Thanks to a recent column by my friend Andy Patrizio, I found out that there’s “been an ongoing debate among bloggers and industry observers over one simple question: Where are the open source billionaires?” OK, I’ll buy that some people think that’s a real question, but I think it says more about they don’t understand the connection between software development genius and what it take

I continue to be surprised by the amount of weight given to downloads as a metric for OSS success. A topic Matt Asay also touched on recently over at The Open Road. Like Matt, I’m talking OSS at the product or company level (i.e., not OSS projects) and by success I mean sales.

The big question everyone asks when it comes to Linux is "why doesn't everyone use it?" That is, obviously, what I plan to address today, but first I want to get a few things out of the way.

The specific reasons why people try Linux vary wildly, but the overall reason boils down to one thing: They hope Linux will be better than Windows. Common yardsticks for measuring success are cost, choice, performance, and security. There are many others. But every Windows user who tries Linux, does so because they hope it will be better than what they've got. Therein lies the problem.

No one can make the claim that Ubuntu isn't becoming the de facto Linux distro out there in the world today. Sadly, there is also a problem with watching Linux being tied to a single experience. Choice goes right out the window. So thankfully, despite Ubuntu's success, there are some fantastic alternatives out there that fit the needs of most people.

Although I certainly respect Bill and Melinda Gates for what they do (how many billionaires do you see doing the charitable works they have been doing?), they and Microsoft are not the only ones working towards this goal.

Of late, I keep banging into the problem that people want systems to be “secure by default”: they don’t want to pester the user about security. They want the system to just do the right thing. The problem is, this just isn’t possible.

The main problem you face when you're attempting to lift the lid on what makes Linux tick is knowing where to start. It's a complicated stack of software that's been developed by thousands of people. Following the boot sequence would be a reasonable approach, explaining what Grub actually does, before jumping into the initiation of a RAM disk and the loading of the kernel.

Last spring, marketer and blogger Hugh MacLeod posted a question on his site: If open source is such a phenomenon, where are all the open source billionaires? His audience wasn't amused.