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A Linux Distro Made For 99% of People (www.youtube.com)

submitted 2 months ago by Yuritopiaposadism@hexbear.net to c/technology@hexbear.net

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[–] trompete@hexbear.net 24 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

ZorinOS is using misleading marketing to trick people into paying them money. If you don't know, they sell a premium version, for me it's 47,99 €.

What you get:

E-Mail support during installation
some themes and backgrounds and shit

What the marketing blurb says:

8 Premium desktop layouts (incl. macOS, Windows 11 & Classic, ChromeOS, and more) + Standard layouts
Professional-grade creative suite of apps
Advanced productivity tools
Bundled with alternatives to over $5,000 of professional software
Included technical support service for help with setting up Zorin OS
Contribute to the development of Zorin OS

Their marketing screenshots for "professional-grade creative suite of apps" are just Gimp and Blender and such, things that come standard with any Linux distro, including the free version of Zorin I think. The same seems obviously true of the "advanced productivity tool" and the "alternatives to over $5,000 of professional software". They're being deliberately very vague though.

By "technical support" they mean:

Have any questions or queries while setting up Zorin OS? Each copy of Zorin OS Pro comes bundled with the Zorin Installation Support service for one computer. It lets you get technical support by email directly from our team.

And by "contribute to the development of Zorin OS" they mean:

As an independent company, we want to create great products that give back your privacy and freedom. Every purchase of Zorin OS Pro helps to fund our operations, so we can improve Zorin OS further for the benefit of all.

Ok cool so they're not promising to do anything in particular with that money.

Sleazy hucksters. I also strongly suspect all the ZorinOS shilling you see online is the very opposite of organic.

[–] Erika3sis@hexbear.net 7 points 2 months ago

I also strongly suspect all the ZorinOS shilling you see online is the very opposite of organic.

Thought this the moment I heard of the distro, the premium version is just way too scammy

[–] dead@hexbear.net 2 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Section 4 of GPL explicitly permits developers to charge a fee for customer support. It also permit distributors to charge a fee for providing copies of software. "You may charge any price or no price for each copy that you convey, and you may offer support or warranty protection for a fee."

Richard Stallman has said that the purpose of this clause is to convey that FOSS means user freedom, not free of charge. Developers have to be able to make a living wage by selling their labor.

You're describing a totally normal thing as if it is a scam. If you want medical advice, you go to a doctor. If you want legal advice, you go to a lawyer. If you want advice on how to use a GNU/Linux distro, you go to the developer. It is not unreasonable for the developer to charge money for using their time.

You seem confused about what development a Distro company actually does. The Distro developer compiles the software for the the distro repository which is used by the package manager. The distro developer provides you the updates for your software on your system, including security updates.

Yes, you could download GIMP and Blender yourself. You could even compile those softwares yourself from the source code. You could become your own distro developer. You could make your own software repository and your own package management system. That takes time and effort and skill to accomplish.

There are multiple distro companies which sell customer support, including Ubuntu and Red Hat and SUSE. Most of the customer support is sold to businesses and corporations.

Personally, I like to do all the digital hygiene on my own computer. Some people may not know how to install an OS and choose to pay someone to install their Distro for them. While I choose to read documentation to figure out how software works, some people may choose to pay to speak with the developer.

It is better that a FOSS company sells customer support to people than a proprietary software company sell customer support to people.

A criticism that I have of Zorin is they try to replicate the GUIs of proprietary software as if Windows and Mac are the best possible UI. People only like Windows UI because that is what they are familiar with and they are afraid to change. It is a phenomenon of behavioral imprinting.

[–] trompete@hexbear.net 8 points 2 months ago

I complained that their marketing is misleading and scummy, which it is. I did not complain about GPL violations, that's strawman you opened up. I am not confused about what distros do, you're being presumptuous.

A company that tries to trick people into paying for a premium option using misleading marketing is the least we need. These people are not providing any valuable service, they're just vacuuming up money from people who do not know better, money that could actually go to something useful instead.

[–] HexReplyBot@hexbear.net 2 points 2 months ago

I found a YouTube link in your post. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy: