will support it and the desktop application vendors will all
>> support it.  Then rapidly Linux will increase to 30, 49 and 50% of the
>> desktop market, or more.
>>
>> Its inertia folks.  We have seen it before, and we will see it again.
>> But soon it will be on our side....and that is the scary part for
>> Microsoft, because deep in their little beady brains, they know it.
>>
>> md
>>
>>
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-- 
David Ruwoldt
Senior Systems Specialist
Information Technology Services
Level 9, 9 Gawler Place
ADELAIDE UNIVERSITY SA 5005
AUSTRALIA

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