FSF Criticises Ubuntu For Dropping Grub 2 For Secure Boot

sfcrazy writes "The Free Software Foundation (FSF) has published a whitepaper suggesting how free operating systems can deal with UEFI secure boot. In the whitepaper, the foundation has criticized the approach Canonical/Ubuntu has taken to deal with the problem. The paper reads: 'It is not too late to change. We urge Ubuntu and Canonical to reverse this decision, and we offer our help in working through any licensing concerns. We also hope that Ubuntu, like Fedora, will actively support users generating and using their own signing keys to run and share any versions of the software, and not require users to install a key from Canonical to get the full benefit of their operating system.'"

Comments

They also criticized Fedora..

[gQuigs]

not as much, but still (for planning to use the MS key). It's a very bad position we (Free Software) are in with Restricted/Secure boot. I think it's time the Linux friendly vendors really get behind CoreBoot [http://www.coreboot.org/Welcome_to_coreboot] and let us be truly independent.

As it is setup right now:
Binaries can only be signed with one key. If you use Microsoft's key, you can't use your own.
Not all vendors may support letting users add their own keys. (and even if they do it certainly complicates a fresh install).
ARM will be completely locked down if vendors want MS to run on it.
If you use the Microsoft key, they can revoke your access (they likely need cause, but still)

Re:people who use ubuntu are linux posers anyways

[jellomizer]

Linux has gone mainstream... Just not on the desktop. Where is remains a distant 3rd behind Windows and OS/X.
With Android, Linux is quite popular with mobile. Linux is also strong on the server side too.
Linux never made it to the desktop, because there were too many drivers to support. When you luck out and get a System that is well supported by Linux... Linux rocked on that system. However if you try to put Linux on a poorly supported system, it usually sucked, and felt like a cheap OS.

If Microsoft make "Windows 9" a Linux Distribution with a Windows themed UI. It would probably be just like Vista, many people complaining about hardware compatibility, systems crashing all the time (due to improper drivers)