Comparison is also invalid. Linux as a whole (not the kernel but OS experience) isn't controlled by some Big Brother who decides what and how it's done single mindedly. So such kind of composite result is somewhat expected.
Luckly Android, ChromeOS and WebOS as proper Linux distributions have replaced most of it.
ChromeOS hasn't displaced Linux on school laptops, there wasn't any.
LG WebOS hasn't displaced "Linux", it competes with Google TV (formerly Android TV)
So here goes a children explanation.
> Unfortunely I still have to, from time to time.
I, pjmlp, still have to use GNU/Linux desktop from time to time.
> Luckly Android, ChromeOS and WebOS as proper Linux distributions have replaced most of it.
Android, ChromeOS and WebOS, have replaced most of my needs, pjmlp, for GNU/Linux in the desktop and similar devices.
Great! I really hope you're happy with that setup! It's your personal computer and by all means, do what works well for you. In the end that's always a personal thing that's different for everyone. Who am I to judge how you use your computer?
But maybe ... stop complaining about Linux desktop then? If you don't like it? This must be like the 3rd time I've seen these types of single-line dismissive "Linux will never win the desktop"-comment from you in the last few days. Just one line, little or no context, or explanation, and IMHO also zero value, and an entire discussion derailed.
This is just becoming disruptive. You don't need to say anything you know. Personally, I rather dislike a number of things, but you don't see me complaining about it with one-liners every chance I get – and when I do say something, at least I make sure it's something of some substance, when I feel it actually contributes. And I sure as hell don't go around complaining people are "children" for disagreeing.
Ideally that kind of thing would be part of GNOME, or KDE, but then there are those that rather keep using twm like experience, making GNU/Linux really only good for headless experiences, at least the UNIX/POSIX part is always there.
Yeah, binary software will have to ship its own copy of ffmpeg... This isn't unique to media codecs though.
No perfect solutions here; both "system-wide codecs" and "every application brings their own codecs" have their own up- and downsides.
Besides, with ffmpeg and gstreamer the system-wide codecs paradigm also works on Linux.
This is one of those "it's different but it doesn't really matter much" type of things. Most people "just" install vlc or mpv or whatnot and things will "just work" for them, not really different from Windows. That it's technically slightly different is almost entirely transparent to the user.
On Windows there's Windows Media Foundation and DirectShow that centrally manage everything and also support the "individual nut and bolt" approach. Android has its own central thing (MediaCodec?) that must be used. MacOS and iOS presumably have their own central manager (Quicktime?) too.
But Linux? It doesn't serve as an operating system for media. It's tremendously inconvenient as an admin/user rather than an evangelist.