>Citation needed.
>IE7's market share wasn't always larger. Does that mean IE6 was at one point better?
That means at one point IE7 was new.
>Citation needed.
http://marketshare.hitslink.com/report.aspx?qprid=3
>Dell sells Linux PC's at a higher price than it sells Windows PC's
Yeah, because Dell is always doing things right. But why should one expect to get a pre-built linux PC for significantly cheaper anyway? Linux may be free, but other things surrounding it (support and such) are not. And Windows OEM licenses are cheap as hell. Also, anyone who knows about this tuff knows that licesnse fees for OSes don't take an enormous bite out of the IT budget. Running Linux doesn't end up being signifgantly cheaper in the long run. TCO is a complicated subject and there is no clear winner. So its easy to say in general Linux is not signifigantly cheaper to operate than Windows.
>and being as how you can't find Linux PC's in Best Buy
You can buy a bunch of different distros of Linux at Best Buy. Been that way for something like 10 years or more.
How about we look at the largest retailer in the US.
http://blog.wired.com/business/2008/03/middle-america.html
Oh shit, Linux failed.
So the largest PC retailer sells Linux PCs. The largest consumer electronics store sells Linux. The largest retailer sold Linux PCs. Anyone can download Linux for free. You can try it without installing anything.
Linux is out there, it is available, it is accessible, people know about, people have tried it.
>People are going out of their way to install Linux. I've never seen white-box sales of Microsoft Windows ever approach that of Linux downloads, and I'd be suspicious of any report to the contrary.
Which of course is curious because Windows is still on more PCs. So using downloads a guide of adoption doesn't make sense. Constant releases mean more downloads. People trying out a few distros means more downloads. Not every download comes close to an installed and regularly used Linux implementation. I have had 6 Windows versions I have regularly used and I have downloaded close to 30 Linux distros over that same time period.
>Of course, you don't have to back up anything you say with citations or logic or anything; you haven't thus far, and I won't expect you to now, either.
Speaking of logic, I was talking about recent adoption rates and not overall numbers limited to 1 aspect.
Lets look at 2006-2007:
"According to research firm Gartner, the Windows share of global server shipments gained a percentage point to 66.8 percent in 2007 from a year earlier. Open-source Linux's share fell by a percentage point to 23.2 percent last year and Unix dropped to 6.8 percent in 2007 from 8.1 percent in 2006."
http://www.reuters.com/article/ousivMolt/idUSN2748543820080228
So you can limit your focus to just web servers and broaden your time frame to avoid the point.
I'll just show you that over the last few years Windows Server is kicking Linuxes ass in the server market.