Quoting: damarrin

Quoting: tuubi

Quoting: damarrinMarketing clout is Linux’s single weakest point.

Worth it though, if the alternative is being less open and collaborative.

I disagree, Linux totally needs to grow its market share to be trully viable as a PC OS, I'd say 10% should be enough, and it needs marketing for that.

No amount of market share is worth losing what makes Linux better than the competition. And I really mean that it's already a better PC OS than Windows or Mac OS. But I guess we all have our own criteria.

I don't see how marketing and thus bigger market share is going to make Linux a worse OS. I just don't see what one has to do with the other.

Quoting: damarrinI don't see how marketing and thus bigger market share is going to make Linux a worse OS. I just don't see what one has to do with the other.

Nether do I, but that's not what I said. You might want to read back our conversation to refresh your memory. But here's a recap:

You said that "Marketing clout is Linux’s single weakest point", attributing it to not having a "company backing it as a whole." I replied that not having marketing clout is "Worth it though, if the alternative is being less open and collaborative." Your answer to this was "I disagree".

Quoting: tuubi

Quoting: damarrin

Quoting: tuubi

Quoting: damarrinMarketing clout is Linux’s single weakest point.

Worth it though, if the alternative is being less open and collaborative.

I disagree, Linux totally needs to grow its market share to be trully viable as a PC OS, I'd say 10% should be enough, and it needs marketing for that.

No amount of market share is worth losing what makes Linux better than the competition. And I really mean that it's already a better PC OS than Windows or Mac OS. But I guess we all have our own criteria.

In some ways one could argue Linux has already suffered for what little mass appeal it has. What is the most popular gaming store on Linux ? Steam which is closed source. What are the most popular engines used in Linux games ? Unity and UE4 which are closed source. What is the most poplular GPU ? Nvidia with closed source drivers. Not to mention that hardware is coming with more and more closed source microcode and blobs attached even if there are open source drivers. People either eagerly gave up FOSS principles, if they had any, to get our sweet games or in some cases didn't even know what we were giving up in the first place. I agree we all have our own criteria so for many i'll just be the old man raging about the good old days or something like that.

Quoting: tuubi

Quoting: damarrinI don't see how marketing and thus bigger market share is going to make Linux a worse OS. I just don't see what one has to do with the other.

Nether do I, but that's not what I said. You might want to read back our conversation to refresh your memory. But here's a recap:

You said that "Marketing clout is Linux’s single weakest point", attributing it to not having a "company backing it as a whole." I replied that not having marketing clout is "Worth it though, if the alternative is being less open and collaborative." Your answer to this was "I disagree".

Yeah, I disagree with your statement that it’s somehow worth it that Linux has no marketing.

Quoting: PublicNuisance

Quoting: tuubi

Quoting: damarrin

Quoting: tuubi

Quoting: damarrinMarketing clout is Linux’s single weakest point.

Worth it though, if the alternative is being less open and collaborative.

I disagree, Linux totally needs to grow its market share to be trully viable as a PC OS, I'd say 10% should be enough, and it needs marketing for that.

No amount of market share is worth losing what makes Linux better than the competition. And I really mean that it's already a better PC OS than Windows or Mac OS. But I guess we all have our own criteria.

In some ways one could argue Linux has already suffered for what little mass appeal it has. What is the most popular gaming store on Linux ? Steam which is closed source. What are the most popular engines used in Linux games ? Unity and UE4 which are closed source. What is the most poplular GPU ? Nvidia with closed source drivers. Not to mention that hardware is coming with more and more closed source microcode and blobs attached even if there are open source drivers. People either eagerly gave up FOSS principles, if they had any, to get our sweet games or in some cases didn't even know what we were giving up in the first place. I agree we all have our own criteria so for many i'll just be the old man raging about the good old days or something like that.

Today, if you want Linux *and* gaming, you can:
- have a dual boot with a closed source OS, and closed source games downloaded via a closed source store (max game list)
- have only Linux, and closed source games downloaded via a closed source store (medium game list)
- have only Linux and FOSS games (minimal game list)

I prefer FOSS, but having a dual boot, and buying Windows only games does not promote Linux as well.
Have only Linux without Steam is really hard if you want a decent game list.
So i take the 2nd option.

Last edited by DebianUser on 14 September 2020 at 4:06 pm UTC

Quoting: damarrinYeah, I disagree with your statement that it’s somehow worth it that Linux has no marketing.

Worth for users and for normal developers who aren't playing in platform politics.

Legacy publishers aren't normal. They are corrupt. So they run to release for Google Stadia which has less users than desktop Linux, because they expect Google to pay them for it. No one pays them to release for Linux.

Which is something that someone like Valve could fix, by giving them more incentives. But Valve probably figured out they want too much or something else of the sort.

Last edited by Shmerl on 14 September 2020 at 4:09 pm UTC

Quoting: Shmerl

Quoting: damarrinYeah, I disagree with your statement that it’s somehow worth it that Linux has no marketing.

Worth for users and for normal developers who aren't playing in platform politics.

Legacy publishers aren't normal. They are corrupt. So they run to release for Google Stadia which has less users than desktop Linux, but because they expect Google to pay them for it. No one pays them to release for Linux.

Which is something that someone like Valve could fix, by giving them more incentive. But Valve probably figure out, they want too much or something else of the sort.

And cherry on the cheesecake: publishers who release on Stadia often does not provide linux binaries trough Steam... the port exists, but (????) <- insert here the BS you want

Quoting: damarrin

Quoting: tuubi

Quoting: damarrinI don't see how marketing and thus bigger market share is going to make Linux a worse OS. I just don't see what one has to do with the other.

Nether do I, but that's not what I said. You might want to read back our conversation to refresh your memory. But here's a recap:

You said that "Marketing clout is Linux’s single weakest point", attributing it to not having a "company backing it as a whole." I replied that not having marketing clout is "Worth it though, if the alternative is being less open and collaborative." Your answer to this was "I disagree".

Yeah, I disagree with your statement that it’s somehow worth it that Linux has no marketing.

I think you're still either missing my point or ignoring it on purpose. But that's fine.

I'm confident that if Linux had a different sort of license and less focus on being free and open, none of us would be gaming on Linux today. In the best case it'd be as popular as one of the BSD variants, and in the worst it would have never taken off at all.

And because Linux has a copyleft license and it has no corporate owner, it won't get the kind of marketing "clout" that you wish for, by traditional means at least. We'll just have to keep doing what we're doing and capturing mindshare the hard and slow way. Based on the last couple of decades, I'm optimistic that Linux will continue its trend towards mainstream acceptance for the foreseeable future. There'll be setbacks, but I don't see any real roadblocks ahead.

Quoting: ageres1% still means millions dollars. I'm sure Proton is profitable for Valve right now. What are their expenses, salaries for few guys working on DXVK and Proton?

Oh, I agree with you and I too assume the revenue brought in is enough to cover costs for current Linux development. My worry is what would Valve do when the revenue drops or becomes unprofitable? 1% is still margin of error sized for companies, no matter how many millions it may represent.

I guess on the positive side, if their cost to maintain it is small, it's easier to argue against cutting Linux development ("It's less than 1% of spending, boss").

I would assume in general the possibility of contraction of the gaming industry as a whole as a reflection of the global economy. I guess it's a matter of whether companies like Valve and others seeing value in continued investment.