[rchowe]

Ubuntu was supposed to be the linux distribution that was easy for the everyday user. Now they're suffering from GNOME politics and Canonical treating their users as beta testers (but Unity works great for (most) people with Intel laptops).

Don't get me wrong - Ubuntu has made great strides in usability, but it's not that linux is harder, it's that people who are already used to Windows will find it much "easier" because the mental shortcuts are already there, compared to Linux where they need to think about something as simple as launching a program. Combine that with the fact that Linux does break on occasion (mostly with regards to distro upgrades) and probably requires the command line to fix it and you get frustration on the user's part compared to Windows.