[KULUA EVENT] KULUA vs Win2k -- UPDATE (fwd)

[Randy Rathbun]

Very true Frank. I was perhaps being a bit too simplistic in my examples
with the Mindstorm and the MP3s and just did not explain myself enough. 

I guess what I was trying to say is that people want to see more than
eyecandy. Or even earcandy. I use Linux for a lot of stuff. I use it to
control the lights in my house. I use it in astronomy to see where the
stars are, the position of the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, and am getting
ready to use it (as soon as I can get it built) for capturing long exposure
CCD images of nebula and stars. If you can show people that it is not "just
windows" that can do this, but a free and open OS, and show them that it is
a real alternative to some $500+ thing that is closed up, well, I think
that is what people want to see. But, that is because this is where my real
computer use lies. I am not into massive databases or some of the other
things that people use Linux for. I am more into the "why a user should
switch" thing. 

For example, my dad keeps saying to me, "I don't know why you are running
that Linux thing. I think you should switch back to windows. What the hell
can you do with Linux? There are no apps for it." Well, I proved him wrong
the other day. I finally got to show him all the cool things I had it
doing. He was blown away and now wants me to install it on his NT box for
him. All it took was a simple 30 minutes of letting him at it and seeing
for himself that "Whatever MS can do, Linux can do better" - by that I am
chiefly meaning that it can run for months or even years before you have to
reboot, etc. He uses MS Office all the time and was very impressed with
Star Office, so he wants to run that. I told him he could download the
Windows version of it, but he wants to run Linux now. Why? Ya got me. But
he was impressed enough with what I was doing to want to make the switch. 

*********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********

On 2/17/00 at 4:49 PM Frank Wiles wrote:

>On Thu, 17 Feb 2000, Randy Rathbun wrote:
>
>> I think you are right in some ways, but I think you are wrong too - not
>> that that is a bad thing! :)
>>
>  And I think you're wrong as well... 
> 
>> The folks who are going to be there tonight are most likely going to be
IT
>> pros... not mom and pop and the kids - mainly because the weather is
going
>> to be poor, but also because I don't know of many 11 year olds who want
to
>> see a real life creation of the 1984 Macintosh commercial. 
>> 
>> I do think that with all the info we are going to hand out tonight - ie,
>> the meeting invites, etc, that all us linux meeting goers might think a
bit
>> about having a dog and pony show for the next meeting or two. Bring your
>> hardware in and put on a demo for all to see. Knock our socks off. We
all
>> know that Linux is great for playing MP3s (well, I do anyway) but how
about
>> someone demoing some mp3 stuff? Or if you have a Lego mindstorm, bring
that
>> in!  THAT is what people want to see - not a pretty desktop that makes
>> silly noises and has a music score written by Brian Eno. 
>> 
>
>  The average user is VERY important to the Linux community, however
>without big business taking an interest ( i.e. Dell, IBM, etc ) things
>will go nowhere fast.  No one cares if Linux can run MP3z or Lego
>Mindstorm, they care if it can run their businesses e-mail and web pages.

>
>  Where big business and educational instituions go is where the desktop
>goes.  
>