I am totally with you on this
The answer needs to be, “What are you going to use it for?”
I always ask before suggesting or installing linux on a client machine, normally the answer is internet and mail. But most of my clients are retired. Some also need skype but mainly whatsapp and facebook for communications with family members.
Nothing technical or hard
Yes, my favourite, all-time #No 1 answer I ever got:
“Nothing serious, just for my son to play some games, so a cheep toy-computer will be enough…”
Well, gaming requires the most expensive set of hardware
Yes. I understand. In case of giving ad, Google products, specially YouTube is very good. But that needs money, which needs funding and only donations from users will not work. Besides thinking about how to get funds, we can do one thing for FREE, which is whispering campaign. We can convince our friends and families and clients to use Linux. But for that we need to show them what Linux capable of and there, we have come to the same point. As most of the Windows users are not hobbyist, we have to show them that if they use Linux OS instead of Windows, it will support their existing computer hardware and other accessories and we will start running in a circle which we have already started. So… what now? 
As i have said before
I never play games, so when and if asked it an area i cannot answer. Same with facebook or other similar social media. I get very lost when asked about messinger , they want facebook and not a email type connection.
Usually get them to facebook site, click the lost password as they dont remember, then its down to them to rediscover.
That will not make Linux as an alternative OS for Windows, I am afraid. We need mass and for that… again that question, chicken or egg, which one was earlier, means will Linux be compatible with hardwares and apps or apps and hardwares would have to be compatible with Linux? But I think, I have the answer here. Hardware vendors and other app makers will not take Linux as serious alternative of Windows till Linux has some serious vendors like HP, Lenovo etc. in its portfolio. There are some laptop brands who have made some totally Linux based laptops but we need more to show.
Google is actually a Linux user
they build thdir own distro from source code.
So what? That doesn’t change Google from monster to saint. 
Anyway, we should stick to the point, why don’t more people use Linux? We need to find some solution.
Everyone uses Linux (indirectly), every time they use Google.
Does that mean Linux has become the alternative of Windows? 
Well not really alternative, because Windows is evolving… it is on its way to becoming a thin client instead of a desktop OS.
That leaves Linux, BSD, and MacOS… and they are all Unix anyway
So Unix will soon be THE desktop OS… almost by default… we dont need to do anything to ‘sell’ it.
Looks like this was covered by It’s FOSS.
No More Ubuntu! Debian is the New Choice For Google’s In-house Linux Distribution (itsfoss.com)
When this happens I will switch desktop OS.and run older Windows, for certain desktop apps and Linux, preferably on separate drives.
“Thin” is the very last word that would come to my mind regarding Windows. 
But I understand what you mean…
It’s about to put even more control over users, what and how they can do, and to grab the most of their data legally.
I thought you might react to that.
There is some appeal in having all your software on your desk under your control.
Clients linked to a server lose that.
Yes, I love this! I agree. Should the goal even be to try and capture most or all of the Windows user base? I don’t think so? I definitely want to preserve the creative space that is linux.
I think it should prioritize its openness, its freedom for the user, its privacy and security and keep doing what is doing: keep improving free and open alternatives to maintstream products and services so they keep getting more and more awesome.
When I say that linux can’t attract non-hobbyists easily, I totally agree with you that shouldn’t be the goal. 
But at the same time, there are plenty of good reasons why more people don’t use linux.
And yet they still can’t release and maintain a decent vendor supported client for Google Drive on Linux… this is the main reason I stopped using Google Drive to share stuff with my brother 3000 km away… I prefer the convenience of drag and drop (or even Linux commands like “cp” or “rsync” to copy files to a share - which are then available to other users of that share)…
I used to use Dropbox all the time (even paid for it for a couple years) - until - they disabled “free plan” users (I’d earned 12 GB for free) over the years) from connecting more than 3 devices… I have up to 6 or more devices I’d want to connect…
So now I use ResilioSync for sharing stuff (like family photos) with my brother - and just sent a share link to my sister in the UK to also drop scanned family photos… It works quite well…
On the subject of getting more Linux users? Just repeating what I wrote above - I don’t care! I prefer Linux desktop to continue to have a marginal share of the desktop computing market. I’d be happy for it to level peg with MacOS - which with the rise of the SteamDeck - could happen.
Another thing to note : Microsoft are moving away from Linux native - previously there was Microsoft Teams “Preview” on Linux - they’ve discontinued it and instead recommend using a web browser to access MS Teams. This is a perfectly acceptable solution in my book - the WHOLE Office 365 suite works 100% fine inside a modern browser on Linux like Edge, Brave, Google Chrome or Firefox (haven’t tried any others)… I find this really handy actually - I have multiple customers with multiple MS Teams and Outlook environments. I use Firefox for one of them - works just fine… I use Microsoft Edge on my work MacBook - and used to use the Edge Sync feature (so got same settings elsewhere) - but - my employer now blocks accessing work stuff from a non-work device…
And yeah - it does seem that Microsoft are moving to a “thin client” solution. I can see in 5 years time - Windows will be just like ChromeOS - and you’ll do everything through a browser like Chromium based Microsoft Edge.
I love that. Let the market sort it out.
and, @daniel.m.tripp agrees
Daniel is usually a good reality check
I can agree with that. One caveat is that the share needs to be high enough that it gets the attention and support of some major software vendors. If we had just a little more desktop share I think I could justify using Ubuntu or Pop!_OS as my daily work machine.
Because as Dan said…
I could just work inside a browser for Teams and Office. Ubuntu is supported by Microsoft Intune, and they use Intune to manage workstations at work. I volunteered to be the guinea pig, but so far, the answer is no.
This is why Chromebooks do well - and a whole heap of stuff is moving to a “thin client” model… It’s amazing what can be done with HTML 5… I especially love the few projects I’ve seen that implement a whole DE inside a browser - there’s a new OSS one I saw recently (forget the name) - but there was OS.js a few years back - I tried it - but couldn’t get it to present a terminal UI - e.g. so I could use it to SSH to something else…
If you install Linux on a Windows machined and Linux breaks you can recover Windows from the recovery partition. I’ve done it on a dell machine when I tried asking them a Linux question and they said they wouldn’t talk to me so I said I would return the machine and get my money. They told me it had to have the Windows OS installed. I reinstalled Windows and when I found out how easy it was I put Linux Mint Cinnamon edition and the lady has been using it for years without any problems. I’ve checked out many of ZDnet wonderful distro suggestions and have not found one that is as user friendly. I run a computer clinic at the local senior center and as Windows 10’s end-of-life is on the horizon we have been converting users to Linux Mint without any issues. These have been seniors that are not computer literate.