Mark Shuttleworth, founder of the Ubuntu Linux distribution, has written a great article on the difficulties in getting large distributors such as Dell or HP to distribute computers with Linux pre-installed. He doesn't point the finger so much at the companies as at the consumers. Pointing out that those who desire Linux are geeks, and as such have much greater demands than the average customer. He also notes that the cons for the large companies on a number of levels outweigh the pros. Its a great article worth reading.

    Two thoughts I would like to throw into the conversation. First off, one way to counter Microsoft's cash incentives to manufacturers to include the Windows OS is for a number of companies that support Linux to offer a similar cash incentive for Linux installs. Besides the obvious distributors (Ubuntu, Red Hat) there are companies such as IBM, Sun Microsystems, Novell, and Google that could align together to offer these sort of incentives in a bid to lessen Microsoft's power.

    Secondly, while I am happy that Dell Ideastorm reflects a great demand for Linux, I must note that I think this an extremely slanted forum. Who is most likely to be on this digg-like service? Digg users, Linux geeks, Network Engineers, web designers. We are geeks. Not mom and dad. Not Susie going to college. Not John from down the street. Thus, while we may offer some good ideas technically, it is doubtful that Ideastorm will reflect largely marketable ideas when it comes to suggestions such as this because they are made by a select interest group (of which I am a part) that has different interests from the majority of the world population.