Waiting for desktop Linux

NPR recently noted, on the occasion of Beckett's 100th birthday, that the play was not a hit until it played on the radio, until people became familiar enough with it that they could embrace its complexity.

Desktop Linux is a bit like Godot. Advocates will start their annual summit Monday in San Diego, and while there will be a lot of talk, I don't expect your kids are any more likely to see such boxes under their Christmas trees than to see Godot there, or Beckett himself. (He died in 1989. That's him to the right.)

And it's for the same reason.

Computing is now a mass market. PCs are now consumer electronics. Buyers need to be familiar with something -- at least the idea of something -- before they are going to rush in and buy such a product. And they still need to be prodded by mass market advertising.

Advertising can do for desktop Linux what radio did for the Godot play -- make people feel comfortable. And if they feel comfortable, some will buy. At that point, if those buyers are happy, the momentum will really build.

So who will advertise desktop Linux this Christmas? Anyone? That's who I'm waiting for.