Kevin Carmony: Not at all. I think everyone appreciates a bit of polish and attention to details. LindowsOS might be pretty on the outside, but under the hood it's pure, hard-core Debian Linux. For example, if someone is more technical and wants to forgo using CNR, they can still simply go to the command line and use apt. (There's another one of those new terms ;-) Also, developers can use the LindowsOS Developer's Edition if they want all the more technical goodies pre-installed. We don't take any of the power away from Linux, we just put an easy-to-use coat of paint on top of it. Everyone at Lindows.com runs LindowsOS full time, both here at our offices as well as in their homes, so it needs to work for everyone, from the non-technical bookkeeper to our super-geek engineers. I'm glad we have a reputation for being easy to use, but I think even the die-hard Linux "geek" might be surprised at just how much power is under the hood of LindowsOS. (See question #6 if you'd like to see for yourself for free.)
6. What are the main differences of your product when compared to the ones of your two main competitors, Lycoris and Xandros?
Kevin Carmony: We only have one competitor that we care about, and that's Microsoft. No one else has enough market share to bother with. You could take all the Linux desktop users from Red Hat, SuSE, Xandros, Lycoris, Mandrake, etc., and it wouldn't be enough to keep any of us in business for long. The only thing I'd say about LindowsOS, as it compares to other Linux distributions, is that we focus exclusively on the desktop/laptop and go the extra mile to make Linux ultra easy to use. Some Linux users scoff when they see things in LindowsOS like our Audio Tutorials which tell a user how to Launch a program, but 95% of the world needs that sort of ease of use. We have 65 full-time employees (the vast majority of those being engineers) who do nothing but eat, sleep, and drink desktop/laptop Linux. I hope it shows. I'm confident it does.
I'd suggest the best way to know how we are different is to give LindowsOS a try, and since OSNews was kind enough to ask me these questions and post my answers, we'd like to give everyone reading this a free digital copy of LindowsOS. Simply go to http://lindows.com/buyit and select the digital copy of the LindowsOS Developer's Edition. When you check out, use the coupon code "IReadOSNews" and you'll get this $59.95 program for free. The coupon code will only be good for a day or two, so that we don't go completely broke as this coupon code gets passed around. I apologize in advance if by the time you read this, you missed out on this offer. =) (You're also welcome to choose the packaged version, but you'll have to pay the extra $10 for the packaging as well as shipping and handling. Just use the same coupon code and it will deducted $59.95 from the $69.95 cost. If you get the free digital version, you download an .iso and burn your own CD.)
7. Lindows.com already includes its OS on many OEM PCs and laptops today. How easy (or difficult) was it to make such deals with retailers in this Microsoft world we live in?
Kevin Carmony: It's extremely difficult, but we are fortunate to have not only a great engineering team, but also a wonderful sales force that has done an excellent job of cracking this open. Just this week we're announcing the addition of Lee Little to our sales team. Lee is well known and respected in the OEM channel and was the previous Director of Sales from AMD who was instrumental in helping AMD compete so effectively against Intel. It takes a lot of resources, such as a big QA lab to certify all this hardware. We've had dozens of people working on this for two years, so no, it's not easy. However, this is one of those areas where we'd like to think we're helping to bring hundreds of new people to Linux every day. You have to remember that 95% of computer users have never installed an OS in their life. Most users just use the OS that comes pre-installed on their computer when they buy it, usually MS Windows. So, unless you can get Linux pre-installed on computers, you'll never get to the masses. I'm sure this is a key reason that Microsoft dislikes us a great deal. We've cost them tens of millions of dollars in computers that have been shipped without MS Windows. We're very proud of that accomplishment. =)
I've often said that the way Linux succeeds on the desktop is not by Lindows.com beating Microsoft, but by smaller hardware companies beating Dell, by leveraging the huge cost advantages of Linux. As long as Dell only offers MS Windows on their desktop computers, even the smallest system builder can now beat Dell pricing, simply by getting rid of the expensive "Microsoft Tax." There are lots of companies now doing this. The KooBox is a good example of this. This is full computer with a flat-pannel LCD monitor for only $449. Dell can't get to those prices, because they have to pay Microsoft and The KooBox doesn't.
8. What happened with your plans for a TabletPC? Last year we heard about the DocuNote and Lindows, but later DocuNote shipped with Windows.
Kevin Carmony: We are still working on this. The Linux drivers for using a stylus on these devices was all but non existent, so it has taken a long time to make progress here. We decided that until our tablet support could do everything MS Windows offered, we didn't want to release LindowsOS for these devices yet. Running LindowsOS on these machines isn't hard, but having it take advantage of all the pen features is a very big challenge. Our CTO uses a pen computer running LindowsOS, so I know we're getting close.
- "Kevin Carmony interview, Page 1"
- "Kevin Carmony interview, Page 2"
- "Kevin Carmony interview, Page 3"
- "Kevin Carmony interview, Page 4"
