Anybody you know with the "nothing is free" mentality?

[kaldor]

I made a post about this a few years ago. My father is very suspicious and skeptical about anything free, including Linux. He still can't understand that "Lin Ex" is not a company. "Why would LinEx ever give away anything for free?"

Not everything is directly related to the free thing, but it's all triggered by knowing it's free. If I told him I paid 10 dollars for Firefox or 200 dollars for Ubuntu, he'd very unlikely not say any of this.

Examples...

-Took him 2 years of using IE to realize that Firefox is "safe to use" after making numerous phone calls to tech support people and googling Firefox for a long time.

-If Windows is number 1, Linux/Ubuntu must have "hidden costs" because everyone would love free stuff.

-He bought a Mac a while ago after I told him it's based on UNIX, like Linux. He said he wouldn't be able to use Ubuntu because it's too hard to figure out and use.

-His old PC is realllly slow and he refuses to fix it. He says he "doesn't need anything fast" and that "he's used to it how it is" yet it literally takes up to 5 minutes to open a web browser. I used to dual boot with Ubuntu way back when I shared that computer. As soon as I got my own laptop, he nagged and nagged for me to get rid of Ubuntu. He refused to even use it once.

-He wasted money on Norton Antivirus for 8 years, saying free AVs like AVG or ClamAV etc are not "trusted".

-Numerous "This is not user-friendly!" comments when he used my laptop in the past. Complained and complained over silly things and kept saying "Not user-friendly!" if he didn't know how to do something.

-Didn't want me to install Ubuntu on my new laptop, saying "But you NEED Windows, or else your computer won't work!" Days later he kept saying "you ruined your brand new laptop!"


He is 64 years old and grew up in a small community and lived most of his life in rural areas. The place he grew up in is full of very cheap people who always need money for everything.

Edit: forgot a quote.. "I grew up being told nothing is free. I have a very hard time believing that ANYBODY would give anything away for free"

[dsavi]

My friend somehow thinks that if software is free, it's probably got some sort of hidden virus in it. I was telling him about Blender, and he's like "How do you know it's safe?". Took me a while to figure out his thought process. :/

[aysiu]

Well, I think a better approach, instead of trying to convince your dad that there are things available for free is to actually tell him why things are free.

I wrote a piece a couple of years on this:
How does open source make money?

A lot of open source software is available for free to the consumer, but it still cost money to produce. Big companies like Sun, IBM, Red Hat, and Google fund open source projects because it actually benefits them. Yes, there are some open source projects that are just some kid in a basement. If your dad doesn't want to trust those, that's understandable.

You can tell him Firefox is free to download because Mozilla, the company that makes Firefox, earns hundreds of millions of dollars from Google just by having Google as the default search engine. If he feels guilty about getting it for free, he can click on some Google ads.

That Java plugin he installed for Internet Explorer... did he pay for that? That Flash plugin he installed to watch YouTube videos, did he pay Adobe for it?

Well, at a certain point, if he won't listen to reason, just leave him alone. Sometimes you just can't convince people. Happily use Ubuntu yourself and let him take five minutes to start his web browser. Sometimes you just have to pick your battles.

[RiceMonster]

So what if he doesn't like it? Just leave him be, It's not worth arguing over these things.

[kaldor]

it's different when it isn't me trying to convince, but when he asks for my help a lot and when I recommend using Firefox/etc, it starts with him panicking about viruses. He brings up my laptop sometimes and wonders why I am still bothering with it, etc.

I'm not sitting around all day like a child trying to convince him

It just comes up sometimes.

Also, it isn't about Ubuntu/Linux. It's the constant annoying comments about "how the hell is that free" etc when he needs to install something on his computer, or he asks what software would be okay to use for some tasks.

[aysiu]

Well, if he absolutely refuses to use Firefox, and you still want to help him, this is what I would do:

1. Back up all his files to an external hard drive.
2. Reinstall Windows.
3. Configure it exactly the way he wants it (yes, with expensive antivirus and everything).
4. Set up Windows updates to install automatically.
5. Give him a limited user account. Give yourself an administrator account.
6. Most important step: Use CloneZilla to image the hard drive.
7. Set up an automatic backup program to back up his files to an external hard drive.

With a limited user account and Windows updates set to install automatically, it's highly unlikely he should contract any kind of malware to slow down his computer. If, however, it does happen, you can use CloneZilla to easily restore his computer back to working condition without having to go through the hassle of reinstalling Windows all over again.

That's if you still want to help him. I'm not generally one who has the "Use Linux and open source, otherwise I won't give you tech support" attitude, but in this situation, maybe it's something you might want to consider. Just keep in mind that it's likely if you do switch him over to Firefox and/or Ubuntu, that he would still have problems and then just blame all the problems on you switching him over to this strange non-Windows OS.

[kaldor]

Well, if he absolutely refuses to use Firefox, and you still want to help him, this is what I would do:

1. Back up all his files to an external hard drive.
2. Reinstall Windows.
3. Configure it exactly the way he wants it (yes, with expensive antivirus and everything).
4. Set up Windows updates to install automatically.
5. Give him a limited user account. Give yourself an administrator account.
6. Most important step: Use CloneZilla to image the hard drive.
7. Set up an automatic backup program to back up his files to an external hard drive.

With a limited user account and Windows updates set to install automatically, it's highly unlikely he should contract any kind of malware to slow down his computer. If, however, it does happen, you can use CloneZilla to easily restore his computer back to working condition without having to go through the hassle of reinstalling Windows all over again.

That's if you still want to help him. I'm not generally one who has the "Use Linux and open source, otherwise I won't give you tech support" attitude, but in this situation, maybe it's something you might want to consider. Just keep in mind that it's likely if you do switch him over to Firefox and/or Ubuntu, that he would still have problems and then just blame all the problems on you switching him over to this strange non-Windows OS.

I've tried to do that, but he doesn't trust anything being changed on his PC. It's a 6 year old Windows XP installed with about 150 GB of Wordperfect documents on it from the 90's. He won't reinstall Windows, but fixed it by buying a Mac. Sadly, he's not using his Mac as much anymore and using his old slow XP because the Mac is too "advanced" for him.

[mamamia88]

nothing is free. haven't you ever taken economics? it's called opportunity cost. which is what you give up for making your particular choice

[kaldor]

nothing is free. haven't you ever taken economics? it's called opportunity cost. which is what you give up for making your particular choice

If I do sudo apt-get upgrade, did that cost anything at all? What did I give up?

[aysiu]

I've tried to do that, but he doesn't trust anything being changed on his PC. It's a 6 year old Windows XP installed with about 150 GB of Wordperfect documents on it from the 90's. He won't reinstall Windows, but fixed it by buying a Mac. Sadly, he's not using his Mac as much anymore and using his old slow XP because the Mac is too "advanced" for him.

Well, I'm sure your dad has a lot of great qualities, but in this particular instance, he's just not being very considerate of you... or even himself! Unfortunately, it doesn't sound as if there's much you can do. He will complain, and he will not accept a solution. He's 64. Give him a break. My parents are in their late 60s, so I try to give them a break when I can.