Free software might not always be the best tool for the job, since there are more advanced tools in proprietary world. Take GIMP vs. Photoshop, for example. Professionals always lament that GIMP is not good enough for real work and in most cases I would agree.
What actually bothers me are people who think that only the best software fits their needs. And since software can, unlike physical goods, be very easily stolen (e.g. pirated), it is not uncommon that everybody uses that “the-one-and-only” application. Thus the room for competition narrows because of monopoly of the pirated software and as a consequence hurts a real innovation among the competing products.
Since everybody is using the same thing, the competition must actually become the software that is constantly, although incrementally raising the bar. For example: most of the Linux newcomers from Windows userland complain about the command line and want everything GUI-fied. Is command line really that complicated or unpractical or is the real complaint behind the ex-Windows newbies that they actually want Windows that isn’t of Microsoft’s origin?
It seems interesting to me how Mac fans argue that OS X is better than Windows and Linux, how the GUI is more practical and consistent than Windows (not to mention Linux guys who still have to use CLI). But as far as I remember my Windows to Linux migration I think that at learning at a new OS I might have become more cautious of all the options and learn a lot of the tricks about Ubuntu that I might have also done in Windows but I didn’t. I actually learned quite a lot about Windows too, when I released some of my curiosity back from Linux. That’s why I think that Mac fans falsely assume that other OS are less consistent (although I would agree that Windows is quite inconsistent concerning the keyboard shortcuts).
So, when switching between apples, windows or penguins, please, consider that you must switch your mindset and habits too. And that doesn’t happen overnight.
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