Linux too big?

I read a recent comment that Linux (kernel and Desktop) have become too big. the writer was complaining that the memory foot print of mainline distributions such as Mandrake, Fedora, and Susse have become too large and now are suitable onloy for large, 'modern' systems and leaving legacy systems out in the cold. There is some truth in this, but the author did not state that there are alternatives readily available. There are distibutions that take much smaller footprints such as DSL, Puppy Linux, Feather Linux, and Knoppix that run on legacy systems. While these are all live cd's they each have an install option also, thus one can try them on their system and if they work, then install them. Systems such as Gentoo, which are compiled from source give the user a lot of control over the size of the resultant system. There are also, a lot of distributions available that will install in small environments without any problems.