You said something about security patching, testing and production. I thought I’d let you know that those three words don’t really go together.

“Production” implies a professional environment, where “testing” usually applies to the newly added features (and if you’re lucky, to past features or even regression tests against bugs) but to my knowledge never to security. Security patching does happen, but I’ve never seen it tested before applying it in professional environments. And finally, the one instance I know where security patches were tested before applying them was in a college course, that is: not a professional, productive context.

Should you?

Yes, please. I’m running out of stories to go with my popcorn. All I’ve got are the type that would go with a tub of comfort ice cream (or a strong drink, if that’s your poison).

How would you recommend anyone measure this?

Not at all, that’s my point. We can’t measure absence.

So far the answer has been things like nvidia drivers and “anti-cheat doesn’t work”, which are things out of our control.

For the cases you get an explicit reason, yes. Again, we can’t measure or evaluate data that isn’t there. We can’t know how many potential users just weren’t convinced by the pitch.

If you don’t understand what something is, it may be that you are not the target audience!

So the target audience for Bazzite are people familiar with cloud-computing based development practices? Otherwise, they wouldn’t make it past the first five words of the pitch “Bazzite is a cloud native image built upon Fedora Atomic Desktops”.

Also, that’s a great way to build walls, but I’d prefer we build bridges and help people understand instead.

Laypeople don’t install operating systems.

Laypeople with respect to OS development or cloud development may well do so. Many Linux users - particularly the share of Windows Gaming converts - have no expertise with “standard cloud tools”, but that doesn’t and shouldn’t be an issue for using Linux.

If it is an issue for using Bazzite, specifically, that would again lead back to the point: Are Gamers in general the target audience, or just a specific subset?

Less technical users don’t care and go download the ISO, they don’t need to care about any of this.

How do you know? Here, we circle back to measuring absence. If less technical users read “cloud” and close the tab, there’s no way of detecting that.

The conventional marketing wisdom is to deliver strong selling points in your pitch. In the absence of statistical ways to test it, I would approach the question from the perspective of the “customer”, assuming that would be gamers: They want gaming, they want stability, they want to not worry about breaking their system. Bazzite can deliver on that, so why not put those points in the pitch instead?

Now, I understand that what you’re doing right now works well enough for you. What I don’t get is the strong reaction to an apparently frequent suggestion to improve a detail. The whole thread started with an unprovoked “the more I see this whining the more I want to keep it on the website.” Instead of eventually reconsidering or just ignoring the complaint, quarterlife felt the need to be explicitly spiteful.

How would you even measure how many are turning away? Do your stats tell you how many people don’t download it? Do they give you feedback on what turned them away? And those who did download it, do they give you feedback whether and how the term influenced their decision?

But that’s all beside my actual point. I may have gotten carried away in my frustration at a recurring issue in the tech space where people proficient with some thing are unwilling to cater to those who aren’t, buillding a wall of required expertise around the good things (software or knowledge) they otherwise produce.

I think it’s an unreasonably pedantic stance to insist on using a correct term at the expense of utility. I’d expect a software description to start with what it does, not how it comes to be, particularly if the “how it comes to be” is abbreviated in an intransparent technical term, linking to a page slapping the unfamiliar with a slew of product terms and technologies rather than an actual explanation of what it means and what bearing it has on the product. Your description as it is now targets tech experts, rather than laypeople, and if other people have also suggested changing the wording to be clearer, it shows that I’m not alone in that assessment.

I feel like the tech environment - and any other knowledge-oriented environment like science or education - is better served if those with more knowledge make an effort to make it accessible to those with less. Thus, I take issue with people doubling down on hiding it behind terms specific to their field and largely unknown outside.

We probably won’t agree on this issue. You feel justified in being technically correct, while I place more value on accessible descriptions for less technical (prospective) users.

Alright, let’s put it in easy words then:

You will continue seeing these comments as long as people with common sense discover Bazzite and don’t immediately turn away at the term.

any professional paid Linux job

a small subset of users (Most of which are going to be Windows Gamers)

So your target audience is the small world of professional cloud developers using Linux, and you don’t expect many other Gamers, Windows or otherwise, to even consider Bazzite? In that case, ride on upon your high horse.

Meanwhile, the rest of us will keep trying to actually attract Windows gamers to Linux and cater to Linux gamers that don’t happen to be working in a specific profession. Bazzite clearly isn’t the right choice for normal people then. Sorry for that misunderstanding.

the website quite literally links to something that says that’s not the case

Why people keep expecting lay-users to confidently stride into technical word-soup and come out with a clear understanding is beyond me, but it definitely tracks with your “professionals only” policy.

And by the way, you actually have to find and click three links to arrive at a technical description that talks about developing and building environments. How does that help the average user? It still tells them nothing about the OS they originally were interested in.

The issue with this kind of buzzword is the multitude of definitions in use. You assume people are familiar with and agree upon yours, thus making it the correct one. But the meaning of words isn’t just dictated by what some people think it means, but by the way many people use them. Thus, Buzzwords used in many contexts primarily to sell something by vague association with something trendy (“cloud”) suffer from a dilution of meaning.

In this case, the OP was confused whether the word means that their system will be running in the cloud rather than their machine at home. So however “correct” your definition may be on paper, it brought no benefit in describing your product.

And that is the heart of the criticism: Don’t rely on snappy buzzwords just because you have one definition for them. Explain that definition too, in case people like the OP don’t know which one you use.

Doubling down on being obtuse does nobody any favours. If people communicate “this term is confusing”, refusing to change it is your right, but spiting good intentions is still immature.

What use is misleading accuracy? Why double down on confusing people?