[Reply] Why Doesn’t Linux Market to the Masses?

Adam Kane, over at the blog Foogazi asks the question above. One could dismiss this as just exuberance. But from a business perspective it does merit an answer. Put simply wouldn’t there be more adoption of Linux if a broad market campaign was applied?

The Linux Product

The question that begs here is which one? Ubuntu via Canonical? Fedora via Red Hat? Suse via well of course Suse? Or any one of a hundred others. The problem is Linux itself is not a brand. Closest we have of course are the leading 3-4 distros that have mind share. But lets say that the top 4 pulled together and started a advertising cooperative. They went out and spent $10m on TV time. Where does the offsetting revenue come from?

Keep in mind that any user can pull down a copy and run it on their devices. So the risk is the expenditure may not garner the increased revenues as is expected for proprietary products. It should also be noted that Red Hat, Canonical, Suse spend their dollars on targeted advertising and on sales force to get their products in Corporations where the $$ are made.

The Grassroots Phenom

Linux possesses an arm that is almost unique in the IT landscape — User Groups. For Linux it was a out growth of the need to overcome the chicken and egg problem of a world dominated by Microsoft. In the early days how would you get that first kernel when you did not have a kernel to start with? LUG’s solved that problem by providing a ’seed machine’ and [at that point] floppies to start the boot process.

but it has grown far beyond that now to full fledged support, Q&A, new products and new ideas kind of meetings. Nowhere else can you bring a PC to a meeting, ask for an assist on an install and most likely walk out with not only linux but nearly every tool you need to be useful with the device. LUG’s are the LInux secret weapon. With this kind of one on one support user to user who needs to buy advertising? And it sure beats ‘Bob’ from Bangalore who is reading off a script.

Strategic Advantage

One of the precepts in most any MBA training is optimal corporate size. That is for any industry segment there is a certain optimal size for the comapny in which to have the resources to develop new product, defend market share, diss rivals and prevent new entrants in the industry. Tied to that is the idea of having an advertising budget as a component of the positioning of the firm.

But there is a down side. To support any mind share advertising one must adapt a earnings projection mindset. You have to make the quarterly numbers. Crank, crank, crank. That’s part of the problem with Microsoft. Excellence be damned, we got to have 10m units sales this quarter. as a consequence you get Vista. Linux has dead lines too. The Kernel Development team make projections on kernel changes and generally stick to them. But if something like a security patch needs to take presdence they will delay a change. That is added flexibility in not having to meet $$ projections.

What of Red Hat? Don’t they have to meet projections? Sure they do. Otherwise the commercial side would not stay in business. But if you look at all of the top distros with commercial product their primary revenue stream is on support not sales as compared to a Microsoft. Red Hat wants more customers. But they want corporate customers who need the support services.

Point is, not being saddled with a large need for revenue keeps one nimble. It also means you waste less money in the change out to a new paradigm when it is required.

Conclusion

By the diverse nature of Linux, the OS, the applications, the environment; I don’t know what Linux as a brand would do with an advertising budget. Probably the best advertising of all is the fact that the key players in the FOSS movement are all now actively supported by Corporations. Von Roussmen found er of Python at Google for example. Or note the fact that IBM would not be where they are today were it not for Linux. Linux literally saved IBM in the early 80’s from the Mainframe-Mini-Desktop malaise they were having. Few of their applications were transportable across OS’s [OS360, AIX, Dos] Linux solved that for them. But I don’t think IBM would be such stalwart Linux supporter today if a Linux brand was competing against the IBM brand.

Linux is winning, thank you very much, by NOT being ‘corporate’. Linux dominates the embedded controller market. It nearly in full control of the printer engine market. It has got its foot in the door in the low end of the PC market and is very solidly established in the server market.

Let us let the Penguin fish for its prey as it sees fit.