Canonical Is Still Operating At A Significant Loss

[Luke]

Linux is Valve's insurance against the Microsoft Store becoming mandatory

Yes, they do, indirectly. SteamOS will be considered profitalble when income from games purchased via SteamOS is more than their investments into SteamOS.

SteamOS as well as the earlier ports to Ubuntu arr as likely as not Valve's insurance against being locked out by M$. If you recall, Steam's owners were very displeased about Windows 8, considering it a threat to their business model. Fear was that future versions of Windows would close down the platform like iOS and attempt to block non-MS applications. Supposedly this
was already either the rule or considered for Metro/Modern applications, with legacy Windows 7 stuff permitted to run so as not to sink Windows 8 on its maiden voyage.

This is probably less of a threat now, thanks to the failure of the M$ store to attract many developers and the frosty reception Windows 8 has gotten from its intended customers. Whether or not Steam sells enough games to pay for their investments in SteamOS now, it's a priceless insurance policy-and a shot across Microsoft's bow. If Windows 9 blocks Steam, then all Steam games port to SteamOS. If Windows 9 screws up the bootloader enough to block dual-booting, Steam will tell people to put either SteamOS or Win7 on a separate hard drive. Once that gets going, game development for Windows would stop. Enough of this, and some of the SteamOS users will install the rest of the desktop and browsers into SteamOS and dump Windows 9 altogether.

In other words, the money spent in SteamOS is money invested in forcing Windows 9 not to lock out Steam, as well as a chance for a second revenue stream. Nobody as sucessful as Steam is going to bet all the marbles on a "politically unreliable" base. To do so is like choosing to buy a house where the transit line you depend on to get there has ever been on the budget chopping block.

[sarmad]

SteamOS as well as the earlier ports to Ubuntu arr as likely as not Valve's insurance against being locked out by M$. If you recall, Steam's owners were very displeased about Windows 8, considering it a threat to their business model. Fear was that future versions of Windows would close down the platform like iOS and attempt to block non-MS applications. Supposedly this
was already either the rule or considered for Metro/Modern applications, with legacy Windows 7 stuff permitted to run so as not to sink Windows 8 on its maiden voyage.

This is probably less of a threat now, thanks to the failure of the M$ store to attract many developers and the frosty reception Windows 8 has gotten from its intended customers. Whether or not Steam sells enough games to pay for their investments in SteamOS now, it's a priceless insurance policy-and a shot across Microsoft's bow. If Windows 9 blocks Steam, then all Steam games port to SteamOS. If Windows 9 screws up the bootloader enough to block dual-booting, Steam will tell people to put either SteamOS or Win7 on a separate hard drive. Once that gets going, game development for Windows would stop. Enough of this, and some of the SteamOS users will install the rest of the desktop and browsers into SteamOS and dump Windows 9 altogether.

In other words, the money spent in SteamOS is money invested in forcing Windows 9 not to lock out Steam, as well as a chance for a second revenue stream. Nobody as sucessful as Steam is going to bet all the marbles on a "politically unreliable" base. To do so is like choosing to buy a house where the transit line you depend on to get there has ever been on the budget chopping block.

While what you're saying is true, it doesn't change the fact that Valve still wants, and needs, SteamOS to succeed. If SteamOS doesn't attract enough people Microsoft will be able to take Valve completely out of business by locking them out of Windows. Also, even though SteamOS is sort of an insurance policy, an insurance policy that brings money is better than an insurance policy that costs money. Like any business, Valve will try to make SteamOS profitable as fast as they can.

[cynical]

If they didn't have to hire extra developers to fork gnome shell, mir, and create things like upstart and their own store and rather used current standards like wayland and systemd they could easily cut developers cost.

Instead of needing a team of 30 developers or so they could have 10 - 15.

And they would be no different than any other Linux distribution that I have to spend time tweaking into something usable. No thanks...

[Vim_User]

If they didn't have to hire extra developers to fork gnome shell, mir, and create things like upstart and their own store and rather used current standards like wayland and systemd they could easily cut developers cost.

Instead of needing a team of 30 developers or so they could have 10 - 15.

Fun fact: Neither Wayland nor systemd are current standards.
Upstart existed before systemd, so how should they have used systemd instead?
Also, which store instead of their own should they have used?

[sarmad]

And they would be no different than any other Linux distribution that I have to spend time tweaking into something usable. No thanks...

I needed less tweaks with Fedora 20 than I needed with Ubuntu 13.10, and Fedora is now running for me with better performance and less bugs.

[curaga]

Hey, nice cave you got there.

Oh, you just wait until I'm an IT millionaire. I'll change my last name to Dotcom and build a 1000 m^2 basement like the world has never seen. With pools, sharks, lasers, and a fully automatic, armed drone security system. Oh and blackjack and hookers.

[Luke]

If Windows locks out Steam, Steam gamers will go over to Linux ports

While what you're saying is true, it doesn't change the fact that Valve still wants, and needs, SteamOS to succeed. If SteamOS doesn't attract enough people Microsoft will be able to take Valve completely out of business by locking them out of Windows. Also, even though SteamOS is sort of an insurance policy, an insurance policy that brings money is better than an insurance policy that costs money. Like any business, Valve will try to make SteamOS profitable as fast as they can.

Steam is so huge that if Windows were dumb enough to lock them out, they would be able to migrate a large part of their base to SteamOS or some other Linux distro. Think: if Steam became console-only, a hell of a lot of their customers would buy the consoles. If due to a Windows lockout they only had to download an ISO, burn it to a flash drive, and install it to a spare HD, even more would do so because another HDD or SSD is cheaper than a console by at least 2/3eds. If it was possible to dual-boot Windoze 9 with SteamOS, than the migration would be entirely free. It would be Windows much more than Valve/Steam that would lose in this transition. Windows needs Steam, soon Steam won't need Windows anymore than Playstation does.

Even Intel is now hedging their bets, with talk of encouraging new desktops and laptops to be shipped with Android rather than Windows. For Intel to even speak of a divorce from M$ is an extremely serious warning. If Microsoft trues to go down Apple's yellow brick road, they will find that most of those who want Apple's walled garden have already bought Apple, and their will be little room for Microsoft. If they don't learn from the utter failure of Windows RT and the original Surface tablet, they could literally become extinct. If Windows 9 becomes a locked garden, M$ will have to keep selling of supporting Windows 8/7, or else go under.

At that point every new desktop or laptop would be on some form of Unix kernel. Steam OS is based on Debian. Android: Linux kernel with different interface and proprietary apps-and preparing to migrate upwards to laptops and desktops. It's been possible to install Android on desktops for years. ChromeOS and Firefox OS: both based on a Linux kernel. Crapple: Unix kernel, I think one of the BSD's.

I don't know what iOS uses for a kernel, so most tablets or phones would be on Android (linux kernel) or iOS (don't know), plus the various smaller phone OS brands. One of these is Ubuntu, poised to take off in China.

[prodigy_]

Ubuntu Server is a great OS.

Not really. It's good if you need to test something very quickly with minimal effort. But for a production system you want either Gentoo (because of its unsurpassed flexibility and rolling release model) or RHEL. Ubuntu Server is just Ubuntu without GUI, i.e. a wannabe server distro made by a company that doesn't even have a clue about kernel development.

[prodigy_]

I don't know what iOS uses for a kernel

Mach 3 kernel, modified to adapt it for phones and tablets.

If Windows 9 becomes a locked garden

You mean Win8 (Secure Boot, Metro UI) isn't?

[philip550c]

Not really. It's good if you need to test something very quickly with minimal effort. But for a production system you want either Gentoo (because of its unsurpassed flexibility and rolling release model) or RHEL. Ubuntu Server is just Ubuntu without GUI, i.e. a wannabe server distro made by a company that doesn't even have a clue about kernel development.

Not saying those aren't good but I don't want to pay for red hat and when you manage thousands of servers gentoo could be a lot of work. I haven't had any issues with ubuntu server in the many years I've used it.