AFAIK, Canonical tries to bundle Ubuntu with only free (read: open-source) software, to promote the idea that a totally open-source system can be a viable alternative to Windows / Mac. We all know that's a load of bollocks, though, as inertia keeps us using Flash Player and MP3 instead of HTML5 and OGG, for instance.

Boxee, Google TV, and such are able to license Netflix and use their technology because it's much harder to hack them. Netflix has been fighting movie companies for years now to get full Linux support because Silverlight is the only player technology with the DRM to satisfy the studios that movies can't be copied from the stream, and Microsoft obviously has no intention of making it available on mainstream Linux distributions.

I believe that Boxee, Google TV, and 360/PS3 all use other technologies, but that can be inherently less secure because it's harder to get inside of them. Also, they can afford to pay the monstrous fees to work with Netflix and develop a solution that will satisfy all of Netflix's backers.

Licensing technology, especially with all of the patent stuff that's been going on lately, is an incredible undertaking and costs a lot of money, and many companies are unwilling to license to companies like Canonical because Linux is a huge administrative headache due to its openness and peoples' desire to have open systems.

At least, that's how I understand all of this. I could be wrong.

I agree, but Redhat is staring at a billion dollar annual revenue. Innovation follows platforms that people want to use in their own spare time. Redhat needs to make this happen in the long term or they risk ending up like Solaris where no one wants to use them after 5pm.

There are a couple of different problems here. RedHat is actually pretty good in that they only include open software in their distribution. I, and many others, would not trust the OS nearly as much if they included things like Flash or other binary only blobs. These binary blobs could be doing anything. We know Flash works against the user's interest, and who knows what other binary piece might do?

Secondly, how would they license? Most of the code they could license requires a charge per copy. RedHat , Ubuntu and most Linux distros encourage the free redistribution of their disks. You can download it for free(aside from bandwidth charges which RedHat is not involved with. They don't even know how many copies are really in use. So, either they would have to change their whole distribution model or they would have to pay for something that is fairly nebulous. Fluendo has published a version of the MP3 codec that can be distributed for free. They purchased a license that has no per copy costs, but that is unusual to even have that as an option.

Finally, the RedHat company produces the RedHat distro for commercial use and the Fedora distro for home use. There is an active community of Fedora users who happily use it after 5 PM and you can find how to get most codecs working in Fedora, if you search a bit. The freedoms associated with Linux make it much more pleasant to use that any proprietary solution available today. I would also say Linux is more powerful and easy to use, but I can see how not everyone would agree about those, since your experience and workflows can drive those comparisons. OpenSolaris was making good progress. It is a shame it was killed a little before it got to the point where it was usable for everyday duty for the average person.

I think a large majority in the world is in the "I dont mind paying 2 bucks now and then but dont make me go searching for a solution on a technology forum because I couldnt care less about how to get it to work".

RedHat isn't interested in making a desktop OS, though. Their focus is on the enterprise market, with the Fedora team doing their best to make a desktop OS. It would be very difficult for RedHat or Novell to really make a push into the mainstream desktop market, and I imagine that justifying to their shareholders would be impossible.

The desktop distro teams can't organize enough to get support from major companies, and the enterprise companies can't push into desktop because it's financial suicide to try and support normal desktop users who can barely use Windows.

The part I dont understand is what prevents Redhat, Ubuntu etc to license multimedia codecs just like any other closed source company? Most significant streaming devices like the boxee, google tv etc run on top of a linux kernel, with netflix support and all other bells and whistles. Why dont linux companies push to license the same and make them available on the desktop?

Most linux companies aren't interested in the desktop. Redhat is focused on servers. Canonical is the only major linux distro/company that has the desktop as a primary focus.

I've never understood the "MP3 support on Linux was terrible for a long time" thing--when was this long time? I'm pretty sure I was playing MP3 files under Redhat 6.2... how long ago was this?

My first experiences with MP3s on Linux was with RedHat 9 and Fedora Core 4 - Fedora 9. Yes, it was always possible to install the restricted codecs, but only recently were those instructions and processes made easier (and now, with recent distros, automatic). Maybe I was doing it wrong, but asking a user to install "restricted codecs" for something that Windows Media Player can do automatically isn't good for making users feel comfortable with your system.