Announcement: Linus Tech Tips moving to Linux!
Hello and welcome back! In light of the upcoming Steam Deck launch and the catastrophe that Windows 11 is chalking up to be, Linus Tech Tips and his co-host Luke on the WAN Show announced they would be switching to Linux as their daily driver Operating System. This is a relatively exciting thing for those of us who are closely following Linux use on the Desktop. For those of you unaware – Linus Tech Tips is a content channel on YouTube built by Linus Sabastian, a Canadian technology content creator and founder (and CEO) of Linus Media Group; he is the third most-subscribed technology channel on Google's YouTube. For a creator with that many subscribers, followers, and with that much clout and ability to influence people – he's choosing to openly push the Linux Operating System. Nottingham Nerds, and many before us have known for a long time the power, capability, customizability, security, and privacy of Linux would make it to the mainstream. With Valve/Steam pushing for it so hard, with System76, Tux Computers, and even Nottingham Nerds creating businesses around Linux and open-source software – and now with influencers as well-known and respected as Linus Tech Tips moving to Linux – we are home free.
The reality of why Linux has had such a hard time making it into the mainstream is that, as amazing as it is, it is free and open-source. Typically we use those terms in ways that paint a picture of something good, but in this context, being free and open-source also generally means that we have a lot less backing from massive companies, and that means we have no marketing and we have no presence in big box technology stores. For the most part, someone can't just go out to their local BestBuy and purchase a computer running the Linux operating system because we don't have any companies pushing hardware into those stores. We have smaller companies building and distributing their own hardware/software (System76 especially since they also build a Linux distribution), but those are mostly online stores, not a physical place people can go to purchase hardware.
While Linux has so many great things about it, to include it's customizability and all of the choice a user has in what their system runs for software and even what type of desktop environment they run, this also can be difficult for non-Linux users to grasp because if you run a Windows PC or a Mac, you are given whatever Microsoft or Apple decided you should run and that's what you get. You don't have the choice in what it looks like, what software it comes with – and you certainly can't change much about it. In Linux land, you can literally choose between tens or hundreds of versions of the operating system that are just a little bit different. Some are meant for general desktop use, others are for cloud server use, some are purpose built for scientists or content creators or engineers. To many, this amount of choice is amazing and and powerful. To others, this amount of choice is a detriment because they just need a PC to do their work or check their email and that's it – they don't want to make a bunch of choices or customize anything (and that's totally okay), but it's perceived as overwhelming. Luckily, desktop operating systems like Pop!_OS are making massive improvements to Linux desktop computing and have made it easier than ever for anyone to use Linux on almost any hardware.
Don't get us wrong, Windows 10 was an amazing upgrade to Windows 8, but it's still rife with viruses, spyware, bloatware (Candy Crush Saga anyone?). It's missing basic things like Secure Shell (SSH) unless you start getting into PowerShell or you use Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL – Microsoft's attempt at using Linux components to stop IT admins from moving to Linux full time) – but even that is beginning to show itself as another attack vector; not to mention the print spool virus/malware catastrophe earlier this year. Plus, the upcoming Windows 11 is going to be even more troublesome – due to the security requirements of TPM 2.0 (security module), any hardware manufactured before 2017 or so won't even run Windows 11! Even worse, if you get Windows 11 Home edition (most users use Home edition) you can't even make an offline account on your own local (home) computer – you will be required to make an online Microsoft account and login with that – they require you to buy Windows 11 Pro or above to make a local account! Heresy! Plus, it was recently found that Windows 11 will make your current hardware run up to 30% slower than it currently runs due to some changes in the operating system for security purposes. Seems like a huge push to get people to buy a bunch of hardware they don't need. Not to mention the fact that half the pre-built machines you see on Amazon (and many other websites) or at BestBuy are either overpriced, have low quality components, or some mixture of the two.
At Nottingham Nerds, we provide the latest and greatest hardware possible and try to reduce pricing as much as we can so that your hardware lasts as long as it can – and we use Linux for a ton of reasons, chiefly privacy, security, customizability, ease-of-use, and most importantly to ensure that your hardware remains relevant as long as it can – instead of it being forced into obselescence by some parent company due to a software update (looking at you Microsoft and Apple). Thanks for reading everyone, and have a great weekend!