The article is a little bit too harsh, but I get the idea. Let me explain ...

First, the title is wrong. Ubuntu is absolutely making Linux MUCH friendlier to use than ever before. In fact I would seriously doubt if Linux could be as popular as it is now without Ubuntu.

But the problems mentioned in the article are real --- every Ubuntu upgrade fixes some issues and breaks some others, especially drivers. I think the reasons are pretty obvious here: Apple has only a small portfolio of hardware configuration and generally Mac users don't tweak their systems as much as Linux folks do, and Apple can actually test each release on all possible hardware (Hackintosh excluded) AND reasonable system variants before they make it public and feel pretty confident it won't break too much stuff. So it's not very fair to compare Ubuntu with OS X for driver compatibility, as there is simply too much combinations of hardware and software to support. In this regard, Ubuntu is more similar to Windows.

But Windows has an advantage right now: it has a much larger install base which forces hardware/software vendors to "manufacture to Windows". And Windows has only a handful clearly-defined "reference implementations" for vendors to test out---currently the "reference implementations" are XP and Vista/Win7, then double the number to account for x86/x64 variants. Even then it is very hard for Microsoft to keep all devices working for all Windows users.

The situation is much worse for Ubuntu: officially there are four editions (U, K, X, and Netbook Remix), and think about the number of platforms it supports. In addition only a few vendors actually test their products on any flavor of Linux. And those who do test on Linux are usually big names like Intel (even then they suck from time to time). Your cheap webcam manufacturers don't really have the money or time or any incentive to test the $5 crap on Linux they sold to you. So the reality is, the test coverage for a particular installation of Ubuntu on a particular hardware configuration for the vast majority of users is pretty limited. You shouldn't really expect too much more than what we have now.

The more I think about it, the more I appreciate the effort Ubuntu and the whole Linux community spent to make Linux more approachable to common folks like my dad (he's been using Ubuntu for quite some time now and never bothered by virus/trojan any more -- I just don't upgrade the system as long as it works).

But problems are still problems. A year ago when my old laptop finally stopped working after a glass of juice got into its body I switched to a metal MacBook. I finally decided that my time wasted on figuring out how to make my webcam work again after each Ubuntu upgrades, if accumulated, is actually worth something. I feel much happier now on a Mac. Sometimes I still long for the power of control on Linux and really get annoyed by various little things on OS X (like even in Snow Leopard the default Terminal.app doesn't support 256 colors -- WTF!!??), but I'm willing to accept the trade-offs. Besides, when I really need the power of Linux I immediately summon the Ubuntu installed in VirtualBox and ssh into it (actually I think this is the preferred way of running Linux -- you avoid all the driver issues by virtualizing the hardware).