linux_learner Posted January 30, 2004 Report Share Posted January 30, 2004 perhaps from the title you have some idea, perhaps not. i was in best buy the other day, as it is one of my most common stomping grounds. a littttle more than a year ago they used to stock red hat, suse, and mandrake. yesterday i walked in and found only 3 boxed sets of suse 9.0 pro. i have repeatedly asked them to stock linux. of which they tell me, its not up to them, but corperate. i told them, it'd be nice to have some choice, not just windows. when i go into to buy a computer, i have a choice. hp with windows, compaq with windows, or sony with windows . this is not what i call choice! i told them i wanted to see computers with linux preinstalled on display. the only way to accomplish this, is not with a lone voice, but if we all collaborate and hound them to death about it. let them know that we want linux. let them know there is a demand. if we do this, and have a friends do this and so on, we can get best buy to change. how do we do this? they said bestbuy.com has a suggestion box, and we should use that. (i didnt tell them i'd do this. they we're speaking only to me, but can all drop a few "suggestions"). lets start advoating and letting dealers, stores, manufacturers know that we want linux. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ixthusdan Posted January 30, 2004 Report Share Posted January 30, 2004 I know that retail responds to requests for product. It's a good idea. But, then it has to eventually sell, which is always where linux falls short. We need more marketing from the distros. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fuzzylizard Posted January 30, 2004 Report Share Posted January 30, 2004 In addition, as for boxed versions of distros, Red Hat is out of the desktop boxed distro game and I have never seen an up-to-date version of Mandrake ever in a store. That only really leaves SUSE. Personally, I think the fact that they carry SUSE 9.0 at all a miracle. BTW, is this in the States or in Canada that you talking? Also, Best Buy does not sell their brand of computer, at least not here in Canada. Therefore, the real people to pressure are Compaq, HP, Toshiba. These are the companies that need to be targetted to supply notebooks and computers that are preinstalled with Linux. Not necessarily the retail middle man. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tyme Posted January 30, 2004 Report Share Posted January 30, 2004 Best Buy doesn't have their own brand of computer. In the U.S. they sell HP, Compaq, Toshiba, E-Machines, and Sony Vaio's. I worked there for about a week and a half, and they do sell Linux, but they don't support it in their tech bay. THAT is where I think we need to hit them, get them to support Linux in their tech bay. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
linux_learner Posted January 30, 2004 Author Report Share Posted January 30, 2004 i did see a "generic" computer in best buy. the salesman said it was their own. he also said it was available online. i just looked, couldnt find it. as far as red hat and mandrake not being in stores, i knew that. i search news.google.com daily. my point is not whether red hat pulled their distro from shelves or mandrake being in finacial trouble, but rather that best buy can and should carry more distros. debian, knoppix, lindows, conectiva, lycoris, the list gets really long. does best buy need to carry all of the distro's? no. that would be prohibative and pointless. i do also realise that the distro's need to do some marketing, but lets look at an interesting fact. IBM advertises some for linux, and thats linux in general. IBM doesnt specify a distro in their adds. we have seen over the past year, linux has exploded. not just in the server market, but also in the desktop market. linux is in such high demand in thialand that HP had to pull in dell to meet the demand. telling manufacturers was the next suggestion i had. i just wanted to see how this played out first. the more we consumers, let people know what we want, then the chances go up of getting what we want. for to long we have sat back and accepted what has been provided to us. its like we the consumer has forgoten that these people are in place to meet our demands. like they have been dictating to us. now its our turn. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bvc Posted January 30, 2004 Report Share Posted January 30, 2004 (edited) I know that retail responds to requests for product. It's a good idea. But, then it has to eventually sell, which is always where linux falls short. We need more marketing from the distros. yeah.....what he said....to add, that means we have to stop freeloading. I did said we, as in, me included. IBM? Who's that? Computer retailers don't care about IBM. :lol: Edited January 30, 2004 by bvc Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gnubie Posted January 30, 2004 Report Share Posted January 30, 2004 Actually, I'd just prefer that I could buy a computer with NO software installed whatsoever. Period. Then I could download mandrake for free and install that. ;) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gabbman Posted January 30, 2004 Report Share Posted January 30, 2004 Along those same lines, I used to be able to spend hours in the loacal Chapter's book stores looking for and purchasing Linux manuals and software. In the last 6-9 months, only M$ and Mac are on the shelves, nada linux, .... when I asked the store manager, he told me it was a chain wide descision to drop the linux line of products. I no longer buy anything from Chapter's or Indigo. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bvc Posted January 30, 2004 Report Share Posted January 30, 2004 I no longer buy anything from Chapter's or Indigo. which won't phaze them a bit. It's gonna require more users buying the distros and distros putting more into their promo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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