Purchase Ubuntu at Best Buy and an Angel Will Get Their Wings

Okay, maybe I went to far with the angel getting wings part.

Ubuntu is officially partnering with Best Buy to sell Ubuntu for $20 for those people who would rather buy it at a store and have commercial support then download it and burn it for free themselves with no support.

Even more crazy, people from Best Buy will come to your house and install it for you for $130!

I think this is a very good move. First, it will bring in extra income to Ubuntu. But more importantly, for whatever reason, most *normal* people would rather buy software for $20 at Best Buy that comes with commercial support then download it and burn it to a disk for free and use the free types of support.

Take my grandparents for example. They have an old computer where they don't really use it anymore. They told me they would like to try Ubuntu on it just to see what I was talking about. I said we'd just have to download it, burn it to a CD and install it. They have the attitude it would be easier to just buy it at the store while they were out. Also, when an issue happens they what commercial support, not some online forum to solve their problems.

So, like always, I think Ubuntu is leading they way in doing things the Linux Desktop needs to do to go mainstream. First, get the stuff pre-installed on computers. Next, get it in stores so people can buy it to give it a try and have commercial support. Next, they need to find a way to advertise.

By the way, as I've already stated, Ubuntu is still free to download. (They'll even still ship it to your house for free.) This is just for the average Joe who wants their software shrink-wrapped and in their favorite store and is will to pay to have it that way.