Linspire, formerly Lindows, has quickly become one of the most common distros of Linux seen with machines sold in retail chains such as Fry's Electronics and Walmart. The distro focuses on ease of use and compatibility, and the effort has been impressive. It is one of the distros that require you to purchase it, for both the installation and the support. In response to a free version that was created by a volunteer (completely legal by the way), Linspire is offering version 5.0 of their release completely free, until September the 6th. The linked page details why they chose to do this, and their reasons are sound. The free version released by the volunteer had to strip out support for many things – such as Java – that the paid version did not. Linspire wants to give people the chance to see the real deal, and thus are offering it for free, temporarily. None of this is anything you can't get on your own, but the Linspire package is very decent for someone who is wanting an introduction into Linux. Anyone who has been thinking about trying Linux or would like to try this, I suggest you so do now!

To get your free copy, you purchase a “Digital” copy from their website and apply the coupon detailed in the linked page. It is available for download in three places after that, HTTP, FTP and bittorrent. As an avid Linux user I encourage you all to give this a try.