Posted on December 18, 2006 - by jono
Features vs. Freedom
This entry is my opinion and may not represent the views of my employer, Canonical.
Recently there has been a lot of discussion bubbling up regarding the possibility that Ubuntu will ship proprietary 3D drivers by default for some video cards. My aim here is not to discuss the specifics of that decision, which is still being fleshed out and ratified, but to instead define my views on the bigger picture behind the discussion – features vs. freedom.
I will warn you now people, my views and opinions on this are not exactly simple. While discussing this view with many friends and colleagues, I have been informed in words of single syllables that my position is complex and multi-faceted. I have had largely the same view on this subject since I got into free software, but I have been working to better define it, and here I want to document it. So, hang in there with me. I may give you a cracker at the end if you are still paying attention…
For some years now I have been expecting a show-down between freedom and features. That is, our community would need to make an important decision between freedom and a closed source technology that is deemed important. In this showdown each of us draw a line in the sand, but our lines vary hugely. In the past, the issue was largely moot – few closed source technologies were deemed important by the wider free software community. Today though we have a bling-tastic desktop just over the horizon, but for many of us the transparent-rounded-wobbly-shadowed masterpiece (!) is inaccessible without some closed-source driver wizardry being poured into your computer. The debate here is not really the specifics of closed-source 3D graphics drivers, but whether we are willing to compromise our freedom for closed source drivers that will ultimately get more people using Linux. Are we?
Compromise is an interesting word, and everyone’s definition of it and the freedom they defend with it differs vastly. It seems that for many people, their definition of freedom is closely interwoven with their ability or willingness to compromise on certain features. Although we have many holier-than-thou bloggers who demand freedom and “no compromise” as cornerstones of their philosophy, far too many of these people don’t themselves practise what they preach. Many of these people place freedom as the single most important aspect of Linux and free software, but crank up the wireless firmware, binary blobs in their kernel, send pithy emails of complaint about incursions to their freedom from their Gmail account and go to work every day in a Microsoft-shop. When queried about such abundant compromises in their own philosophy, the response is often that “you totally need a wireless network card to get stuff done”, “web applications are different”, “firmware is different” or “I have no control over my choice of career”. Each of these indiscretions are compromises, and many of the people who claim them do have control and the ability to change them, but the changes are simply too inconvenient. But hey, the “no compromise” lifestyle is not typically one befitted with ease and luxury – the ethos is to pucker up and suck it up in the name of ethics and free software.
My opinion on this is simple. I believe that people should simply practise what they preach. If your opinion is “no compromise”, then there should be no compromise. You don’t get to choose what is more ethically acceptable here, this is the point of “no compromise”. From the outset I have always stated that I believe in free software, but I do acknowledge that I sometimes use non-free software – as many of you know, my studio is currently non-free until we all feel the big Jokosher love. I have explicitly not taken a “no compromise” position because I know I could not maintain a “no compromise” lifestyle. As I made clear in a previous entry, I think sensationalism is an enemy in the free software world, but unfortunately much of the discussion about features vs. freedom seems to boil down to very vocal outbursts by the holier-than-thou brigade who often step beyond sage fact and fall into headlines and rhetoric to grab Planet
Those who shout the loudest are not always the best barometer of opinion.
Will the features work?
Today we live in a competitive industry. Although dominated by Microsoft, all vendors, including our friends in Seattle, are working hard to create features and innovations to keep them in the game. As the world learns to talk to each other over the Internet, computers become more centrally placed in our lives, and we spend more time caring about computers than we used to. They are no longer the ugly beige boxes shoved under a desk in a cold office, they are must-have items that help us run our lives, define our style and allow us to share and communicate with each other.
As computers have become so central to us, the vendors have ramped up the bling to provide a more aesthetically pleasing experience. These improvements not only make computers more attractive to use, but more usable too. Irrespective of the arguments behind freedom, having a sane bling-enabled desktop does create a better experience for the user. Microsoft and Apple have invested in this, and as such having a bling-enabled desktop is part and parcel of the competitive market. This is what happens when dominant market players define direction – to stay in the game, you need to compete on the same playing field.
Bling is important, not specifically for the features it gives us, but for the competitive advantage it gives us. If we can’t compete, we will lose. Simple. Now, some of you may be happy for Linux to always remain a niche Operating System that only a small subset of people of use, but I see things differently. I want us to win, and I get up every single day with the intention of helping us to win. Many of us talk about World Domination, but achieving World Domination is something that can only happen if we too keep ourselves in the game. When we step too far away from the competitive industry, we risk becoming an historical reflection in the computing timeline, not entirely dissimilar from BeOS or OS/2. Its tempting to get on our collective high-horses and snub the rest of the industry that they don’t follow our ethos and perspective, but while admirable in a puritanical sense, it is destructive in a competitive “lets kick some arse” sense.
So here we face the challenge – we have a clear conflict of interest between moving forward and being relevant and a conflict with the freedoms that underpin our whole community. I don’t see this conflict any easier than anyone else, and I too hold the values of software freedom close to my heart. But while it is tempting to pontificate, I would rather spend my energy trying to help us win. There are basically two options that I see here. We can either sacrifice our freedom a little bit to be competitive, or stick to our guns and stick with freedom, but potentially sacrifice the ability to compete. One way or another, something wins and something loses. Lets look at the possible outcomes, all pushed through my own notch filter of how I suspect it would turn out:
- We allow 3D proprietary drivers and sacrifice part of our freedom – by including the driver support for some cards, we will allow Linux to compete with Vista and Mac OS X, and stay relevant in the game. As we remain competitive, more people get to know about Linux and more people get to taste the freedom that is secured in 99% of most Linux distributions. As such, by remaining competitive, we get the ability to push out the message to more users and we get a bigger net win of people using free software. Essentially, our sacrifice of freedom in one aspect of the system (3D drivers) would result in a much bigger net win of users enjoying freedom in other aspects of the system (the rest of the distribution). This would result in more users, and importantly more contributors to the free software community, helping us to create more free software.
- We deny inclusion of the 3D proprietary drivers by default for reasons of freedom – if this happens we would be secure in that freedom is preserved in the 3D aspect of the distribution, but we would lose our ability to compete on the 3D level, which while not exclusively bling-related, would impede our competitive ability. This would give our competitors the ability to steam ahead of us, leaving our comparatively boring and flat looking OS in the dust. As our competitors grow they will increase their assault on other parts where we do win, and this would put more pressure on Linux distributors. This increased pressure could involve layoffs and result in less time being invested in distributions and less time being invested in upstream development. As such, our current standard of living would begin to drop and less time and money would be invested in Linux.
Now, of course, I am not suggesting the world is going to come crashing down if we don’t include the bling, but the world will come crashing down if we don’t keep Linux competitive. Sure, on the server we have things mostly sewn up, but on the desktop it is an entirely different game and a different set of rules.
What I believe is critically important is that we never stop fighting for Open Source 3D graphics drivers. A comprimise in freedom in part of the wider Linux distribution needs to be backed up with a confidence that the freedom will continue to be the priority as market share grows. The key difference here is our approach to getting this freedom – it will only happen with market pressure. The fight for free drivers for reasons of freedom has not proved successful, and the choice to only buy Intel will have some impact, but not a huge impact due to lower market share. We need to become a large and relavent player, a player that can mandate decisions at a market level that will truly affect the market. Sure, there are plenty of challenges to this approach – when we get a large market share, would Linux distributions really want to rock the boat and demand Open Source drivers? Well, this is the proof of the pudding. I expect companies such as Canonical, Red Hat, Linspire and Novell to always place consistant market pressure on the hardware manufacturors to understand and migrate to the ethos of free software.
Although the decision about binary 3D drivers in Ubuntu is not yet concluded, the bigger picture encroaches many other areas. Of all, I would love to see our community get a better, more representated voice when it comes to issues of freedom. We all hold freedom close to our hearts, but sometimes the very loud voices of the few can blur the general opinion of the masses. We each have one voice in the choir.
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December 20, 2006
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The hardware problem with 3D drivers and other issues will be solved with a new free software friendly hardware company.
http://www.opengraphics.org
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December 20, 2006
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Casey, you’re overlooking a fundamental distinction. To wit: how much more difficult is it to copy a piece of hardware versus a piece of software? How much more difficult is it to modify a piece of hardware versus a piece of software?
If Canonical gets permission to distribute binary blobs on Ubuntu 7.xx CDs, will that permission extend to everyone who receives those CDs as well?
There are no technical reasons preventing that, as there are with hardware.
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December 20, 2006
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(sorry for my English) I have Nvidia card and use nvidia closed source drivers (it’s my choice) but I don’t think they should be by default. When new XOrg 7.1 was ready I had to wait until Nvidia will release driver for it. I couldn’t upgrade to new (beta of Edgy then or sth like that) Ubuntu because of it. Next time I’ll buy card with open source drivers (is it any available? Intel cards are only for laptops?) but if nvidia drivers will be by default some people wouldn’t know where the problem lies – why they can’t test new XOrg for example.
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December 20, 2006
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IMO, you’re view is biased toward having the drivers included, so most people will probably post the opposite (since people that agree tend to say nothing). Instead of commenting on your post directly, I’ll just give you my take, which is the same as it was before reading your post. I do not think the drivers should be included on the CD. I do think it is ok to make them available for download, or install from a separate media. If people really want the drivers, they will find a way to get them, whether you make them available or not. So you might as well make them available and save everyone a headache.
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December 20, 2006
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So if “bling” is the means to be competitive, then why didn’t Mac OS X trounce Windows in the market after it came out? The Mac doesn’t just have “bling” advantage over Windows – even if you replaced its fancy Aqua looking UI with something that looked like Gnome 1.0, the Mac would STILL be technically superior to Windows because of the design & usability of its UI. But where has this gotten the Mac?
I just don’t see eye-candy helping Linux any more than it’s helped Mac. I contend that the WHOLE REASON Linux is even in the game is EXACTLY because of the nature of Free Software – both libre and gratis.
If Ubuntu or any other Linux distros do eventually decide to include non-free video drivers, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE do it in a way such that we at least slightly inconvenience the user at the time he/she installs these drivers, and use it as an opportunity to educate about the technical AND social consequences of using them. Make them click an EULA-like agreement button (you gotta click HOW many EULAs when you install Windows & Office? maybe that’s why they’re winning…). Throw up a short splash screen every time X starts up to remind them.
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December 20, 2006
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Linspire has put tremendous pressure on hardware companies to support Linux and open source solutions. We have had a fair amount of success, but that success almost always comes from the OEM (HP, etc.) putting pressure on the device manufacturer. If I call up a modem manufacturer and say, “I want you to work on supporting Linux and OSS,” I get a pretty cool response. However, if I can get HP to call them, I get a much better response. OEM’s however, are all driven by one thing….sales.
If Linux is to gain support from hardware vendors, it needs to make ECONOMIC sense for these vendors to support it. That means they need hundreds of thousands of their users asking for Linux and OSS support. If Linux remains a very small market (on the desktop), they’ll never bother. Why should they? They are in business to make money, period.
95% of all desktop and laptop computers are running the OS that came pre-installed when purchased. If you can’t get OEM’s to pre-install Linux, it stalls at current early adopter, hobbiest, tech-user levels. To get to the next level, you need OEM’s. Those reading this may be fine with buying a PC that already included a price for an OS, then downloading a Linux iso file, burning a CD, and installing an OS. 95% of the rest of the world will never do that.
These are realities. Linux needs hardware vendors and OEM’s. OEM’s need sales to stay in business. Users won’t want Linux if it doesn’t work.
It’s a necessary compromise to support hardware, multimedia, file types, etc. to get more people using Linux on the desktop. Dell, HP, etc. aren’t interested in selling a desktop or laptop computer that won’t work with iPods, graphic cards, wifi devices, etc. These are just the realities.
Get more people using Linux, and you have a market that hardware vendors will need to care about.
Kevin Carmony CEO, Linspire, Inc.
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December 20, 2006
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I really don’t know if Jono is even bothering to read all these comments, but I think it is great to get this topic out into the wild in an informed and thoughtful way. I respect Jono’s position, and greatly appreciate his contributions to the Free Software community, but I think what he has posted is beard. The solution is difficult and expensive, but if Mark S. and Canonical want to deal with the real issue at hand it will take a fair amount of resources. What issue is that you say? People want to use the hardware they have invested money into acquiring, and they want to use Free Software. The only meeting of those two roads is the production of Free Software drivers for hardware. Creating graphics drivers is not a simple, actually its a fucking insanely difficult, task. It takes very specialized knowledge, and enormous amount of patience, and will of iron. Canonical needs to find these people, put them to work, and get the free drivers in X.Org to a competitive level with NVidia’s and ATI’s drivers. Paying those people is expensive, and there will be a fair amount of time required to perform the task. Mark S. has shown amazing generosity in funding Free Software and the Ubuntu distribution, but if he really wants to solve this issue to the satisfaction of the community and new users alike, he needs to invest in this endeavor.
–Aodhagan
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December 20, 2006
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I am indeed reading them when I get some time – keep them coming.
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December 20, 2006
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More than 100 comments and nobody said it, so I guess I’ll have to: the issue is not only about 3D. The proprietary drivers add quite a lot of other nice stuff: The NVIDIA proprietary driver supports XRandR, TV-Out, Twinview, ACPI/APM support (ACPI is still not perfect though) has XvMC support and better 2D performance, provides configuration tools (nvidia-settings, nvidia-xconfig) that are quite complete, etc… The free drivers lacks most, if not all of these features, which, to me, are way more important than 3D support.
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December 21, 2006
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People should be free to use Linux as they see fit. That’s what the freedom of open source is. Most people in the passed didn’t want closed source drivers, codecs etc . . . for the few that did they could install these them selves. These days most people will install them as the first thing they do after Linux is installed. The default install should accommodate the majority with easy tools to adapt the installation to suit people who want different from the default.
As for convincing Hardware manufactures to make open source drivers. That will only happened with purchase power (market share). Linux now has enough market share that hardware manufactures have started releasing drivers. In the passed most drivers were created by dedicated Linux enthusiast (thanks guys:wink:). Not including binary drivers just means that users have to install the drivers them selves. It does not mean that the hardware manufactures don’t get the sale and it the sale that they want (this is why market share is important).
We should include the binary drivers because it makes life easy for the users and makes no difference to the hardware manufacture. They still get the sale even if the user has to install the drivers them selves. What we should do is recommend hardware that has open source drivers (and make it obvious what these are). If Linux users favour hardware with open source drivers when buying new hardware and have enough market share that this will lead to significant sales, then manufactures will release open source drivers.
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December 21, 2006
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I think there are some significant questions to answer when approaching the issue of support for hardware when used in collusion with binary drivers. First, what do you do if in the future the company providing the binary drivers decides to stop doing so because they feel it no longer makes sense in the market?, esp. after you have built your system around the expectation that those drivers are available. Don’t think in the world of mergers, buyouts, changing market dynamics, that this can’t happen to your pet piece of hardware, no matter how popular the vendor currently has become. Anybody remember 3DFX, or Plan9. Hell, even ATI was bought by AMD. Second, how does Cannonical, or anybody else for that matter, plan to offer support within a kernel tainted and populated by binary blobs. Or do such organizations expect to tell users, “Sorry, we can’t support you because you chose the default install, and we don’t have access to the code to answer your questions.” Yeah, that’ll work in the business world. Third, once you compromise on one competitive necessity, where do you stop? One person’s requirement is another person’s waste of hard disk space. Fourth, when did Free Software become a project to pressue others into opening their code instead of producing our own? If you can argue that people have the “right” to run whatever software they want, then you can hardly argue that organizations aren’t entitled to release code under whatever license they damn well please. Its not a good long term situation to rely on code from those who don’t embrace your goals. Fifth, once we start talking about “market share” we are talking about economics. What’s the plan, as a bunch of free distributions, packages, etc. to generate revenue streams directly for hardware vendors to promote the opening of code, or better yet, how do we expect to convince them to open the code once we’ve admitted that when push comes to shove we’ll compromise on the access to code for access to their hardware. To use an adage, the ball stays in their side of the court. Instead of everyone bantering on about how they are going to use the closed driver whether its the default or not, or how their mom wants the convenience of the closed driver, or bling is swell, or whatever, lets see some answers to the real questions at hand. Thanks.
–Aodhagan
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December 21, 2006
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There seems to be a lot of confusion over the meaning of “freedom”. Closed source software takes away your freedom to see how the software works, to modify it, and then redistribute it. If there’s a problem with your NVidia video drivers, for instance, you have to wait for Nvidia to fix it. So by using their video drivers, you have less freedom in the sense that you, or the community, can’t improve the drivers.
No one is trying to take away your “freedom” to run whatever software you want on your own computer. No one is trying to force you to use only free software. That’s the big strawman argument we see over and over in these types of discussions.
Free Software advocates are pointing out that proprietary software takes away your freedom to study and modify the software you depend on– and that’s the important freedom here.
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December 21, 2006
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Most posters here forget about one more aspect of open drivers: portability. Closed graphics drivers for Linux from NVIDIA and AMD/ATI come only for a handful of architectures. It mostly means x86 and x86_64 – perfectly understandable from the business point of view. But there are obviously other hardware vendors that produce a variety of parts: ethernet, ADSL, wi-fi chipsets, USB gadgets and so on – they typically target x86 and maybe x86_64.
And what about other architectures people care about? PowerPC? SPARC? What about other OS-es: BSD, Solaris/OpenSolaris, etc? The same piece of hardware can perfectly run under Linux, no matter the architecture, *IF there is the source code for the driver. Said source code can be adapted, ported and improved. It’s a win for everyone. It’s not insane to demand access to the source code of the driver. This way the hardware can be supported by knowledgeable members of community on multiple platforms the vendors never could care (or heard) about.
The quest for openness is also a quest for honesty. Hardware must always be produced and bought. It’s physical. Drivers complement the hardware, but this is only software, a smart bunch of bytes. Multiplying software is not costly. And the software should be free for everyone, in all senses of the word.
Aodhagan in #122 nailed it right – if there is no free driver, write one. No matter if this is a graphics card, wi-fi chipset or a printer. That’s exactly what upset Richard M. Stallman a long time ago with closed drivers. Just think where did this lead to.
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December 22, 2006
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response to #125 features from binary crap
windows words has also many features that openoffice or gnome office lacks. neverthelesss we are willing to put the effort to build a solid kernel. you seem to forget that a kernel module can do anything on your box. anyway you can’t do a 3d binary module these days that is not a derivate art. so ubuntu would directly violate the gpl and the great linux driver ecosystem.
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December 22, 2006
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Very well spoken. I’m still not sure on what to make of the whole issue, but you have made some good points about it.
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January 2, 2007
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Jono, in you reply you say, “I don’t decide it, the community does and it is still being discussed. Feedback is always important, and the Ubuntu development community would love to hear your thoughts!”
This is not totally true. There is no vote on this issue and the community does not decide. At the moment, it’s not clear who does. Ultimately, the decision will probably be made by Mark Shuttleworth personally and people on the TB and CC may then choose to oppose it for technical or community related reasons. If it then goes to a vote, it could probably be blocked. If there are technical issues, it shouldn’t go in but there’s a path to resolution. If the CC members oppose it, they’d need to do so on behalf of the community.
Do the conflicted nature of things in the community. I suspect several members would have a hard time brining it up to oppose it on behalf of the community. In that case, Mark basically gets to make the decision.
Of course, he and the CC and TB will listen to the community, but its not democracy and its dangerously to build up expectations that it might be (although in comment 1XX on your blog, it’s probably OK).
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January 21, 2007
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I can’t help but wonder, who’s freedom is being taken away by the inclusion of ‘features” – proprietary CODECs and the like? In what way am I personally more free, if I can’t legally play MP3s or WMVs etc?
In what way does the ability to access and install these proprietary CODECs reduce my freedom if I am not free to choose to use them? or not. In what way am I more free if half the Internet is unavailable to me because I am unable to use Flash or Windows media.? In what way does not having access to these proprietary CODECs make Linux more desirable to potential new users?
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February 18, 2007
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February 28, 2007
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Linux won’t die anytime soon if binary graphics drivers are not included – but it’s growth into the “market” for regular users will be very limited without them.
Meanwhile ATI and NVIDIA don’t seem to be in any rush to open source their drivers. They have their reasons (good or bad doesn’t matter) to prefer them closed. With Linux only being a nice OS there is hardly any reason for them to feel pressured at all atm.
That they even offer binary drivers is probably a combination of them not being too much work for them (they know their own stuff and have running code they only have to adapt/port) and to keep their options open (some government agencies that are potential big customers going with Linux these days).
For business machines all this is a non-issue. They don’t nee 3D accel and often will just use the onboard graphic chipsets of their mainboards.
Where the 3D drivers are used (games, graphics workstations) the binary drivers are a must-have. People install them all the time. The fora are full of people asking questions about how to get Nvidia/Ati installed and configured for their distribution.
So, currently, for that part of the “market” (games, etc…) Linux/Ubuntu needs the ati/nvidia drivers much more than the other way around. If Ati and Nvidia stopped producing Linux drivers tomorrow their balance sheets would hardly be affected – but almost every Linux gamer (yes – I know aboput all those fine games that do run without – but the majority of gamers want the up-to-date-stuff from the shelf – and that’s still problem enough even with the binary drivers) would be forced to switch back to Windows.
To summarize: Any real pressure to open source the nvidia/ati only comes from Linux being important enough – and that means market share. Forcing non-techies into a must-have installation of those drivers is just an annoyance to them and keeps many potential users from Linux.
Yes, there is no guarantee that ati/nvidia will ever open source their drivers – but that then won’t be worse than the current situation.
Include them in the repo – ask the user on setup if s/he needs a 3D accelerated desktop – if yes – install closed driver where necessary – otherwise the open alternatives.
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February 28, 2007
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One more thing: To claim that closed source software is “unethical” is plain silly.
Inconvenient, less secure, a liability, annoying – yes.
But there is no ethical/moral obligation whatsoever for a company to open source their product. I’m happy if they do so. It will influence my buying decisions, it might even eventually be in their own best interest – but it’s not a matter of ethics.
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February 28, 2007
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Yet another comment
Features vs Freedom is a false dichotomy.
Having features is a freedom. The freedom to have that extra functionality – especialy if it is an option.
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August 10, 2007
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Interesting post !
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August 18, 2007
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Thats a great article !
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October 22, 2007
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I understand how you feel. But Ubuntu deserves some chance. Let’s give it a benefit of the doubt. I’m sure they won’t release something that will not benefit the whole computer-entwined community.
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May 22, 2008
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Listen, I’m a big fan of Redmond and their products. I’ve built a very lucrative career off of supporting technologies based on Microsoft technologies, and I am effectively an 8th grade drop out. I’m also fiscally conservative and generally pro-business. In a nut shell, I don’t fit the typical stereotype profile of the idealist, anti-corporate *nix user.
But I’ve been playing with nix here and there since the days of the Sparcstation 5/10. I never got very far into SUN OS/Solaris, but I got pretty deep into Debian around Potato and Sarge. Compiling kernels for notebooks with wireless drivers, running KDE. I also ran a Citadel-UX Internet BBS off of FreeBSD around this time. My point is, I’m not anti-nix as a Win32 advocate. But I am very critical about the *nix community and their promises and their claims and their traditional hostility and elitist attitude toward the Win32 community, as a GROUP. I could go through my bullet list of exaggerated claims and attacks on Microsoft technology and how the *nix community likes to compare itself to Win32 as Apples to Apples until the argument doesn’t suit them, then they claim it is Apples and Oranges – but I won’t.
Instead, I’ll point out that overall, I dig Debian, and better, I think that Ubuntu really achieves bridging the gap that I always said Debian needed to cross in order to be a viable competitor to Microsoft technology on the desktop. The thing about Debian is, “it just works”. In particular, the dselect/apt-get package management impressed me far more than other *nix alternatives available at that time. What good is an OS if every time you try to install a package the .rpm has a dozen different dependencies that you have to work out, some of which inevitably require a compile? Debian took care of that hassle. But it was lacking in driver support and ease of setup. Ubuntu has done a fantastic job of addressing this – at first glance.
But then it quickly became clear that the idealistic philosophy (that is so often a *nix achillies heel) behind Ubuntu made them come up short. How ironic that if I had a high end, Intel/Nvidia system Ubuntu would have worked out fine for me (I prefer this combo, by the way. And no VIA chipset for me. Intel chipsets all the way, I’m a corporate whore through and through.) But I had picked up a POS old AMD with an ATI Rage 128 Pro chipset in it that I deemed worthy of *nix – almost MADE for each other. How ironic that this would highlight a major shortcoming of Ubuntu.
One that to me, for the average Ubuntu demographic, is a huge deal breaker. An AMD, ATI, DIY box is where nix *lives. This is core market for a *nix distro. How many people drop bleeding edge technology into a modded ultimate gaming box and then pop a *nix on it? Not many. If you’re paying more than $600+ for your system, you’re probably not going to quibble about an additional $180 for the OS. Nope. There might be a few oddballs here and there, but the AVERAGE *nix user, for one reason or another, is budget conscious and oriented across the board. And budget conscious machines often end up with ATI video cards. Now, I, perturbed, went out and bought a cheap Nvidia 5500 GeForce3 for $20 after rebate and called it a day. But even THAT is a painful purchase for a lot of the *nix people I’ve known in my life – and, really, when it SHOULD have worked better with my ATI card, it kind of offsets the value of Ubuntu. I could have gotten a graymarket OEM WinXP for about $60 more and the ATI card would have worked fine.
And so I saw this conflict for Ubuntu right away – based on what I see as silly Ubuntu core-values and philosophy. It doesn’t “just work”. It actually has some frustrating issues that don’t have to exist, but do because of idealism. And I represent a certain target market that the *nix community claims to want to convert. With my experience and background and skills, if something like this turns ME off to a *nix distro, then it is going to really have an impact on the LARGER target market you want to convert from Win32 platforms.
So this blog actually resonates with me. I think the *nix community is torn, amost bipolar. On the one hand it WANTS more market share, more penetration among these key demographics. On the other, it has a disdain for the very market it covets, for the people that market represents. I think there is a certain segment that enjoys the *nix Punk Rock/Thrash Metal effect… that is, “Linux has an aura of hipness because it is uncommon and not accepted by the average”. If you ever achieve mass acceptance, you lose that anti-chic allure. May sound like an outrageous claim, but I think it is part of this equation. Being part of the “Windows Community” just means you’re an average person in society. Being part of the *nix community means you BELONG to something. And Lord knows, a lot of *nix users need somewhere to belong. (Not that Win32 doesn’t have its fair share of anti-social, badly adjusted propeller-heads – I may very well be one of them).
My point is that Ubuntu, because of philosophy and idealism, falls short of its claimed goal – and trying to fix that shortcoming presents a huge and challenging decision to the Ubuntu community. I am shocked to read this blog, because MY feeling was that idealism would trump practical marketing decision in a *nix community (which in my mind, ultimately means that this would be another dead end *nix project and ideal).
If that isn’t the case, if the practical marketing decision trumps the idealism, that gives me hope. Ubuntu, by having flexible moralities, may have a chance at making a difference. They might get labeled a “sell out” by the TRUE hardcore element of the *nix Community… but such is the price of success.
Gentlemen, get your Flamethrowers ready. I probably won’t be returning here to follow up – just stumbled upon this thread by chance.
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November 22, 2009
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Day by day we looking for freedom, But for that our future is going down…