Forget Hardy

[Douglas Pollard]

    It seems to me that it is Linux that is trying to get the general 
public to use it instead of the very easy to use but flawed and 
expensive Microsoft programs. The things I do with a computer are the 
things I am interested in not the computer itself  or its programing and 
I suspect that most users feel th same.  I have learned a fair amount 
while using computers about them but that is incidental to doing video, 
.photograph,  cnc machining  and writing.
     This talk of dumming down shows a narrow interest of almost all 
things except Linux and programing.  Linux is the organization that is 
seeking users not the other way around and if someone on this list 
considers beginners or people of limited computer interest too dumb to 
use Linux seems to me they are too dumb to be acting in Linux's 
interest. Broad interests are one very good measure of intelligence.
    I sometimes use a hammer and I don't care a whit how it was made, 
it's a tool and I use it as such.  The more it requires of me the less I 
am likely to use it.       
     I buy and sell a few stocks on the stock market. I only buy stocks 
of companies that when I go into their store and little is required of 
me to buy their product and the experience is pleasant these companies 
always and I mean always  do well and when they begin to expect a lot 
from me as a customer I sell their stock and it always goes down in 
value in the long run.
    There are huge numbers of lists to help the user with Linux 
programs  and that is a testimony to the fact that a lot of help is need 
by the average computer user who by the way may well be  brilliant in 
his own field. 
    I have quit Linux several times but keep coming back.   If a persons 
time is worth anything at all ( being retired mine is not) then Linux is 
the most expensive program ever devised by man.  I got interested in it 
because Windows is not stable enough and does not run in real time so is 
not suitable to use to run CNC leaving Linux and Unix  for this 
purpose.    I love it.
       Ubuntu has taken a lot out of what I have to do and know in order 
to use Linux. 
        Let me say this though when I ask a question on line of people 
who are there to help it drives me nuts when they tell me to go to 
previous posts to find the answers.  I am one who is loath to ask for 
help so I have spent one heck of a lot of time trying to find the answer 
myself and by the time I ask for help I am usually near the end of my 
string.  By this time all I want is a quick solution. 
        I realize this is all my problem and not some the lists but it's 
how I feel and this seemed a good time to express it.
                                                                        
                    Doug   

Bart Silverstrim wrote:
> Oliver Grawert wrote:
>   
>> hi,
>> Am Mittwoch, den 11.06.2008, 01:13 -0700 schrieb Steve Lamb:
>>     
>>>      Erm, slang is used all the time in technical discussions.  It is what 
>>> makes technical discussions possible without having to spend 50 minutes 
>>> spelling everything out.  Part of engaging in technical discussions, in ANY 
>>> field, is learning the slang.
>>>       
>> Ubuntu should be different here and should adapt to the user instead of
>> requiring the user to adapt to the tech slang, really.	
>>     
>
> Are you saying that the initial users of Linux...those who are or tend 
> to be more geek/technology oriented...working in a group of people 
> primarily attracting like-minded people...should be turned off to using 
> Ubuntu because they'll be attacked by net-nannies telling them they need 
> to tone down and "dumb down" for fear of scaring off people who really 
> don't want anything to do with the computer other than playing a video 
> game, with no interest in the reason those technology-minded people 
> first got involved in the first place?
>
> Because I think the last time that what done it was called AOL...
>
>