And that's totally bizarre, because I've seen people wearing Linux-branded portable music players everywhere, and I've seen Linux distro logos in major motions pictures and even Metal Gear Solid 4. Given Linux's all-encompassing focus on making their software beautiful and easy to use, and their extensive TV and print ad campaigns, I'm amazed we haven't seen a major uptick in installs.

"""Given Linux's all-encompassing focus on making their software beautiful and easy to use"""

Personally I find Linux desktops to be extremely frustrating, buggy, inconsistent and not well designed. Many applications are ugly.

If you live in a terminal/firefox world you probably won't notice this though :-)

S.

Whoosh!

Are you serious or being irony? Your last paragraph makes senses if you replace Linux to OS x. At least in U.S. :-)

We often thought marketing doesn't matter to tech product. But I think marketing matters. But even marketing matters, if the product doesn't match expectation, the product will not go anywhere. The best marketing is done by users. When people see others constantly use Windows XP, they use Windows XP. When people see others use iPod, they use it. When people see others use Google, they use Google. It may be a herd effect. But most users don't care the subtlety. They have too much to worry in their life. Gadget, personal computer, Internet are just part of their life.

I remember trying to install Linux...on my particular computer, it took ages, and never really worked.

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