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Shuttleworth on Ubuntu's Direction and Intent
cj2003 writes "Mark Shuttleworth has released a FAQ about Ubuntu's Direction and Intent. It comments on the discussions of funding, of being a Debian-fork or not, of the strange names, and many other 'hot topics' relating to Ubuntu. In his own words: 'This document exists to give the community some insight into my thinking, and to a certain extent that of the Community Council, Technical Board and other governance structures - on some of the issues and decisions that have been controversial.'"
Not if you give away the discs with free shipping.
The Farewell Tour II
The tagging of "Professional Edition" on to an OS or piece of software is the equivalent of " FROD LOCUST GT EDITION ... 2.6 cam engine Car " .There is likely no real advantage for most users and perhaps a few disadvantages , but people like to think they are getting the best . ;Name the normal version "Professional " or "Power user" and name the true pro version "industry " or such like .
The easy answer
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
Windows has taught the world that "Home Edition" is synonymous with "Crippled Edition."
And it sure does make it easy to build a better distro.
He's certainly made me believe he's sticking to Debian for the heavy lifting then Q/A and patching to make the packages perform the way he wants them.
I do wonder though if the Debian volunteers will really stick around and still take pride in working on the distro that makes Ubuntu so good.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
> I agree that some tactics of the proprietary software industry are less than desirable, but how many of us would be able to earn a living without them?
From available evidence, the outstanding majority. In fact, a majority (approx. 90% by some counts) of all programmers already do earn a living working directly for companies that use the software, rather than for those companies which sell software for others to use. Beyond that, of course, I'm sure companies existing and new will learn to adapt as the market changes. Once, all computer companies sold their own, incompatible, proprietary machines; now most sell open, compatible, semi-generic systems. And yet, the industry is hardly any poorer for that.
How wonderfull the world would be if his behaviour and attitude was the default among rich people - using his money with a vision to improve the world, instead of getting 8 sportcars and a larger penis.
- barkholt
If you want to see and hear him talk about many of the things he mentions in the FAQ, you should watch his Ubuntu talk at Debconf this year. Theora 132MB, MPEG 257MB
You know like Windows Whistler, or Longhorn? I mean, Longhorn could be the name of a porn movie. I certainly wouldn't want my child using it, especially if Bill were in it. But it doesn't matter, because the actual release is called Vista. Similarly, Ubuntu codename "Breezy Badger" is, officially, Ubuntu 5.10; "Hoary Hedgehog" was Ubuntu 5.04; "Warty Warthog" was Ubuntu 4.10. As you so astutely notice, naming as a matter of "marketing"; how much marketing do you want them to put into the names of unreleased software? When the final releases are professionally, numerically named, what, exactly, are you complaining about?
Ubuntu might be popular within its own community, but the distro won't go mainstream until its image matures past high school sophomore.
Or until some people become less anal-retentive. Did you read the part about NASA being one of their customers? And is an interacial menage a trois somehow worse than a single race one?
They have a foundation that helps take care of some of the administrative costs. One of the ways they make some money back is by paid tech support as an option from a third party provider (Canonical is technically that in this case). There is also free tech support, boards, etc at no cost. Their intent is that if you have no money you should not be denied anything from them - its nice to just see people being nice in the world for a change.
"As the intrepid kobold companion continues his journey, he begins to wonder... if priests raises dead, why anybody die?
Ubuntu is Linux for Human Beings and thankfully most humans aren't humourless.
Criticising Ubuntu's 'marketing' is ludicrous given that they have had outrageous success in accruing brand recognition very quickly.
I don't think the problem you see really lies with Ubuntu. With your references to "half naked and interracial menage-a-trois" and Dapper Drake being a "gay duck" I think it is you that has maturity problems, not Ubuntu.
Boffoonery - downloadable Comedy Benefit for Bletchley Park