Linux, Open Source, Hackers, and a lot more are wrongly accused of a variety of things every day.

• You can’t play games on Linux – WRONG You can play pretty much every game in Windows within Linux, granted you have to use emulation (i.e., Wine or Cedega), but you can play them and play them just as well.
• Linux is to hard – WRONG If an 80 year old woman who has never touched a computer in her life can use it, then it obviously isn’t to hard. Linux has become a lot easier in recent years since GNOME, KDE, and others have worked hard on usability.
• Linux is for hackers – WRONG Linux is for everyone! Whether you are a coder, a gamer, a musician, or just a typical user, Linux is for you just as much as Windows or Mac OS X is. Also for those of you who think hackers are bad, read the next line and re-train your vocabulary.
• Hackers broke into my system – WRONG A script kiddie or a cracker has broken into your system. Hackers are ethical programmers who don’t want to take advantage but create more advantages to what is there. Hackers are the people who write the code that make Linux, Microsoft, Mac OS X, and anything else on your computer do what it does. Crackers are the bad people, hackers are the good people. Stop confusing the two, this goes especially to Merriam Webster, other dictionaries, major media outlets, and our very own governments. Put this as a mental note, and remember it forever, don’t always believe what you read, especially this blog!
• Open Source isn’t good for the IT world – WRONG The IT world wouldn’t be where it is today without Open Source. Besides being a culture that enjoys all of their freedoms, Open Source pretty much rules what you do and see on the Internet. Open Source allows many to view the code and offer fixes immediately whether they are simple bugs or major security issues. Open Source makes it possible for fixes to be made available within hours. Closed source or binary code makes it impossible for many to view it and offer opinions, so you will always have to wait for that small team in Redmond or wherever they are to figure out how to fix the solution. Think of Open Source as a collaborative effort among millions of diversified individuals to bring you the greatest and most secure applications. Diversity is good thing right?

There are many other misconceptions or false accusations that tend to annoy me as I am sure it annoys many others as well. There are many great people who talk about Open Source and Free Software, but hardly to you ever hear them shoot down the falsities that many people put on them. If we are going to remain a culture, it is time we stand up to the IT bigots who try to shame us or better yet the ignorant media and our not-so-perfect government (this goes for every government in the world). So, what can we do as a culture to spread the positive word about us and to put to rest the bogus misrepresentation that is put on us?