Prebuilt/turn-key Linux laptop availability (was: Prebuilt/turn-key PC options)

[Joshua Judson Rosen]

David Rysdam <david at rysdam.org> writes:
>
> On Thu, 16 Aug 2012 00:36:46 -0400, Joshua Judson Rosen <rozzin at geekspace.com> wrote:
> > Do you do, or have you considered doing, anything in the way of whitebox
> > laptops with straight-up Linux installs (i.e. no Microsoft overhead)?
>
> If you want/need a powerful laptop (for, I dunno, portable gaming
> something?) that runs Linux right from the vendor, I have no advice.

Oh, I've decided that I'm happy just ordering from ZaReason, for that
(the laptop that I got from them for work, a year ago, continues
 to be one of the nicest I've ever lain my hands on).

HOWEVER: especially when shopping for something like a laptop,
I really do like being able to *put my hands on* different models
before making a choice. I'm *currently* trying to decide between
two different models of ZaReason; if I could actually lay my hands
on them both, I'm sure I would have already bought one. But that can't
happen with (e)mail-order, so I'm torn between the options. I guess
I'm sort-of pining for the `before online' days <http://xkcd.com/1036/>
(the issue is slightly different than in that comic, but only slightly).

Of course, like Brian said, there is also that whole thing about
"supporting local business"....

> If you only want an "adequate" laptop with no Windows Tax, I suggest
> buying one used. I did that recently from "Electronics Warehouse" in
> Nashua. They've got many to choose from.

Well, in general: if you want it for cheap, consider buying used.

I'm less concerned about the `Windows Tax', though, than I am about
the whole EUFI `Secure Boot' business and the issue of whether
I'll even be able to buy a new laptop to run Linux in the future.

I had actually sort-of forgotten about the Windows Tax per se,
though I do remember it now....

(OK, this is going to be a sort-of ranty essay...)

Actually, I recently watched `Revolution OS' with my wife, and got to
re-experience the whole `Windows-Tax rebate' thing... through the lens
of hindsight. It's always interesting to go back and look at these
zeitgeist documentaries a decade(!) later: you get to see how different
your own attitudes might have become in the intervening time. Like,
in regard to this whole `Windows rebate for laptops' thing:
I remember that--and I remember how positively I felt toward it
at the time. But, looking back at it now..., I can't help but think
how *stupid* we were to be playing that game at all.

People would spend *100 hours* fighting with a vendor, manufacturer,
AND(!) Microsoft in the hope that they might get *$100* back, while still
having all of the records show that *you paid for that laptop to have
Windows on it*; and your reward, on top of the net-negative fancial `reward',
was that you got to spend another hundred hours playing the role of
`systems integrator' for that laptop, and you got a near-guarantee that
you'd also have to shoulder the systems-integration task next time--
and that it'd probably also be worse next time.

The *smart* course of action would have been to just bypass
the whole system--bypass the whole vendor/manufacturer/Microsoft stack
that put Windows onto your laptop in the first place: find out who's
*really* making the things (e.g.: Compal or Clevo), put together
a group project to figure out which of *those* will be easiest to make
Linux work on, and then *buy them* early in the supply-chain.
Before Windows even gets a chance to enter into the equation;
before the decision to install maximally-hostile hardware modules
like `winmodems' is even made; and *long* before the margins for
all of those things are added to the price.

Maybe we would have had to buy a hundred of them to make it viable--
which, if you're going on your own, is crazy; but DiBona &co. had
about that many people together *in a single parking lot*, so we
absolutely had enough people--and enough collective money--to actually
do the smart thing in stead of the stupid `picketing Microsoft' thing
that we actually did.

Maybe we would have had to formally organise into a group for the purpose--
maybe even more formally than people organised for the Windows-Tax
protests. The most extreme version of that would probably be
`forming a company' and setting up the supply chain in the name
of our corporation. Being entrepreneurial.

So, here's the thing: people *have* finally started doing this.
We now actually have ways to just buy a laptop with whatever Linux
you want pre-installed on it, where someone else has actually done
the `systems integrator' job for you, making your job as a consumer
easier rather than harder--making sure that everything Just Works,
so that all you have to do is buy the thing and turn it on.
We don't have to worry about how we're going to deal with
or work around the Windows Tax, because someone else has already
blocked the Windows Tax from entering the system at the ground level.

As far as I can tell, this is what the `Linux computer manufacturers'
like ZaReason, System76, ThinkPenguin et al. are. Reading Cathy
Malmrose's blog, it sounds like the genesis of ZaReason was probably
her and Earl having the classical entrepreneurial conversation:

        Why won't anyone sell us what we want?
        What do we have to do, *start a company* ourselves!?
        [pregnant pause]
        OK then.
        We'd better get started cleaning out the garage....

According to some of her recent blog-posts, they're looking at
options for reorganising the company (like, into a cooperative,
or a NPO, or something) as a way of lowering the barriers
to raising Linux laptop shops in more places more quickly:

    http://zareason.blogspot.com/2012/07/tourniquet.html?showComment=1344832650432#c4879149017754233172

(and there are more details on ZaReason's prospective re-org in the two
 most recent blog-posts[1][2])

Their main driver for re-org is to accelerate expansion across *national*
borders...:

   "We are considering restructuring the company to be employee-owned /
    employee-run so that we can establish shops in many countries more
    quickly, but we need to find a business person who can assist with
    it (and so far can't find one we can afford to talk to).

   "If we're not in your country yet, please accept my apologies. We're
    doing what we can to grow global. F/LOSS isn't limited by location;
    F/LOSS hardware shouldn't be either."

... but I wonder about the prospect of expanding domestically--even if
that just means getting their laptops into more of other peoples' showrooms
across the country.

I mean, extrapolating from my own buy-rate (including the other people
for whom I either literally or effectively buy laptops), I wouldn't be
surprised if just the Nashua-area LUG members were a sufficient
customer-base to account for enough sales to keep one Linux laptop vendor
in business. Are we, in actuality? If not..., why is that?

Of course, I'm looking in from the outside--I've never run a computer
business; I'm a hacker, not an entrepreneur; and, really, my perspective
right now is mostly just that I buy Linux laptops prebuilt because I
know that I can't afford to deal with the hassle and uncertaintly of
`just' buying a Windows laptop and installing Linux on it myself these
days; and that the whole `UEFI Secure Boot make-it-hard-to-install-Linux'
situation (coming soon to a store near you!) is scaring the hell out of me:
I just want to know that, in another five years, when it's time to buy
the next round of laptops to run Linux, I'll even be able to do that.

How does the rest of this story go?

Footnotes:

[1] http://zareason.blogspot.com/2012/08/removing-barriers-for-linux-hardware.html
[2] http://zareason.blogspot.com/2012/08/follow-up-to-pricing-hardware-that-runs.html

-- 
"Don't be afraid to ask (λf.((λx.xx) (λr.f(rr))))."