I know there are a lot of ways we can encourage people to use Linux and I wonder what you all do? perhaps you can comment so we can share our ideas and, where it makes sense adopt as many as we can.
So here goes for my 2 pennyworth:
I have an older laptop which I loan out to friends and family when they have problems with their PC’s ( Windows of course )
Whenever I go in a shop which sells computers/parts/software to buy anything I make a point of saying something like “If it doesn’t work with my Linux box can I bring it back for an exchange or refund?” usually they say “No” so I say “Oh okay I will go to …. and see if they will” It’s only worked once so far but I hope it will make some difference overall if a lot of us do it.
I email companies such as HP to tell them I have bought their printers/computers and so on and mention specifically it’s because of their good support of Linux. i have, from time to time, emailed others such as Lexmark and Canon to tell them I didn’t buy their kit because they still didn’t support Linux.