FreeBSD (How vague can I get? ;) )

[Saifi Khan]

On Tue, 22 Sep 2009, Allen wrote:

> Hi list,
> 
> First, I want to say thank you. To anyone who's ever used FreeBSD, you've
> either loved it outright, or been in awe. How is it possible that something so
> complex as an OS can be done without cash to everyone doing it? Now think
> about this; How can this OS be so much better than one money can buy?
> 

FreeBSD and *BSD needs some loving and your mail is a wonderful step in that direction.
With the support of the community, anything is possible.


> I thought about this for a minute before sending this message, and figured why
> not? Those Credit Card commercials you see on TV always say "Something
> something, 5 dollars, something something 50 dollars, and something something
> 300 dollars, getting to do this; Priceless!"
> 

iirc, that sounds like the Standard chartered credit card ad, here in India.


> Well, let's try this with FreeBSD:
> 
> A PC from 10 years ago your neighbor tossed in the trash because Vista won't
> even install on it let alone run slower than someone on a bicycle racing
> someone in a McLaren F1 because they were using  Windows 98 on it and XP
> crawls on the thing:
> 
> 0 Dollars
> 
> A new bottom of the line PC with non onboard video card, but only 16 MBs of
> Video memory, and two monitors used:
> 
> 50 dollars
> 
> An Internet Connection you need anyway these days, about 150 dollars a year...
> 
> An Epiphany that Microsoft's newest OS is going to cost almost 500 dollars and
> you can't afford it or the crap you'll be getting on your machine running it
> and finding FreeBSD, downloading it for free and getting a couple burnable CDs
> from a friend... PRICELESS!
> 
> After almost 10 years, from the day I walked into Best Buy here in Michigan,
> and saw on the shelf Mandrake Linux 7.1 and "The FreeBSD PowerPak" with
> FreeBSD 4.0 + 6 CD toolkit, + "The Complete FreeBSD" 3.0 book for less than a
> hundred dollars, I've always been a fan of FreeBSD and how much power I got
> for so little.
> 
> Some friends of mine make fun of me for paying for free software saying it's
> stupid to buy something and spend money on something I can get online, and I
> continue to buy FreeBSD stuff to help support whenever I can. My last order
> was over 500 dollars getting FreeBSD on CD-ROM, and a new version of "The
> Complete FreeBSD" book, The FreeBSD Handbook, and then the newer ones Vol1 and
> Vol2, and stickers for my Laptop and Desktops, and of course a FreeBSD mouse
> pad and label pin, and I'm glad I did.
> 
> I also bought "20 Years of Berkeley Unix" on DVD, with MKM as the speaker. I
> can say proudly that my Wife thinks he's amazing and wants to go see him talk
> one day.
> 

Wow, unbelievable ! 
That reads like a teenager's adoration for a rock star ;-)
i'd go for Def Leppard.

How do you see the *BSD community evolving today ? 
Is there something that can be done better that makes *BSD capture more mindshare ?

i'm a newbie and thank you for your time in advance.


thanks
Saifi.