For me the answer is time. It boots faster, updates faster (by a huge margin), has the same basic functionality available (browser, spreadsheet, listen to music, watch video, etc.), isn't under constant virus/malware attack, and is free.

I dual boot all my machines as I still Windows to do a few things but I boot linux at least 90% of the time...

You never know what you might want to do until you discover an urge. Linux has uncountable possibilities. A few years ago I had an MRI and was sent home with a disk. Just for the hell of it I wondered if I could look at it. In a half hour I was reading my MRI on Debian. I know that's way beyond what the average user might want, but you never know what opportunity might encourage you to try.
I provide support for friends who can't begin to afford Windows. They pick up Linux very quickly and find it friendly to use. These are people in their 70s with little experience. Distros these days are very friendly, some more than others. I also do Win support and there are just as many or more questions/problems.

I have a lot of respect for Mac but don't know how it compares in breadth of applications to Linux but I suspect Linux may win.

Q. Is there a reason for a Linux user to switch to Mac.
A. So that they can have a machine with full compatibility with the other apple products (which cost far more than their counterparts running Android).

They will of course have to pay a small fortune for the Mac, and will only be allowed to do what Apple wants to let them do.

Unless you want to use some specialist software that requires a Mac I doubt you can make a more convincing case than this...

The only actual reason I am using windows, are for games that only work on windows. Then again I would only use windows if I have tried using said game with Wine.

If it was not for this I would permanently use a Linux distro.

A fine post, astrogeek. Nothing to add from here .

I use Linux for several reasons not least because I can have several desktops running at the same time. I can have related items on the go without getting lost in the clutter. Whatever I try on Windows I finish up with a whole heap of icons and a whole load of windows that just get in the way.

I'm not sure an "average Joe" cares.
I'm not sure a Mac user cares.

If it ain't broke...
Rok seems to be the exception and I don't believe he's "average" anything.

This is funny because in my many years of using Linux, I've never used a Linux server. I may have been served by one, but that would be unknowingly. I would argue that a "content" MAC user not need to switch because that OS is Unix/Linux based anyways. I would argue that a MAC user switch because of Apple. I have a MAC book sitting right here and do develop apps. It's a pain in the backside versus Linux, Android, heck even Windows, which I also do. Why? The OS is so restricted. Granted Windows has it's problems, but I can usually do what I want with little fuss. With iOS I continually run up against things I can't do because there's just not an interface allowing me to do it.

All very fine reasons to use GNU/Linux, especially the MRI and science apps, those are new ones to me.. But I definitely do appreciate the freedom aspect of GNU/Linux, and I do have a bad habit of saying Linux without GNU. I know GNU and the kernel just as much evenly important, so yeah... Thanks guys for sharing your thoughts!

Good point! But that's Apple for you...

I have been trying for 10 years to make the switch from Windows to Linux. I have no difficulty playing the few windows games under wine.
I have two major problems that stop me: Some of my spreadsheets have links to other files that are rarely opened - not even LibreOffice handles this. And on the same spreadsheets, I'll have two tabs open at the same time, one of which provides me a quick way to see the codes to enter in the other window and it provides a summary of the data. (I see Windows 10 no longer supports tabbed spreadsheets!)
I currently have 4 working computers. I have yet to be able to copy files from one to another UNLESS I'm using Windows! Samba used to work to thw windows machicines but they have deprecated Share.
I do enjoy Vector Linux as it's interface (XFCE) is very similar to Win97.

I switched to Linux a few years ago without regrets (had a brief fling with Windows 10). I will never go back to Windows for anything. The only thing that kept me running Windows was games, which I've quit (all but Minecraft). Most of the other things that I used that were Windows only have an online version that is far superior to anything I ever used before on Windows. I gain so much from using linux and lose so little. It's a perfect win all around for me. It's also easier to fix and maintain... spend half as much time with maintenance than I did with Windows on the computers in my house.

Best decision I ever made to jump to linux.

This sounds like you have locked yourself into some specific feature of some specific application as being the only way that you can do those tasks. If the latest version from M$ no longer supports that either then you will be forced to change how you do those tasks anyway.

Maybe it is just time to step back and re-examine how your data are transformed or used, as opposed to how you accomplish that transformation or use with existing tools. Then start with a GNU/Linux platform of your choice and just ask how can I get the same end result with the tools available on that platform.

As long as you keep your data locked up in a specific application, you do not own your data. Liberate it, and yourself!

File transfer among *nix computers is utterly trivial and you have many choices of how to do it! Again you simply need to learn what tools are available for the purpose and pick that which best meets your own needs.

If you want to do it only and exactly as you do it under the M$ ad-ware system, then you will remain in their box - GNU/Linux is NOT window$! It is vastly better and easier... but it is different.

So quit blocking yourself by thinking that their way is the only way. Look at your tasks instead of how you do it on window$. Then ask how do I accomplish this result on Linux?

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First time I've ever heard windows being easier to copy files from one another over linux.

There's netcat (nc), scp, rsync, sshfs, samba, NFS.. Many gui browsers even support sftp.
woof is well, "A small, simple, stupid webserver to share files" and for syncing stuff there's syncthing.
Could probably go for a lot longer if I looked around.

All of these are completely independent of any 3rd party service like dropbox, google drive, etc.
In my experience, copying files between computers linux is significantly easier then windows and was a big influence in my shifting over.

Seriously, it is a business decision, and the only meaningful way to make that decision is to carefully consider the total business context in which "the new system" is to operate.

"License costs" (or the lack thereof) is completely irrelevant: every business technology or process has costs, which are simply "costs of doing business" and/or "cost of goods sold." Labor costs are pretty much the same: "yes, I am earning enough money to pay you ... and me."

Apple, Microsoft, IBM, and various Linux distributors can all expect to continue making earning a comfortable living doing the things that they now do: namely, enabling companies to earn profits from business activities which have nothing directly to do with computer technology, but which are facilitated by that technology.

For example, one of my long-standing clients earns a rather prodigious amount of money each month selling funeral-home supplies, because, like it or not, "people die, every day." They use, and will continue to use, "a fairly typical cross-section of" software technologies ... from all of the vendors aforesaid, working together ... to sell their, ahh, "stuff."

When you talk about "Linux," and of course "Unix-ish in general," leave us never forget: "gadzillions of ... telephones." These technologies are very-successfully deployed in lots of situations where "(your grandmother) doesn't give a damn how the damn thing works, and never intends to do so." Linux is frankly wonderful at being ... ubiquitous. So, if you're looking for Linux to "draw attention to itself," perhaps you are missing the point.