Ubuntu KDE

[Travis Newman]

> To be commercially successful on the desktop, Linux will need at least a 
> 25% market share 

Who says? Cite your source! Apple has far close to 5% market share. 
NetZero accounts for only 7% of the dial-up users nationwide. Would you 
not consider them commercially successful?

> However, success will only  be measured 
> in millions at the enduser level and that level of success requires the 
> total integration of all applications, something that only KDE has 
> accomplished thus far but also something that KDE is only perhaps 5% on 
> the way to accomplishing.  Why this contradiction?  WinTel is a moving 
> target and catching up with that moving target requires a vision of 
> where the future is heading.

First off, you're using that same mark of success. If I set out to make 
an operating system and only 5 people use it, then you'd probably say 
it's a flop, but if my goal was to make an operating system that I could 
use and who cares about everyone else, then its a success. Success isn't 
measured in numbers. But seriously, there are MANY more KDE based 
distros out there than there are Gnome users. All of my friends that 
I've shown Linux to (who weren't already Linux users) were disgusted by 
KDE and thought that Gnome looked polished and not too flashy. It's all 
subjective. You do KDE you alienate Gnome users, you do Gnome you 
alienate KDE users. But, you provide both cds, one for KDE, one for 
Gnome, and the average joe-sixpack says "Whoa, what the heck, I don't 
know jack about this stuff. What'd a KDE? What's a Gnome?"

> Again, what do you want Vincent, more missionaries to preach to the same 
> choir (an Americanism meaning that preaching to those who are already of 
> like mind is more or less useless) or do we need more missionaries in 
> the field who preach to the WinTel heathens?

KDE, in my opinion, is not the way to go to get more users. If you asked 
me a few months ago, I would have said "KDE is a better system, but it 
disgusts me so I use Gnome" but now, I'd have to say that Gnome comes 
out on top. They've come quite a long way, while KDE keeps gradually 
getting worse and worse, bloated and more bloated.

They'd probably also get irritated at being called WinTel heathens.