I'm beginning to see Linux as simple a broad open platform that is very customizable to individual needs. The idea of the spanning, generally somewhat similar but incompatible enough to be a nuisance, problematic because you have to install it on your own in virtually all cases, desktop Linux is a dying breed. I say this as a sole user of desktop Linux for nearly ten years (currently typing in CrunchBang, a Debian respin).

Why? The places where Linux has slowly started to spin are independent ecosystems each spun from Linux. This has slowly been becoming the case in the mobile sphere. But the mobile OSs that are winning are not the ones that are much codeshared with desktop Linux like Maemo, but those that exist in independent ecosystems like webOS and Android, not to mention the open source devices like Kindles and Tom Toms that you never think about the OS on.

Even the main Linux distros for desktops and similar x86 devices are beginning to separate. Ubuntu is looking at alternatives to the X server. Chrome OS has the possibility to make inroads which is not a traditional distro in any sense. Linux as a kernel is becoming something diverse that can be respun to many different uses.

Used to, the Linux landscape was fairly consistent. Mobile devices that ran the Linux kernel were using much of the same code and software as the desktop Linux distros. For example, Dillo was a web browser used on Linux ports to mobile devices and the desktop. I had mobile Linux devices in the past that ran Pidgin.