[LUGSB] Linux LiveCDs

[Richard Yao]

Dear Everyone,

Every semester, I meet a few Windows users that would probably be
happier with a Linux distribution, but going through the trouble of
downloading an burning an ISO is enough trouble that they never do it.
I know I could give CDs that I burn myself to people, but software
tends to be unappealing to people unless it comes in professionally
designed packaging, which is something that I could not afford to do.

I ran into such a person today. I demonstrated my laptop and told her
that it does not slow down as it ages and she was interested in it. I
had some Ubuntu CDs that Canonical had mailed me a few years ago, so I
gave them to her. I told her that one ran KDE, which was like Windows;
that the other ran GNOME, which was like Mac OS X; and that she should
try them both to see which of the two she liked better. I also warned
her that the software was two years old, but she ran Windows XP, so
she did not mind. Unlike the past when I would tell people to go get
the software to use it, she said that she would try them out and let
me know how she liked them the next time we ran into each other.

With that in mind, I would like to get more professionally packaged
LiveCDs to give to people so that they can try Linux. Canonical gives
free LiveCDs to people, but I seem to have reached my quota for them.
I imagine that being a University Linux Users group Canonical would be
willing to give us a large allocation of LiveCDs for little to nothing
if we asked. Is there any chance that we could try asking Canonical
for a large allocation of them through LUGSB?

If it turns out that we have to pay for them, then we would not be
restricted to buying Ubuntu Linux LiveCDs. There are other
distributions that target new users that we could consider, such as
Sabayon Linux and Linux Mint. Maybe we could talk about allocating
funds for this at our next meeting. Also, I believe that the
university has a policy of cutting funding for clubs that did not use
all of the previous semesters' funding, so instead of taking a funding
cut next semester, we could use any excess funds we have to either buy
Linux LiveCDs to give to people or donate to open source development
(e.g. Sabayon Linux, Codewavers, KDE).

Yours truly,
Richard Yao