I really don't care for this video...

[Simon]

My room mate switched from Windows 8 (yes 8) to Linux, when I gave him my Kubuntu 12.04 on a USB drive and said "Boot this.".

He is not a computer geek or "tweaker", he is working toward his doctorate in hematology and I am working on mine in genetics. He was amazed how fast the OS booted from the drive and how quickly it identified his wifi, blue tooth, web cam, etc... All this while on the USB chip and not installed. I admit I assisted him migrate his needed files from W8 to Linux. After he installed the 12.04 OS he did upgrade to 13.04 (which I thought would be a deal breaker) and left it running while he had some function to attend. Everything seems to work for him and unlike myself, he has his auto update.

Now I realize we are college geeks, but geeks of a different flavor. I get my hands dirty in those terminal windows and play with WINE and Bash. Frank is like a monkey pushing buttons to get fed. He is not in the games... well he is a PS3 person soon to be PS4. Computers are all about productivity to us. We need presentations, medical information, and access. Frank is now going on 3 or 4 months and hasn't asked me once to correct something with Linux. Unlike my current girlfriend has Windows 7 and that is a different story. She might end up being my next evil ex, if she doesn't make the move to Linux **INSERT BIG GRIN HERE**

Frank and I plan to work in a lab together, some day own a lab together, guess what OS we will be using?

[claydoh]

I may tick some people off with this, but really, pouring linuxy-goodness into the closed-off, preaching-to-the-converted, echo-chambered corners of the 'net is not much more than mutual masturbation puff-puff-pass. Someone coming in to point out that something is awry just knocks down the tent harshes the mellow.

Sometimes we need a swift kick in the nethers to knock things into a different perspective for bit. I just wish that Bryan could come up with a different method than rehashing the same script over the years, yelling into that echo chamber.

[GreyGeek]

Bryan is a very sharp and funny guy, AND, a Linux advocate. He's also an entrepreneur who lives by his wits, a commodity which he has in abundance!

[SteveRiley]

it keeps Linux/distros a moving target for security threats.

Very few discovered vulnerabilities are distro-specific. Vulns in, say, the kernel or Postfix or OpenSSL will hit all distros equally.

[SteveRiley]

mutual masturbation... knocks down the tent
puff-puff-pass... harshes the mellow

Good grief! I think you need to get outdoors for a little while!

[bsniadajewski]

@Simon I don't believe that Linux proves that anarchism works. you still have guys like Shuttleworth around.

The main reason, I believe, that no polity had practiced anarchy is security. When anarchy befalls an area, there is a possibility for a surrounding country or countries to take advantage of the situation; or, as was the case for Somalia, new states to pop up (Puntland, Somaliland) and warlords start wrecking havoc. With a (responsible) government, there is a chance for sucurity and stability.

[Simon]

I didn't say "anarchy is security", for those of you who are not aware, anarchism by definition is a leaderless society. It is not what those miscreant teens practice in the states either. The internet is a leaderless social information network. Linux may get some major funding from a billionaire or some fancy Dan like Shuttleworth may claim to have laid the foundation, but they still remain a microbe in a much bigger organism. The day a cell or membrane in my foot starts telling my brain what to do, I will begin to worry. I wasn't trying to turn this into some political debate, just using an allegory that like anarchism, Linux is always going to be there in all its forms. No matter how many politicians try to control it, you cannot fight a headless snake.

@claydoh: That maybe true that we need to rattle the bars once in a while. But if I can give Kubuntu to my friends (believe me Frank is not remotely computer literate) on a CD or USB and they choose it over their current OS, that says something. Yeah, and from my medical point of view, that may be less addictive than tobacco, but it still causes cancer, better to stick with the masturbation. LMAO

[tek_heretik]

What Linux needs is an 'standards association', members vote on certain standardizing features to make it more friendly user and programmer wise.

[bsniadajewski]

@tek_heretik Agreed!

[SteveRiley]

Check out something called the Linux Standard Base, or LSB. Then know that one of the largest original distros -- that would be the one upon which Ubuntu and hundreds of others are based -- intentionally chose not to follow the LSB.

[phonic-otg]

Also if you ascribe Anarchy to mean lawlessness you'd be wrong.
It is more Rules WITHOUT Rulers.