dailyfinance.com — Microsoft is "indoctrinating" Best Buy workers to sell its highly anticipated Windows 7 operating system using outright lies about the performance of open-source competitor Linux, according to Linux experts and at least one Best Buy employee who has seen the alleged Microsoft training slides.
Sep 6, 2009 View in Crawl 4
elenaadamscomSep 7, 2009
You are aware that Lego nearly went bankrupt, right?
thejadedmonkeySep 8, 2009
Seems like what I said stirred up some debate, so let me clarify.I have a desktop. If I'm going to use Linux on it, it needs to be my only OS, as I can't stand dual booting to play a game, and then restarting to edit pictures. 9 times out of 10, I can't even stand rebooting to jump from XP to Windows 7.Mac's... Like Ccoburn3 said, "Running ANYTHING on an Apple product except the current Mac OS is virtually impossible. And even that doesn't run very well. The only reason Apple is still in business is that Vista was such a bad product."Apple doesn't even have decent XP drivers for my macbook model, and the only reason why Windows 7 runs so well on it is because it comes with drivers that are far superior to what Apple provides. If I install Linux, I have to spend hours getting my keyboard backlight to work, my mouse to have a 2nd button, etc. I don't know what it's like now, but about a year ago, it was like that.I bought a Dell mini 12 with Ubuntu on it. I got a great deal on a scratch and dent, at $285, so I couldn't pass it up. The thing came with Ubuntu Linux on it, and often after I would resume from suspend, it would take up to 5 minutes for it to detect my wireless card - it would connect right away, but only once it realized it had a wlan card to use.Or, it would simply reboot on resume.And it would run slower then Vista did.No matter how you look at it, as an experienced user, I had issues. If you're buying a computer at Best Buy and talking to a salesperson there, I would expect you have less knowledge then I do. And if I can't get linux to work well on non-standard hardware, and Dell couldn't provide a good out of the box experience, I doubt the average consumer would be able to get it to work.Sure MS might be skewing things slightly, but they're seriously far from lies. I could never recommend Linux to anyone who wasn't a total nerd, and certainly not to the demographic that shops at best buy.
weirdlookinguySep 8, 2009
"Linux does not support many common applications and online services like iTunes, Zune, Quicken, Photoshop, and Office 2007,"First of all, why is everyone outraged at MS over this? NO f**kING s**t they're gonna defend their OS and tell consumers why they believe their OS is better!Second of all, that slide is the f**king truth. No end-user/consumer is gonna want to go and try and set up WINE, find alternatives to iTunes, Photoshop, etc, etc. All you little linuxfags can provide your s**tty, half-ass "works ALMOST as good as it does in windows" solutions, but the truth is that the consumer wants a nice, stable OS that does everything they want it to do (iTunes/iPod support, Photoshop not GIMP or some lame-ass alternative, etc.). Not some open-source piece of s**t that supports their hardware only 98% and a different feature breaks every time it auto-updates itself.Windows fanboy? Damn straight I am. You little linuxfags made me into one, always calling your OS "superior" and blowing sticky loads over how great Linux is supposed to be. f**king face it, Linux is a great OS for an enthusiast but it's not ready for the consumer, and never will be unless Apple (ipod/itunes), Adobe (Photoshop), etc. etc. get behind it. Go f**k a penguin and leave Microsoft alone.
jlaughSep 11, 2009
Office programs suck period. Word-processors suck as a class. Tabs! I'm sorry but no one has used a typewriter in over 15 years. Open office sucks because it is trying to be MS Office. Word sucks because it cost to much for what it does, it's trying to imitate a typewriter. Give me a page layout program like Indesign any day of the week.Powerpoint is a joke, you have to constantly fight with it to get any control over what you are doing. Now Excel on the other hand is a good program.Most MS programs are like a poorly designed swiss army knife knockoff.Thankfully my MS developer friend got me a $30 copy of Office. I'd never pay anything more than that for an office suite. To bad it's installed on so many computers that you have to have it for compatibility. If Open Office wants to do something to gain market share they should rethink the layout capabilities of their word processor instead of trying to replicate bloatware like MS Word.
rangahSep 11, 2009
It's so easy to make claims like shallot's when you use so many bulls**t qualifying words."It's just not mature enough as a decent desktop OS choice for ordinary people"A) What is mature enough? Everything I use on the linux desktop works PERFECTLY. None of my programs crash, I'm not missing any features that I want. B) As a 'decent desktop os' - you know what's not decent? Spyware.C) 'for ordinary people' - I'm an ordinary person. I don't have any special computer training, I'm not certified for anything, I am an ordinary home user. Powershell is pretty nice. To pretend it brings the power of a unix environment to windows is either a bold lie - or just highlighting your complete ignorance on the subject.
rangahSep 11, 2009
What is a 'proper audio system'? Jack is more powerful than anything you'll find on windows, and for everyone else, ALSA is perfect.
ben2talkSep 14, 2009
Not many diggs here - but a most valid comment. Problem here is that people argue more to support their current positions. People using Windows feel threatened, Linux users also.Chill out, just sit back and watch. Critical mass is approaching.
anonymousmedicSep 17, 2009
I love the elitism in here. PEOPLE SHOULD MAKE THEIR LIVES HARDER BECAUSE LINUX IS JUST BETTER FOR EVARYTHING, RAR RAR RAR!Seriously, trying to bully people into doing complex tasks they don't want to do isn't going to win people over to linux. 95% of computer users don't know what /usr, or /etc is. They don't know how to mount a device, or use the console, or configure XFree86 to update their graphics drivers using proprietary drivers so their performance won't suck like a taiwaneese hooker. They don't want to open up a text editor and configure their operating system by hand. WINE still takes a lot of hand configuration (And, a nice copy of windows XP if you want to get a true emulation going) to use on complex games and software, and the only other alternative is expensive as hell. They want to double-click on something and be able to install and use it, without figuring out if they need a .deb or .rpm, or if they need to set the permissions in console on the .bin. They don't want to enter a root password every time they change a setting. They want simplicity, and things done for them. Here's what your average computer user wants:To use an operating system, out of the box, with minimal configuration, and the need to download a minimum amount of software to get it working.To use the most common software programs with ease - iTunes, Photoshop, quicken (And the open source alternatives to quicken suck. Majorly), Office, Call of Dut, World of Warcraft, etc. They don't want to configure emulation software by hand, or use open source software they have never heard of, and don't offer the same functionality.To not do anything with a command line, or have to memorize commands.An easy to navigate GUI environment (KDE and Gnome are getting to that point)The ability to work with the latest hardware and games as soon as they come out.Until Linux can deliver on convinence, compatability, and hardware support completely, it'll never be the year of the linux desktop. You can have the wet dream of pwning microsoft and apple all day long, but it'll be nothing more than a masturbatory fantasy if you think people care if you think they suck at computers for using Windows in the real world.There are things that linux does right, but 92% of PC users, and 6% of Mac users in the market today don't give a rats ass about that.
funkylokiSep 18, 2009
Because Linux is just not as profitable for them as MS and Apple products.
jakobrowningSep 22, 2009
Maybe I'm missing something.FTA: "Linux does not support many common applications and online services like iTunes, Zune, Quicken, Photoshop, and Office 2007,"When did Linux start supporting any of these common applications and online services?FTA: Another slide calls the statement "Linux is safer than Windows," a "myth."That is a myth, an operating system is only as safe as the user makes it. A lot of Linux users run from root(or similar account) with piss-poor/no passwords. Our servers get hit all day everyday. If we didn't setup any safety measures up we'd be f'd.It's just marketing. It happens in a capitalistic society. Enjoy your iPods.