Date: Thu, 26 Apr 2001 19:38:29 -0600 From: Drew Eckhardt <drew@PoohSticks.ORG> To: hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: BSDI and Marketing 101 Message-ID: <200104270138.f3R1cUU23561@revolt.poohsticks.org> In-Reply-To: Your message of "Thu, 26 Apr 2001 19:03:47 EDT." <5.0.2.1.0.20010426185733.023fbec0@mail.etinc.com>
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In message <5.0.2.1.0.20010426185733.023fbec0@mail.etinc.com>, dennis@etinc.com writes: > >I saw BSDIs retail product of FreeBSD in a local bookstore the other day, >and it became sadly clear why LINUX, although highly inferior, is so much >more widely used. Linux was much more widely used because the Jolitzes felt their i86 unix port was a "research system" which didn't need to run on arbitrary hardware or do what people wanted while Linus was initially working on a Minix clone that would run on his hardware and maintained that "practical" attitude throughout the project. Linux also provided substantially better interactive performance under load, which was the normal operating state for starving students. Who in turn wrote drivers. Finally, Linux was not endangered by the AT&T lawsuit. Combine these factors, and Linux was more rapidly accepted by starving hackers, enough of whom contributed drivers for their hardware rather than buying something which would work. The larger hacker community rubbed off on more hobbiests than the smaller in BSD. More hobbiests could actually run linux on their systems because of both hardware support and Wintel coexistance (things like non-destructive repartitioning, the unix semantics on msdos file systems, etc. really helped). IOW, Linux was useful to more people sooner. Even if BSD can match Linux's growth rate, that head start means BSD won't catch up in numbers. Of course, this is irrelevant. I run BSD on my black (actually, they're purple) boxes and servers. I can get jobs doing BSD professionally. If people want to use Linux where BSD works better, that's their perogative as long as I don't have to hold their hand or clean up after them. >What they dont seem to realize is that people who know its worth more than >linux also know they dont have to pay $129. for free software with fancy >packaging and paid support. Joe Average (where the numbers come from and perhaps venture capital) is going to go with Linux because of name recognition, it works well enough (which is even better than BSD) for his purposes (Installing some Linux binaries on BSD requires finding the corresponding Linux libraries, which is easier said than done. Installing them on Linux just works. Linux also has more complete driver support. It can coexist easier with Wintel.). Personally, I'm now running BSD exclusively because it was more flood resistant than Linux (my Linux mail server & DNS machine did not survive the catastrophic water heater failure, while the robust BSD box was more water tight). To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message
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