I use Linux because the Windows normies recoil from my computer in fear whenever I open the terminal, like a school of fish around a shark. Sometimes I even open htop if I want the office to myself.
Tech posts and memes are this or rage bait and nothing in between.
"x is the way to do y"
"x language sucks haha!"
"x language is so good haha!"
"x language has so many packages depreciating haha!"
"don't use x do (extremely archaic/impossible way) it's the only way dude!!”
it's even worse because tech YouTubers do the exact same thing with popular libraries and frameworks, it's all ragebait (always has been outerspace meme)
The crazy part is games run better and I don't have to set my region to JP to play... uhhhh... JRPGs. Not to mention I can't relapse into playing League with That Guy.
I am looking at switching to Linux soon. I really want to be able to keep playing my old WH40k games and my City of heroes and my other MMOs. So you are telling me these will run fine on Linux? I am new at this Linux thing so forgive me.
In my experience, Linux has been superior for older games because proton (the compatibility layer that makes windows game work on Linux) has a ton of old windows components packed in that are broken on modern windows.
The main issue people have these days are with newer multiplayer games and anti-cheat not playing nice with proton.
Modding can also be a bit of a hurdle if you’re into that sort of thing, but with a bit of work it’s doable.
Compatibilty of Windows games in Linux have gone a long way, partly but also independently from Steam's work on it.
In fact Linux nowadays supports more Windows games than Windows, as especially older games still work there but not on modern Windows anymore.
I will not pretend that there aren't games with issues, but in the vast majority of cases that's new games and for the simple reason that some publishers actively go out their way to prevent them from working on Linux (highlights being anti-cheat tech that Linux worked hard to make it compatible, yet with certain publishers intentionally not setting a simple flag needed to run, often with totally made-up "reasons" about Linux' insecurity...).
Dawn of war works great for me, ive also managed to play space marine one and two, (granted one is a bit of a pain in the ass to get working) ive also gotten Gothic armada 2 and gladius to run. As far as I remember the only one that didn't work out of the box was space marine 1 and that's because of some stupid DRM that's been put on it. I'm on Pop!OS for reference.
Wait, which of these Windows users are aware enough of Linux to have a formed expectation of Steam working under it or not? Like, they don't know enough to understand what it is, but they're super concerned that Steam, of all things, won't run on it?
Are these Very Real Windows Users from Canada? Did they approach the poster with tears in their eyes?
I think they expect gaming on linux to be like gaming on macos which is actually awful. As someone who has spent like her entire life gaming on linux, I tried to help a friend figure out how to run a game on their mac and it took so long to get working and was so confusing
A lot of very online gamers are absolutely vehemently against anything they don't personally find value in. I've seen Windows users on Reddit get smug like this because they're operating on the assumption that the limitations on Linux from 10-15 years ago were never overcome and, thus, "Linux sucks because it can't run games."
To me, it's just another version of the Android vs. iOS cope for users who think their choice to use a specific ecosystem makes them superior. The reason I shill for Linux is because it's free, I like supporting underdogs, and most Linux desktops are ready for daily use including gaming, not because I think Linux is objectively better than Windows.
I don't shill for software, man. Not for free, anyway.
But, you know, I talk to enough people about tech stuff to know that Linux getting name dropped generates at most some brief flicker of recognition in like 95% of adults, not some half-remembered decades-old stereotypes. There just isn't enough awareness to support misconception here. And some of the misconception isn't that "mis" in the first place, for the standards of non-technical normies.
FWIW, I'd love a free, usable mainstream OS alternative to Apple and Microsoft. I don't think Linux as currently designed is built to be that effectively, but it'd sure be nice if somebody figured it out. Someone that isn't Google trying to open yet another revenue stream for ads.
Probably the only thing they know about Linux is from when the YouTuber Linus Tech Tips tried to install Steam and broke his computer. That's why they'd bring up Steam specifically.
Man, scale is such a hard thing to get intuitively.
I mean, yeah, Linus Sebastian has a huge following. It's a huge following of self-selected nerds, though. Most people have no idea who he is. Wouldn't even know what he's talking about if you showed it to them.
And that was one thing that he did once. That mostly nobody cared about unless they are an active Linux fan. Which is itself a tiny niche.
Humans just have a hard time parsing when things are big or small, particularly if it's things they are a part of. This is not stupidity, it's just how human perception works. It works both ways, too. A lot of mondern media is about having these parasocial relationships with huge media personalities and thinking you've found some hidden gem only to find out that your grandma follows them already.
It's not that we're dumb as a species, it's that we've created this ecosystem built specifically to exploit human perceptual limits for profit and now it's all we have. It kinda sucks.
Sorry, I went places there, but this whole thread (and honestly, the entire Lemmy linux community) makes me think about this constantly.
No one ever asked me "Oh, are you using linux?" Even if they see that your Desktop Environment is different from what they're used to on Windows, they usually don't notice it's anything else than Windows.
This has nothing to do with Linux and everything to do with using unfamiliar equipment and/or software. I've gotten those comments on seprarate occasions from having command prompt up and from having an IDE up in dark mode. Also from using an external HDD, external sd card reader/writer, wired mouse, and wired keyboard back when external hdds were relatively niche. Too many wires I guess.
The first time I ever experienced this was in a printshop with a bunch of older guys who were definitely not computer illiterate, but all gathered around the monitor for the server that ran our RIP/platemaker to watch commands appear in the terminal when I remoted in from my computer to do something or other. (They would go into the room and work directly on the machine, but it was loud in there and smelled funny, so I remoted in.)
They made jokes about me being a hacker, and although being distinctly boomer-ish, it was high praise coming from some of the smartest people I’ve ever worked with.
(I’ve worked with more accomplished people, and more highly educated people, but not with folks who had built a successful business that dealt with a variety of complex tech from the ground up with their own knowledge and effort. It was a bit charming to have them wowed by such a simple thing.)