Published at LXer:

There are a lot of funny, preconceived notions about Linux (and Linux users). Some ideas fall in to the realm of FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt). Some ideas have an inkling of truth to them, and have grown and mutated into full fledged myths. Sort of like how Vlad the Impaler became Dracula, but with a lot less violence and a lot more compiling.

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The only reason people find linux hard is that they are used to the windows way of doing things. I know a couple of posts in the comments said some stuff about how ubuntu is hard, its not, its just not very stable which happens in a 6 month release cycle. I think windows is alot harder to maintain, you have to constantly defrag, scan for viruses and spyware. I think if a person went around setting up ubuntu(or some other distro) with all codecs and stuff set up then I'm pretty sure the average computer users would have alot easier time with linux. Also most people have never even installed windows, its usually already set up for them with all the drivers installed, for example, I was helping my friend reinstall windows and after he got installed and activated there was no sound, and we have yet to find the sound drivers for it, so there goes another myth, that windows always just works.

Yeah, Vlad the Impaler was actually far more violent than Dracula ever..

Actually I consider Windows myths far more "interesting" than Linux myths, but it could be just me. Like the one that said that if you place a Windows95 setup disc into your CD player, record the audio and play it backwards, you hear satanic (not "satanic" in the original meaning of the word, but in the nowadays media meaning) curses and screams, apparently made in the city of D'Nomder. Well, quite a lot of variations of that joke/tale exist, but the funny part is that I've heard a few folks actually try it out. With not so much success

Another thing - not related to Linux nor computers at all - is that some people said it's utterly impossible to touch your own elbow with your tongue. And that over 90% of those who hear it try it themselves in the next five minutes. Well, I didn't as I thought it's not possible for a regular guy, but surely somebody does it, and fair enough - a few days ago I saw a picture on the net where a youngish person did the trick. Mad!

EDIT:
In fact Ubuntu (this latest version, for me) has been just as stable as Slackware, which is considered rock solid stable by some, and that means quite stable in my case. I don't get where people get the idea of Ubuntu being unstable - despite the fact that it's release cycle is indeed pretty fast; maybe it's up to the situation, but I haven't noticed it. Gnome is the only probable part to cause trouble in addition to proprietary gfx card drivers, but even those haven't caused trouble for me with this release. I hope the next one doesn't change that much..