An Open Letter to Steve Ballmer is written by François Bancilhon, CEO of Mandriva.

Mandriva closed a deal with the Nigerian government to supply 17,000 low cost PCs bundled with their GNU/Linux distribution (OS), but Microsoft and the Nigerian government then closed another deal to use Windows on the PCs instead of Mandriva.

From the 545 comments posted there are less than ten which are worth reading. Less than ten which are intelligently written.

Using GNU/Linux is my choice. I do not force it's use on other people. I do not claim it is better than Windows. I prefer it to Windows because I can customize it to a greater degree than I can Windows.

If I showed my computer to my friends, they would think GNU/Linux is awful, because it looks dated, it does not look stylish or sleek or polished.

I have removed all the sleek style, all the nifty GUI features now available in the latest Gnome or KDE desktop environments because I don't want the distractions, just the minimal functionality to do what I want to do.

And what I want to do is make digital audio/music, which in Windows requires spending a lot of money. And I want to program, which in Windows requires spending money. And I want to design my website, which in Windows requires spending money.

And I also like the idea of freedom of information. The Free Software Foundation promotes the freedom of information, it is against the patenting of information, it runs against the direction global capitalism is taking us, and I support these ideals, and this is why I continue to use GNU/Linux - not because GNU/Linux is better, but because it's ideals are better ;-)