Steam is a massive worldwide market, and the Steam Deck isn't offered everywhere. Chinese users for example have to import it, so not many are used there.
I'd be more than happy to sacrifice a distro I don't care about like Ubuntu to the mainstream if it means Microsoft's market cap gets a sizeable chunk taken out of it.
I got the hardware survey on my Windows PC, but not on my Steamdeck. So I wonder if there is only 1 survey per user, and most people don't use a steamdeck exclusively?
I could swear it was higher earlier this year/last year but looking at the survey results, Linux climbed to 2% this survey. I think maybe that half remembered headline was something like "Linux is higher than MacOS at 1.5% market share" or something like that instead?
It does include it. The article list it in detail: 36.79% of the Linux users use the steam deck. And the number is falling, which means there are more users also using Linux on desktop PC (or other gaming handhelds)