[Bradford] The BBC and Ubuntu

[Stop Watch Consulting Ltd]

Andrea Ryan wrote:
> I don't know if any of you saw BBC Breakfast's coverage of the Windows 7
> release last week, but it basically consisted of 'Windows 7 is great and
> shiny, Mac is also available, and by the way there's this thing called
> Ubuntu which is coming out soon (!) and it's free but no-one wants to bother
> with that'. I paraphrase, obviously, but you get the idea!
> 
> It turns out I wasn't the only Linux user that spotted this, and at
> LUGRadioLive/Oggcamp at the weekend I found out that other Linux users had
> written to, and had further dialogues with, the BBC about their somewhat
> biased coverage. I came across this article (
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8326264.stm) on the BBC this morning -
> perhaps their attempt to placate some of the people they'd upset with their
> Breakfast segment?
> 
> It's nice to see that Linux (Ubuntu particularly in this example) is being
> recognised outside of 'the community' but on the other hand there is still
> some way to go in getting Linux widely accepted as an alternative to
> Windows. The events of the weekend were great, with 200+ linux geeks coming
> together to demonstrate and celebrate the work that's going on within the
> community, but I believe that Linux's best advocates are us - the users. We
> have to get people talking about Linux, and demonstrate that it really is a
> viable alternative. If I can convince my slightly technophobic dad of this,
> surely between us we can convince hundreds, thousands of other people too?!
> 
> Now discuss ;)
> 
> Andrea
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Andrea, many thanks for letting us know.

Linux is gaining some foothold within larger, mostly commercial, 
organisations that have technical competence internally coupled with 
savvy finance departments. Linux, along with FOSS, is a relatively new 
entrant and when viewed in that context it is doing well within the sector.

As you move further down the IT feeding chain the marketing power and 
effort is simply not there. Other then any trickle down effect, 
therefore, any advances within smaller businesses and even more so the 
private user are likely to be incremental and slow for quite some time 
to come.

Our own "Civil" Service are more than happy sell the concept that we 
should pass inflated profits to a foreign (USA) monolith rather than 
encouraging our own skills base. Our published and broadcast media do 
not understand, nor, it must be added, do they show any wish to 
understand, the issues involved. None of them gather evidence of 
comparative performance to back up their statements or recommendations.

The Linux/FOSS "community" is fragmented and dispersed, composed mainly 
of comparatively very small companies and one man bands, with a fair 
scattering of small cooperative ventures. Previous efforts to organise 
these into some kind of marketing force have either failed through lack 
of interest or have been hijacked by individuals wanting to exploit the 
marketing efforts of others and populated by those others who have not 
been fully aware of what needs to be done, therefore unable to compare 
with what they were being asked to do.

There is a thin sprinkling of exceptions to all of this. Nevertheless, 
they could hardly be perceived as successful market penetration in any 
wider sense. The reasons are all too clear.