A bigger concern is that some of the benefits of open source, especially
the attentive "hacker community" cohesiveness, are severely crippled in
the case of general use and acquisition of linux by the larger consumer
base -- the average home user (like my parents) wouldn't serach the web
for updates and patches very often. They prefer something that works
reliably and won't need to be edited or touched for years, and as far as
they're concerned, until it's time to "buy a new computer" (they're used
to keeping tabs on advances in hardware, not operating systems).
What's good for the geeks ain't necessarily good for the geese... :)
--Carp