I spent 5 minutes clicking around the site and can’t figure out what the unique pitch is vs. Mint and other distros, and seems like features are locked behind pay-edition walls. Am I missing something that is making this attractive to people?
If you are used to windows, Zorin feels like windows 10 without the jank. It also looks “normal”, like Windows or MacOS. Idk how to explain that, it just doesnt look scary to normies in the way that Linux Mint or Pop!OS is.
And I’m serious about that last one. Pop!OS has this weird and completely unearned elite hacker reputation among normies by virtue of being reviewed well by Linus Tech Tips and being popular with tech-literate people. Linux Mint has a similar reputation for similar reasons, but it additionally suffers from having Linux in the name, since Linux itself has cemented itself as the arcane operating system of hackers. Zorin just isn’t popular enough to inherit that reputation.
I should also point out that the average computer user does not understand their device enough to know what they should be scared of. The bogeyman of the internet is a hacker backdooring your device and stealing your personal data or installing ransomware, but normies don’t understand how hackers hack your computer. Therefore, they stick to the well-traveled paved paths where it feels safe and normal. This means that trying a new distro sets off the “I’m being hacked!” alarm bells in their head, like how walking through a bad neighborhood sets your hackles up even if there is no real danger. The fact that their data has never been safe sounds abstract and somewhat fake. It’s hard to comprehend a threat so nebulous as the CIA and Homeland Security making lists on their citizens or data brokers scraping so much data off of you that they can figure out that you are pregnant before you do. Hackers are easier to conceptualize. (This mentality also extends to piracy.)
As someone who uses Zorin as my daily driver, the big selling point for Zorin is that it has a really smooth installation experience with a the prettiest desktop environment I’ve seen plus a couple free bells and whistles like jelly mode and a “software store” that allows you to download foss applications and manage your updates easily. As software it does have jank, but only in a way that becomes obvious after a few months, and the lightweight version is very smooth. For that reason, I can’t reccomend Zorin to the average Linux user, but I will always reccomend it to normies looking to get into Linux.
Afaik, it is just pre customized to be usable for windows users. Goal is no terminal required for the average user that just needs a browser and maybe does basic unmodded gaming. Good for parents and siblings who are getting fed up with windows.
The paid bits are extra support, more preconfigured layouts and some apps that people new to linux may not realize exist (for stuff like school IT systems changing to linux, or a vfx company changing away from windows b/c they are worried about ai stealing their art).
Pretty sure they’re the ones that give you like five different layouts to start out with right? Also, people hate picking the most popular anything so Ubuntu tends to be a non starter for some newbies and “top ten” writers.
Like many distros of its ilk though it’s likely very serviceable for newbies and old-hats alike
I spent 5 minutes clicking around the site and can’t figure out what the unique pitch is vs. Mint and other distros, and seems like features are locked behind pay-edition walls. Am I missing something that is making this attractive to people?
If you are used to windows, Zorin feels like windows 10 without the jank. It also looks “normal”, like Windows or MacOS. Idk how to explain that, it just doesnt look scary to normies in the way that Linux Mint or Pop!OS is.
And I’m serious about that last one. Pop!OS has this weird and completely unearned elite hacker reputation among normies by virtue of being reviewed well by Linus Tech Tips and being popular with tech-literate people. Linux Mint has a similar reputation for similar reasons, but it additionally suffers from having Linux in the name, since Linux itself has cemented itself as the arcane operating system of hackers. Zorin just isn’t popular enough to inherit that reputation.
I should also point out that the average computer user does not understand their device enough to know what they should be scared of. The bogeyman of the internet is a hacker backdooring your device and stealing your personal data or installing ransomware, but normies don’t understand how hackers hack your computer. Therefore, they stick to the well-traveled paved paths where it feels safe and normal. This means that trying a new distro sets off the “I’m being hacked!” alarm bells in their head, like how walking through a bad neighborhood sets your hackles up even if there is no real danger. The fact that their data has never been safe sounds abstract and somewhat fake. It’s hard to comprehend a threat so nebulous as the CIA and Homeland Security making lists on their citizens or data brokers scraping so much data off of you that they can figure out that you are pregnant before you do. Hackers are easier to conceptualize. (This mentality also extends to piracy.)
As someone who uses Zorin as my daily driver, the big selling point for Zorin is that it has a really smooth installation experience with a the prettiest desktop environment I’ve seen plus a couple free bells and whistles like jelly mode and a “software store” that allows you to download foss applications and manage your updates easily. As software it does have jank, but only in a way that becomes obvious after a few months, and the lightweight version is very smooth. For that reason, I can’t reccomend Zorin to the average Linux user, but I will always reccomend it to normies looking to get into Linux.
It’s very Windows like and has that corporate sheen they’re hoping is attractive to Windows users.
Afaik, it is just pre customized to be usable for windows users. Goal is no terminal required for the average user that just needs a browser and maybe does basic unmodded gaming. Good for parents and siblings who are getting fed up with windows.
The paid bits are extra support, more preconfigured layouts and some apps that people new to linux may not realize exist (for stuff like school IT systems changing to linux, or a vfx company changing away from windows b/c they are worried about ai stealing their art).
I guess they like the preconfigured gnome environment?
I’m also not sure what I’m supposed to be looking at on their website
Pretty sure they’re the ones that give you like five different layouts to start out with right? Also, people hate picking the most popular anything so Ubuntu tends to be a non starter for some newbies and “top ten” writers.
Like many distros of its ilk though it’s likely very serviceable for newbies and old-hats alike