From the ‘I told you so’ files:
When Apache OpenOffice 3.4 was released last week — the first OpenOffice release under Apache – I *guessed* that it was likely a better fit for Windows and Mac users than for Linux users.
As it turns out, after a week of availability, that’s exactly the case.
The Apache OpenOffice project today announced that after a week of availability they have had over 1 million downloads. Not a bad number, except for the fact that:
ONLY 2 PERCENT WERE ON LINUX.
87 percent of downloads were for Microsoft Windows and 11 percent for MacOS. Yes, I know, Linux users could potentially have downloaded OOo from a different repo as opposed to just getting it from Sourceforge. Still, the numbers are telling, OpenOffice is a great alternative for Windows and Mac users to the proprietarylock-in of Microsoft.
Linux users however, know better. They know that while OpenOffice is good software, LibreOffice is better. Time will tell if the Linux numbers improve for OpenOffice, but I strongly suspect they won’t.
Sean Michael Kerner is a senior editor at InternetNews.com, the news service of the IT Business Edge Network, the network for technology professionals Follow him on Twitter @TechJournalist.