Okay. So. I guarantee you that most Windows users—especially ones on Fedi—know how fucked up Windows has become. Bombarding them with "Install #Linux, we have cookies!" propaganda isn't going to send them rushing to download an image and flash it to a usb drive to install.

They know Windows is a nightmare, they want the nightmare to stop. But there are a lot of reasons stopping them from installing Linux.

One of the biggest ones is that even as Linux has gotten easier and easier to install, it's still a really big step for a lot of people. Maybe they only have one computer, and can't risk slagging it if they mess up. Maybe they don't even know where to start backing up their data. Google and the other search engines are returning AI slop, so they can't trust those to give them accurate and useful answers.

So instead of trying to convince them they want to switch, we need to help them find the resources necessary to do so
if they decide they're ready. We need to be the opposite of all those fucking RTFM bros that made it hard when we first switched. We need to make sure they can find a helpful community to give them the support to feel safe in switching.

Because yeah, Windows fucking sucks. They know that, we know that. But breaking their computer so it works even less is fucking terrifying, and Linux has a fucking PR problem because the RTFM bros are the loudest members of our community.

Edit: this really resonated while I was asleep, and I'm glad to know I'm not the only one frustrated here. A few people have replied asking for help, and I'll try to boost them later when I get back to the computer, but if you can, please help them out. Not everyone is gonna switch, but let's make it better for those who are ready and willing to make the jump.
@deathkitten What version of Linux is the easiest and most like Windows if I wanted to download it to a jump drive and start using it?

@deathkitten I get overwhelmed when presented with too much information at a time/when I need to learn too much information too quickly/when I have too many options/when I need to do too much debugging.

Is there a Linux that's user friendly to someone who's never installed an operating system before?

@griseldagimpel My honest answer? Whatever distro the person who's going to help you is using themselves.

I don't mean just asking here on Fedi, I mean someone who can ride or die support you. This could be a friend who'll take a call or respond to a text/chat message and walk you through fixing your problem. Or if you find a
good active support forum with helpful people who don't just yell RTFM at you.

All that said, if you're going to take the plunge without a ride or die on hand, I've seen a lot of people recommend Linux Mint. It's based on Ubuntu, which is based on Debian, and therefore a lot of Linux advice for all of the three will usually cover most things you need to figure out.

I also saw another person recommend this site to check out various distros, but full disclaimer, I haven't looked at it myself yet.

https://distrosea.com/
Test Linux distros online - DistroSea

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@griseldagimpel @deathkitten KDE Neon would be my recommendation

https://neon.kde.org/download

Get the User Edition iso, put it on a USB drive using

https://apps.kde.org/isoimagewriter/

and boot your machine from the USB —it's a live system so this will allow you to play around with it and see if your hardware is supported before going for a full install.

KDE neon

KDE neon is the latest and greatest of KDE community software.

@griseldagimpel @deathkitten

My suggestion is to start with something that's widespread used. My choice was Debian, and I recommend it for beginners.

Typically nobody using Windows or iOS ever installed an OS in the last 20 years or so.

They bought a computer with an installed one already. So this may be tricky to people who never used a floppy or a CDROM as an install medium.

The key point is that you need an "install medium" which is somehow external for your. PC. This could be a pendrive or a dvdrom if your PC has a player.

Then you have to download your OS of choice in a compacted format known as .iso (called 'image'). This image cannot simply be copied onto your install media, as it will not work.

The install media must be properly initialised in order to become "bootable", which means it will literally 'execute' when plugged in you PC at boot.

From that point onwards, an install wizard will usually be available for most distributions.