Open Source Blog

The story starts in mid-February with Dell launching its Digg clone IdeaStorm site to gather suggestions from customers and potential customers about how it could improve its business.

Almost instantly there are calls for the company to offer Linux and open source software. Quite a few calls, actually, in fact in the early days all of the top three and five of the top ten involve Linux or open source.

Dell responds to the demand with the news that it is certifying Novell’s SUSE Linux for its OptiPlex desktops, Latitude notebooks, and Dell Precision workstations.

What happens next is largely out of Dell’s control.

“Dell Announces Pre-Installed Linux Options” was a typical headline.

Except the company had done no such thing. To be clear, it had never said it would preload Linux on those machines. As CBR reported at the time:

“Dell Inc has announced that it is the process of certifying Novell Inc's Linux desktop operating system for use on its corporate desktop and laptop products… The company said it is also working with a number of other Linux distributors to ensure that it provides customers with a choice of Linux operating systems on its desktop hardware, and is continuing to investigate other Linux-related ideas.”

When Dell pointed this out, the headlines were inevitable.

“Dell Backpedals on Preloading Linux” declared a number of sites.

Except it hadn’t.

Never let the facts get in the way of a good conspiracy, however. “The only thing I can think of is that Dell is caving under pressure from Microsoft” Newsfactor quoted one IdeaStorm commenter as speculating, neatly ignoring the fact that Dell’s explanation that it would work with multiple distributions was stated just a few lines after its explanation that it was working with Novell.

Why am I mentioning this now? It appears that Reuters has inexplicably only just picked up on this story.

"Dell may offer Linux as alternative to Windows" it noted.

Expect the “Dell may not offer Linux after all” stories on Thursday.