Communication Breakdown
Communications from the world of, er, communications. And other stuff.
Tuesday 14 April 2009, 5:47 PM
Canonical hits back at Microsoft in netbook spat
On 3 April, Brandon LeBlanc wrote on the Windows Experience Blog that, in the United States in February, 96 percent of netbooks sold had Windows as the preinstalled operating system. "A number of analysts and researchers following the space see ample evidence indicating customers really DO want netbook PCs to work like their larger brethren – and that the way the vast majority of consumers make that happen is by buying a netbook PC with Windows," he wrote.
"Both MSI – a leading netbook PC OEM – and Canonical – the vendor supporting the commercial distribution of Ubuntu Linux - stated publicly they saw Linux return rates 4 times higher than Windows," he wrote. "Why such a disparity? Because users simply expect the Windows experience. When they realize their Linux-based netbook PC doesn't deliver that same quality of experience, they get frustrated and take it back. Here's a telling stat: In the UK, Carphone Warehouse dropped Linux-based netbook PCs, citing customer confusion as a reason for a whopping 1-in-5 return rate."
"Why are consumers choosing Windows? Because it's easier to use, just works out of the box with people's stuff, and ultimately offers more choice." He went on to claim that "it's easy to stay up-to-date since Windows releases updates, patches and fixes on a regular, predictable schedule" and pointed out that "Windows supports nearly 3,000 printers, more than 700 digital cameras, more than 240 webcams and more than 180 digital video cameras".
On Wednesday, Canonical's Chris Kenyon wrote a retaliatory post, pointing out that "Ubuntu and most Linux distributions support over 3000 printers, over 1000 digital cameras and over 200 webcams".
"It also supports them without the need to search for drivers on dubious websites or load drivers from a CD," Kenyon coughed. "Just plug and play."
On the subject of return rates, Kenyon argued that the issue was not Linux, but the quality of the netbook's hardware and the quality assurance that had been carried out by the manufacturer.
"Well-engineered Linux netbooks have similar return rates to XP," Kenyon wrote. "What makes a real difference to return rates is not whether it's Linux or not, but the quality of the device's hardware and the ability to fully partake in web and media experiences." He listed three examples of things that needed to be done with any netbook:
- Adobe Flash player being pre-installed
- Basic media codecs being pre-installed (these add a few dollars to the cost of a PC)
- Extensive hibernate and resume cycle testing (many OEMS have had to develop and implement new QA processes to work with Linux)
Highlighting Dell's Inspiron Mini 9 as a (praiseworthy) case in point, Kenyon said: "When customers are offered choice on equally well-engineered computers around a third will select Ubuntu over XP."
Kenyon also reminded his readers that it was competition from Linux that "crashed" the price of XP last year. "So even if you bought a netbook last year with XP - feel free to smile when you see an Ubuntu PC," he wrote. "It's amazing what an open market can achieve."
PreviousComments on this post
It's interesting how LeBlanc casually slips in one little twist which completely changes the basis of a point. I think that he is probably right in saying that a large percentage of the Linux Netbook returns happen because the customers expected the Windows experience. But to take that, and then twist it into the following statement: "When they realize their Linux-based netbook PC doesn't deliver that same quality of experience, they get frustrated and take it back", is simply distortion. No one said anything about "quality" of experience; none of the surveys, manufacturers or consumer's statements mentioned that.
The simple fact is that a very large percentage of netbook buyers (and PC buyers for that matter) have little or no idea of Windows, Linux, or operating systems of any kind. For most of those customers, when they turn on the netbook and it doesn't look and work exactly like their previous PC, something is wrong and they are likely to return the netbook. This is going to be a very difficult problem for Linux to solve, if it is able to solve it at all.
However, for those who are concerned with "quality of experience", I would say that the shoe is on the other foot, they are likely to be critical enough to not want an operating system that hangs, crashes, slowly self-corrupts over time and is well known to be the most vulnerable to security problems and attacks - Windows.
jw
Well spoken Mr. Watson. More people today want a secure environment, and that keeps windows out completely. And as far as hardware support, you don't have to hit the internet searching for drivers, and downloading no telling what else embedded with it. Linux installs quickly and finds all of todays exotic hardware, with few exceptions.
Most of the figures I've seen indicate that when presented with similarly spec'd netbooks with an option to buy one with either WinXP or a decent Linux distro (as one example, the Dell Inspiron Mini 9), then Linux is selected by about a 3rd of customers.
Think about that for a second.
Given an open and unimpeded choice, one 3rd of consumers' PC selections would ship with Linux.
If this was to happen across the board, across all vendor PC ranges, this would mean that in 3-4 years (the average refresh cycle for PCs), there would be 300-400 million Linux desktops.
And the more Linux desktops which ship, the more the market for Linux desktops expands, as Linux growth is through word of mouth - users buy into the Linux experience because their friends, partners or kids have.
The greater the Linux desktop penetration, the greater the likelihood that even larger numbers of users will adopt it as their computer environment the 'next time around', thereby increasing that one-third marketshare over time.
The fact that more Linux netbooks aren't being sold appears to me to be due to backroom deals to limit the customer options to buy Linux.
In this country (Australia) it's almost impossible to get Linux netbooks from the mainstream vendors (ie, Asus, Acer, Dell, HP, Lenovo, Samsung, Toshiba). As to why this should be the case, it's impossible to determine. What is known is that Dell, HP and Toshiba offer Linux options in the US and UK, and Acer and Asus offer a greater range of Linux netbooks in many other countries.
This reduced option for consumers to acquire Linux would have an obviously detrimental impact on the Linux's marketshare numbers. It's an artificial tilting of the marketplace - pretty much like every other segment of the PC market, where Microsoft's anti-competitive practices have made it almost impossible to buy PCs without paying for a Windows licence.
