node created 2021/05/26
Linux is a kernel. But the source of all evil in the modern computing world isn't in the kernel, but the middleware and applications running on it.

So yeah, it won, in the same sense that asphalt won because all cars run on it. You still drive a Ford though.

And the reason Linux won is because the sumbitches who discovered they can make more money putting you under constant surveillance and "monetizing" your data than selling OSes and application software realized it's far cheaper and easier to leverage free software that's supported for free by volunteers than come up with their own to run their sruveillance middleware.

That's why you see all those Linux moves from Microsoft: those would have been incredible 20 years ago. But Microsoft isn't an OS maker anymore: they're a surveillance and advertisement platform now, just like Google. They don't care about Linux or open-source threatening their business model anymore, because their business model isn't what it used to be.