Linux Desktop Market Share: Greater Than One Percent?

“Alternatively, you might prefer — as I do — to question the
statistic’s accuracy, and look at other ways to estimate
GNU/Linux’s presence.

“The problem, of course, can never be settled with any
certainty. GNU/Linux comes from dozens of vendors and community
projects, rather than a single corporation, and, since it requires
neither registration nor activation, a single DVD could be the
source of half a dozen installations. Under these circumstances,
any estimates quickly trail off into speculation whose credibility
depends on your own biases on the subject.

“Still, if other estimates may be too high, we have good reasons
for thinking that NetApplications figure to be inaccurate, just by
looking at the statistics provided. To start with, by separating
out figures for Android, you could say that NetApplications has
actually under-estimated the size of GNU/Linux’s market share by
.07% — a small amount, to be sure, but a reminder of how easily
such figures can change with your assumptions.”

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