Does that headline shock anyone, really? Stand outside a Wal-Mart for an hour and tell me how many people look like they are going inside to look at computers, let alone Linux based computers.

Wal-Mart has stopped selling Everex’s Linux-based PC in its stores because of a tepid response from customers, although it will continue to sell the product online, the retailer said Tuesday.

The customer response to the US$199 Everex TC2502 Green gPC desktop was not as high as expected, said Melissa O’Brien, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman..

Wal-Mart, the largest retailer in the U.S., agreed last year to carry the product as a test and stocked it in about 600 stores where it saw high interest in computers.

“The idea was to see if shoppers in our stores would respond as they do online to the offering. The answer is that customers did not respond to expectations, so we decided not to restock,” O’Brien said.

So, who sits online and ends up ordering the Linux PC’s? The housewives? The working couple who barely has time to see each other let alone find time to order a computer? The out of work realtor who has nothing better to do? No. The geeks. The nerds. The computer savvy people who know just what their getting when they decide to order a “Linux PC”. Duh.

Once everyone gets it through their head that mainstream America has no idea what Linux is, the sooner we can all move past that and work on ways to make sure people have a choice in the future.

[Crossposted at The Alligator Pit]

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