I think the only way Linux could be recognised as a serious consumer OS is with proper vendor support, which ironically will likely only be achieved when Linux is recognised as a consumer OS. Typical catch-22 situation. The trouble is that there’s too much of a legacy which suggests that software for the platform should be free. This puts a lot of commercial people off because they are just trying to make money.
Windows and Mac both support open source software and commercial software so they appeal to both groups and with commercial vendor support, consumers don’t have half the headache. Plus, they can call their support line if something goes wrong instead of trying to find internet forums to help. If you can’t boot your machine, how do you visit an internet forum?
I think the more that commercial OSs take on the unix philosophy, the less people will use Linux. As someone mentioned, a lot of unix people ditched Linux when OS X came out. I know a lot of professors at the university I went to did.
Maybe if we lived in a world where people had a better spirit of sharing then Linux would have more success but we don’t. We live in a world of people ruled by the profit margin.
When OS X is released for X86 machines, I’m sure this will have quite an impact on things because all the OSs can compete on a level playing field. OK, you still might not be able to buy generic hardware but it should still be nearly as cheap. If a G4 Mini costs £330, an Intel Mini will likely compete and sources suggest they will carry the new Intel Yonah processor, which has dual-core capability and has clocks in the range 1.6GHz-2.16GHz. You should be able to run OS X on any x86 hardware anyway, it’s been hacked to do so even to the latest version. Apple keep releasing versions with stronger TPM or whatever, which basically means the OS looks for specific hardware. Lol, instead of trying to convince the OS that it is actually running on the hardware, they’ve now just hacked the system to convince it that it doesn’t need to look for it.
If Apple can’t solve the issue, I can see a day when they just release a generic version that can be bundled with PCs as an alternative to Windows. It’s the smart thing to do IMO. When file sharing started out, people decided they wanted a way to share music but vendors didn’t offer a solution so they did it illegally. Lots of people are deciding they want an alternative to Windows so they are illegally hacking OS X86 to run on their PCs so they don’t have to buy a new machine. It just needs Apple to stop being a hardware supported company.
Having said that, I can see a day when selling an opertaing system will become unprofitable. Apple developed OS X so quickly that by the time Tiger has come out, people are starting to question whether upgrading the OS is necessary. People only upgrade if you have a crappy system to begin with. I can see XP users upgrading to Longhorn but beyond that, I’m not sure. It seems they are reaching a plateau. This is similar to 3D software. Sure there are innovations that make the job easier but are they enough to make a sale when you can do the job with what you have?