On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:18:35 -0400, Moshe Goldfarb. wrote:

> On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 11:11:03 -0500, HeyBub wrote:
>
>> Moshe Goldfarb. wrote:
>>>
>>> Look at the usual press when a new Linux distribution gets released...
>>> Stuff like : 8million downloads in 2 weeks etc.... Same for
>>> OpenOffice.
>>>
>>> And that very well may be true.
>>>
>>> However, now look at the statistics for people who are actually USING
>>> desktop Linux.
>>>
>>> If those very same downloads were being used for any length of time,
>>> Linux would have buried Microsoft by now.
>>
>> Well, no. If 8 million folks are using Linux, out of 1 billion desktop
>> installation, that's about right.
>>
>> By some estimates, there are about 8 million truely insane people on
>> the globe. There is some disagreement about the overlap between these
>> two groups.
>
> The 8 million was figurtively speaking for ONE release and a short
> period of time.

Your argument's still flawed. Firefox 3 got 8 million downloads in 24
hours. Nobody can quantify how many are new and how many are upgrades.

--
Andy Jacobs

On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 13:11:30 -0400, Linonut wrote:

> * HeyBub peremptorily fired off this memo:
>
>> Well, no. If 8 million folks are using Linux, out of 1 billion desktop
>> installation, that's about right.
>>
>> By some estimates, there are about 8 million truely insane people on
>> the globe. There is some disagreement about the overlap between these
>> two groups.
>
> Idiot.

I think he meant that as a compliment. I certainly took it as one.

--
Andy Jacobs

On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:00:04 -0500, Andy Jacobs wrote:

> On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:18:35 -0400, Moshe Goldfarb. wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 11:11:03 -0500, HeyBub wrote:
>>
>>> Moshe Goldfarb. wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Look at the usual press when a new Linux distribution gets released...
>>>> Stuff like : 8million downloads in 2 weeks etc.... Same for
>>>> OpenOffice.
>>>>
>>>> And that very well may be true.
>>>>
>>>> However, now look at the statistics for people who are actually USING
>>>> desktop Linux.
>>>>
>>>> If those very same downloads were being used for any length of time,
>>>> Linux would have buried Microsoft by now.
>>>
>>> Well, no. If 8 million folks are using Linux, out of 1 billion desktop
>>> installation, that's about right.
>>>
>>> By some estimates, there are about 8 million truely insane people on
>>> the globe. There is some disagreement about the overlap between these
>>> two groups.
>>
>> The 8 million was figurtively speaking for ONE release and a short
>> period of time.
>
> Your argument's still flawed. Firefox 3 got 8 million downloads in 24
> hours. Nobody can quantify how many are new and how many are upgrades.

Back up a second....
Here is the point I am trying to make...

The Linux community is forever squaking about this distro, that distro and
how many downloads a particular site may have gotten during the release of
a new prodcut.

This is mostly for mainstream versions like Fedora, Ubuntu etc...

So let's accept these figures as truthful because they probably are.

The point I am making is that even if a small percentage of these often
quoted download numbers for Linux were true, collectively, IOW the
Fedora+Ubuntu+xxxyyyzz distributions combined, Microsoft would be in
trouble and the Linux desktop figures would be much better than the 0.6
percent that often gets quoted.

What is happening is that these downloads simply do not translate into long
term use of Linux.
Yes some may be upgrades, agreed, but even still where are all these users
hiding?

Desktop Linux is a virtual unknown.

--
Moshe Goldfarb
Collector of soaps from around the globe.
Please visit The Hall of Linux Idiots:
http://linuxidiots.blogspot.com/

In article <8Zuhk.23743$nD.14389@pd7urf1no>, thufir wrote:
>On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:00:04 -0500, Andy Jacobs wrote:
>
>> Your argument's still flawed. Firefox 3 got 8 million downloads in 24
>> hours. Nobody can quantify how many are new and how many are upgrades.
>
>But you can reasonably assert that there 8 million users, if not more.

Youi could ... if you cared about data

On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:00:04 -0500, Andy Jacobs wrote:


> Your argument's still flawed. Firefox 3 got 8 million downloads in 24
> hours. Nobody can quantify how many are new and how many are upgrades.


But you can reasonably assert that there 8 million users, if not more.



-Thufir

thufir wrote:
> On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:00:04 -0500, Andy Jacobs wrote:
>
>
>> Your argument's still flawed. Firefox 3 got 8 million downloads in 24
>> hours. Nobody can quantify how many are new and how many are upgrades.
>
>
> But you can reasonably assert that there 8 million users, if not more.
>
>
>
> -Thufir



And that doesn't even count us that already had ff3 installed.
caver1

"thufir" wrote in message
news:8Zuhk.23743$nD.14389@pd7urf1no...
> On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:00:04 -0500, Andy Jacobs wrote:
>
>
>> Your argument's still flawed. Firefox 3 got 8 million downloads in 24
>> hours. Nobody can quantify how many are new and how many are upgrades.
>
>
> But you can reasonably assert that there 8 million users, if not more.

Eight million FF3 users maybe, but they include the windows downloads so it
says nothing about linux, I don't see why there is any argument here?

On Wed, 23 Jul 2008 07:59:26 -0400, Linonut wrote:

>>>> Your argument's still flawed. Firefox 3 got 8 million downloads in
>>>> 24 hours. Nobody can quantify how many are new and how many are
>>>> upgrades.
>>>
>>> But you can reasonably assert that there 8 million users, if not more.
>>
>> Eight million FF3 users maybe, but they include the windows downloads
>> so it says nothing about linux, I don't see why there is any argument
>> here?
>
> Because Shuttleworth apparently identified 8 million distinct addresses
> that had a version of Ubuntu, a few months after its release.


What does Firefox have to do with Ubuntu? Not all Ubuntu users run FF,
and certainly not all Firefox users run Ubuntu Linux! Which isn't in
contention.

On the other hand, maybe there's some registration process in which FF is
used to count Ubuntu installs?



-Thufir

On 2008-07-23, Linonut wrote:
> * dennis@home peremptorily fired off this memo:
>
>> "thufir" wrote in message
>> news:8Zuhk.23743$nD.14389@pd7urf1no...
>>> On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:00:04 -0500, Andy Jacobs wrote:
>>>
>>>> Your argument's still flawed. Firefox 3 got 8 million downloads in 24
>>>> hours. Nobody can quantify how many are new and how many are upgrades.
>>>
>>> But you can reasonably assert that there 8 million users, if not more.
>>
>> Eight million FF3 users maybe, but they include the windows downloads so it
>> says nothing about linux, I don't see why there is any argument here?
>
> Because Shuttleworth apparently identified 8 million distinct addresses
> that had a version of Ubuntu, a few months after its release.

....that's interesting.

On the one hand, multiple machines can have the same IP address.

On the other hand, one machine can have multiple IP addresses.

[deletia]
> That's the whole problem. If I count home and work, I have more than
> 20 linux "servers" of which one is a cluster containing twice that
> many machines. But I'm the only person who uses them (well, the only
> person who directly uses them, e.g. logs into them), so really,
> in terms of users that's just 1...You can't count everyone who goes
> to a webpage, or uses a bind, ntp, samba, squid, etc service to be a
> linux user.
>
> That's why it's hard to count. Windows users are easy: it's almost
> all 1 to 1. I have 1 windows machine, so mark me down for 1 in the
[deletia]

....although I don't think there are that many people with home clusters
skewing the statistics. OTOH, Linux can go into plenty of quasi-appliance
devices and you can get multiple hits for the same "user" that way (assuming
there is no NAT to obscure things).

--
Negligence will never equal intent, no matter how you
attempt to distort reality to do so. This is what separates |||
the real butchers from average Joes (or Fritzes) caught up in / | \
events not in their control.

Posted Via Usenet.com Premium Usenet Newsgroup Services
----------------------------------------------------------
http://www.usenet.com

In comp.os.linux.advocacy, JEDIDIAH

wrote
on Wed, 23 Jul 2008 10:17:39 -0500
:
> On 2008-07-23, Linonut wrote:
>> * dennis@home peremptorily fired off this memo:
>>
>>> "thufir" wrote in message
>>> news:8Zuhk.23743$nD.14389@pd7urf1no...
>>>> On Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:00:04 -0500, Andy Jacobs wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Your argument's still flawed. Firefox 3 got 8 million downloads in 24
>>>>> hours. Nobody can quantify how many are new and how many are upgrades.
>>>>
>>>> But you can reasonably assert that there 8 million users, if not more.
>>>
>>> Eight million FF3 users maybe, but they include the windows downloads so it
>>> says nothing about linux, I don't see why there is any argument here?
>>
>> Because Shuttleworth apparently identified 8 million distinct addresses
>> that had a version of Ubuntu, a few months after its release.
>
> ...that's interesting.
>
> On the one hand, multiple machines can have the same IP address.

Unless NAT is involved, I hope not. ;-) And if NAT is
involved, that obviously throws the entire notion into
question anyway.

>
> On the other hand, one machine can have multiple IP addresses.

Indeed, though such multihomed machines are unlikely to do
Firefox downloads. Of course, a machine can have multiple
IP addresses over time if it's sitting on a DHCP subnet,
though assuming all downloads are successful a user is
rather unlikely to download Firefox more than once absent
special circumstances.

>
> [deletia]
>> That's the whole problem. If I count home and work, I have more than
>> 20 linux "servers" of which one is a cluster containing twice that
>> many machines. But I'm the only person who uses them (well, the only
>> person who directly uses them, e.g. logs into them), so really,
>> in terms of users that's just 1...You can't count everyone who goes
>> to a webpage, or uses a bind, ntp, samba, squid, etc service to be a
>> linux user.
>>
>> That's why it's hard to count. Windows users are easy: it's almost
>> all 1 to 1. I have 1 windows machine, so mark me down for 1 in the
> [deletia]
>
> ...although I don't think there are that many people with home clusters
> skewing the statistics. OTOH, Linux can go into plenty of quasi-appliance
> devices and you can get multiple hits for the same "user" that way (assuming
> there is no NAT to obscure things).
>

--
#191, ewill3@earthlink.net
New Technology? Not There. No Thanks.
** Posted from http://www.teranews.com **