i managed an rh-9 bugzilla server in my old job...
liked it so i installed it on my home machine.

I run linux for a variety of reasons. Yes, I hate Windows, yes it's free, and yes its faster and more secure. My main reason is I like the Linux/Unix philosophy and because I have a big hatred for Microsoft. I do still run Windows on my netbook for work, but that's it. I started using Linux about 6 years ago with Fedora 4, and moved to Slackware about 3 years later. I have never looked back. I much prefer Linux over Windows.

I was curious, bored of windows and wanted to run something secure/challenging.
I remembered seeing Linus at news when I was a kid so I knew about linux but had no knowledge of *bsd's.
That made linux an obvious pick.

The "genuine advantage" really pissed me off.
Software subscriptions make me angry.
One has to pay $200+ for an operating system the US government has deemed 'inherently broken'

This is a growing problem! It is time that we had an explanation from Obama!

Throw them a few fish, and they'll leave you alone.

That should be an option, in my opinion.

I think I first tried it out out of curiosity, then curiosity. But lately, I like it because, well, just because.

I enjoy the freedom to install whatever I want, and to be in control of my computer.

I don't feel like I'm under the thumb of anyone. In my field, I hear a lot of people whispering about Windows cracks, etc. so they can get their software for free. I let them worry about all that, while I just keep on ticking with my Linux.

Yeah, I never did give a serious answer. I heard about it about 12 years ago in college, and an internet friend or 2 ran it. I have always been into computers for video games, my first "pc" was a c64. So I had early exposure to basic, and I had a windows pc with DoS/Win3.1 and so I figured I would be comfortable with the command line.

I had always been paranoid of partitions and hard drives in general, so I was not eager to try dual booting. Eventually one of my friends told me about knoppix and so i tried that. I installed fedora core 4 to a second hard drive so that no dual boot program was needed. I felt right at home in the bios so I would just f10 into the boot selection screen.

I was unable to do anything with wine in those days. Once I got good at tweaking wine it was on. Ive tried Ubuntu, slackware, fedora, and gentoo. Ubuntu is really nice, really user friendly, and really easy to transition to windows from. Slackware is my distro of choice, almost everything I am running is compiled from source in one way or another (compiled from source, slackbuild, or slackbuild made on sbopkg).

And I love me a live distro too. I fix windows pc's and live distros help so much. So often its just a file missing, you can cut and paste it from a flash drive or live cd on any number of live distros. gparted live takes care of partition problems when doing a reinstall. And of course you can get those pesky viruses lickity split. One time I gave customers a slax disc to get them on the internet till the cable guy could come with his proprietary drivers.

I just (yesterday from a thread right here) learned how to edit my fluxbox desktop. Its aesthetic (the man-word for pretty), minimal, and efficient. Great for video games, and making dvd's and such. All the stuff I used to do with windows.

Its fast ... Customization is unlimited... Its a great hobby & ITS FREE ..! I've been dabbling with Linux for about 10 years now. Started with Redhat.

I selected "Hate Windows", however, it's almost every selection on the list that made me switch, speed, security, free, just to try.

However, my selection for Hate windows is the major reason, though. I got sick and tired of trying to understand the Registry, services, etc in order to speed the monster up, and trying my darnedest to trust sites that claim they will find spyware, malware, virus's, etc. Not to mention having to relearn how to configure the OS every so many years. Though, to be honest Linux isn't too different in that aspect, GTK+1.2 -> GTK+2.0, Intel drivers, etc, etc, etc...Though, luckily, with Linux if it works, there's no need to fret, IT WORKS...

To be honest, to test the security of Linux, I had planned on dropping Zenwalk 5.2 for Slackware 12.2 so I took Zenwalk on a...well...a Zen Walk. I went to every questionable site I could find, opened every spam mail I had and I did not notice one shrivel of evidence that my system was corrupted, no speed reduction, no problems what so ever...Though I don't suggest someone actually do that, but it was quite interesting. After our first usage of XP and Vista both machines slowed down to a crawl within a month without doing anything other than installing "safe" programs and "never" going to questionable sites nor opening unknown emails.

Not to mention customization, console ease of use, ease to repair, etc, etc, but that's just me...

I selected "Just to try". I just kinda got bored with Windows, and I like the whole FOSS thing... Plus you gotta admit, Compiz is kinda cool

My only problem with it so far (Although this may just be specific to my distro) is network adapter support. I'm still trying to get my USB adapter to get a consistent net connection (I have a separate thread for this issue).

I voted for "because it's free" but the real reason is because Windows is overpriced. Instead of getting cheaper with economies of scale it's gotten more expensive thanks to diseconomies of bureaucracy. Instead of more competition we get less and less every day. Until finally one day we'll have no real choice at all, kind of like voting for Democans and Republicrats in a two-party system.

I was repairing windows machines back to DOS 5.0 I found a box full of bugs I was unable to see! Is crazy Idea. Like a good Friend of mine Retired Head CEO of communications for Corning said everything worked great we built it we used it. Then IBM said this new DOS system. (Howard laughed) works pretty good and will be fixed on the next version. Then they pushed for M$ and it was broken all the time.
Big money big contract big reach around.!

IBM (Big Blue) uses what today.? Not the spin off company called Microsoft. Some times even the big guys can't fix all the broken stuff.
That is why I went to linux I can fix it or change it to my needs. No need to worry about where to buy a program to fix a program.
It is about Community. and the freedom of the hardware.

Why buy a broken system and wait for an update? Why sell a broken system.?
Slackware Current is on the bleeding edge. and runs better then any system out there.(my Point Of view and the 10 other systems I trouble shoot)
But Slackware 13 is just plain stable work horse. (KISS)

Life is better with out the device manager. or bug manager.

I'm insulted! At least get the names right. It's Device Mangler and Internet Exploder.

I started with Linux after building my first computer - It all went well and I built it for a lot less than I could get any where near speck from big PC suppliers.

I intended to install Windows but forgot to budget for it. I picked up a copy of Linux magazine which came with a copy of Xandros. not the best but was free(beer) and did all I wanted in a computer.

Since have used many distros, *BSDs and open soleris never been tempted by windows even a free copy.