Clickbaity title on the original article, but I think this is the most important point to consider from it:
After getting to 1% in approximately 2011, it took about a decade to double that to 2%. The jump from 2% to 3% took just over two years, and 3% to 4% took less than a year.
Get the picture? The Linux desktop is growing, and it’s growing fast.
That isn’t Windows only advantage. It is “easier” to use in the sense that it has less choices, especially if you have been using it in business for decades. You know it well enough to get around, with no concerns about different app names/icons/etc. Im not talking about chrome ot adobe either, im talking “what is the folder program called and why does it look like that” problems.
Most people give no shits about computers. They use what they know, if they use it at all. It’s why “phones and the occasional tablet” are by far the majority of most people’s home computers now.
Linux wont win until it wins offices. That will be where the snowball starts. The greay thing though is linix doesnt need to “win.” It can just be excellent and continue to be a much needed check on capitalism’s race to constrain our freedoms by enshittifing everything they can for profit.
No one uses phones or tablets for actual work. They’re just media consumption and mobile interface devices. When people need to get shit done they sit down with a keyboard and mouse. That’s why they call them workstations.
Workstations are used at work, which is the main gist of my comment above.
Linux has picked up the low hanging fruit, i.e nerds and gamers who have actual computers at home. It wont win over some mythical “everyday home computer user” because they dont exist anymore.
For Linux to truly “snowball,” it needs a serious, fully seemless office replacement that has to be better than “odt by default” libreoffice. Until it can pick off the office clients, it will not win.
Still, it doesn’t need to. Pick up that nerd/gamer/granny dont care how she gets to chrome subset. That’s fantastic for linux, and will still drive innovation enough.
I don’t even know what you’re talking about. The vast majority of people are interacting with a workstation on a daily basis. The only mythical users are the ones that exclusively use phones and tablets.
No one uses Office applications on their local machines anymore. Everything is done in the browser.
Matter of fact, a large majority of all work is done in the browser. Computers have, for a long time, been glorified Facebook machines. Look at how many people use Chrome OS that doesn’t even support any local software at all…
Well yes, but no. The older generations (millenials) do this but Gen-Z does not really knowhow to use a computer and often enough doesn’t want to use one. This problem will probably become even worse with the even younger generations.