Linux needs to grow. Stop telling people it’s ‘tech-y’ or acting like you’re more advanced for using it, you are scaring away people. Linux Mint can be used by a senile person perfectly.
Explain shortly the benefits, ‘faster, more secure, easier to use, main choices of professionals and free’. Ask questions that let you know if they need to dual boot, ‘do you use Adobe, anti-cheat games, or Microsoft Office’, ‘how new is your computer’, ‘do you use a Mac’.
And most importantly, offer to help them install.
They don’t understand the concept of distros, just suggest Linux Mint LTS Cinnamon unless they’re curious.
That’s it, spread Linux to as many people as possible. The larger the marketshare, the better support we ALL get. We can fight enshittification. Take the time to spread it but don’t force it on anyone.
AND STOP SCARING PEOPLE AWAY. Linux has no advertising money, it’s up to us.
Offer family members or friends your help or copy and paste the below
how to install linux: 1) copy down your windows product key 2) backup your files to a harddrive 3) install the linux mint cinnamon iso from the linux mint website 4) use etcher (download from its website) to put the iso on a usb flash drive 5) go into bios 6) boot from the usb 7) erase the storage and install 8) press update all in the update manager 9) celebrate. it takes 15 minutes.
edit: LET ME RE-STATE, DO NOT FORCE IT ON ANYONE.
and if someone is at the level of ignorance (not in a derogatory fashion) that they dont know what a file even is genuinely dont bother unless theyre your parents cause youll be tech support for their ‘how do i install the internet’ questions.
Things are fine until one day they need to plug this random peripheral/accessory and it’s not plug and play. Then they hate you forever
You’re totally right for brand new kit, but for older kit I’ve found that’s swung hard in the opposite direction.
For example, I was trying to help someone at the weekend setting up some old audio kit, a few printers and a slide scanner on their mac system, and it was a nightmare, and half of it’s still not working.
You’re constantly getting stuck with "this device only works with these 3 versions of this software and those versions of software only works on these versions of MacOS and these versions of MacOS only work with these models of Mac.
When I tested the devices on my laptop (Linux Mint), everything was detected instantly and worked with several different pieces of software (at least as far as you can test in a few minutes).
As said, I get that’s not the case with newest kit, or kit that requires special proprietary software, but for a lot of older equipment, I absolutely can’t fault it.