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Ubuntu 13.04 Will Allow Instant Purchasing, Right From the Dash
sfcrazy writes "Ubuntu is becoming a shopping center. Instead of addressing the queries raised by Stallman and the EFF, Canonical is now pushing for making Ubuntu a shopping cart. With Ubuntu 13.04 Canonical is going one step forward, and soon you will be able to purchase software and music right from the Dash without opening the software center or web browser.This is intended to make the whole experience even more interactive and useful for the end user."
As the Canonical developer's Unity DE shows, Canonical is not really that interested in the opinions of its current users.
sure am glad I never wasted any time committing code to Ubuntu
... you can just download another distro. Because it's Linux and Linux comes in more flavors than ice cream. Heck if you don't like any of the flavors, make your own. No need to log on Slashdot and moan and cry about how terrible Ubuntu is and how much it reminds you of them terrible yanks uppin Micro$oft yonder, because you don't know anyway. You wouldn't come within 1000 feet of it, right? You despise it, you loathe it, yes? Good.
Ubuntu would make more money by moving towards Red Hats model of licensing instead of their (outrageous) support hours. Their cost model for enterprise support is a huge reason my workplace won't use them.
"When the user searches her own local files for a string using the Ubuntu desktop, Ubuntu sends that string to one of Canonical's servers. (Canonical is the company that develops Ubuntu.)" from -> http://linux.slashdot.org/story/12/12/07/1527225/rms-speaks-out-against-ubuntu
* Says all I needed to see... & though Mr. Stallman MAY be a wee bit "odd" in some things he does or has done or said? He's not "off" here... no way.
APK
P.S.=> Thus, I suppose the next time I try Linux, it will be MINT vs. KUbuntu (my former favorite)...
... apk
It's one of those polarizing subjects. Some see absolutely no problem with this kind of thing, whilst others are mortified by it and can't understand why everyone else is ok with it. Both sides call each other idiots who "just don't get it" for whatever reason, no ones opinion changes, and life goes on.
All purchases will require the use of BitCoin.
All good things come to an end. Time to move on. I think I'll give Slackware another spin. I read Slackware will run on the Raspberry Pi as well.
E17 has a big day on 12/21... and not because of the Mayans. Looks like it is time to shop around. Plenty of options.
How they want to compile it is their choice. That's the entire point of open source.
That's not a problem. The problem is that the Unity interface SUCKS.
From the Canonical Blog Post on the new feature:
Privacy is extremely important to Canonical. The data we collect is not user-identifiable (we automatically anonymize user logs and that information is never available to the teams delivering services to end users), we make users aware of what data will be collected and which third party services will be queried through a notice right in the Dash, and we only collect data that allows us to deliver a great search experience to Ubuntu users. We also recognize that there is always a minority of users who prefer complete data protection, often choosing to avoid services like Google, Facebook or Twitter for those reasons – and for those users, we have made it dead easy to switch the online search tools off with a simple toggle in settings.
So while I think the privacy concerns with sending data to Canonical when you'e doing searches is significant, so long as the user is aware and has the option, more power to them. I don't think I want to integrate my desktop and network search, but I certainly see a mass market that may want this. Depending upon how easy it is to create and configure these "scopes" to plug into this system it might be a great way to build customized searching without the need for Google to know everything about me.
I think people are too reactionary when it comes to both privacy and commercialism. From the previous posts you'd think this was a mandatory feature and Canonical was selling user data or something. They seem to be responsible players here creating cool tech that some of us may not want. I see nothing for me to get upset about.
For each of such change we're seeing in Ubuntu, people are coming back to Debian. Welcome back!
"This is intended to make the whole experience even more interactive and useful for Canonical and their online retailer partners."
What's pretty clear is that Canonical is now trying to cash in. The good news is that it's easy to switch to another distro.
I am officially gone from
... It's for the ability to east the separation of me from my money. I constantly think about it, every time I use a computer. "The one thing lacking in this OS, the one fault of the developer, is that not once did they think about my pocketbook and how it's too full. They really should divert development time from other features to make it easier to spend money. I really don't do enough of that, and there are so few ways for me to do it."
Dammit, and I was just getting to like Ubuntu as a mature competitor to the commercial offerings. I had even convinced a few friends to try it. Now I'll look like a fucking shill.
HI bsd!
In other news...
If Canonical becomes that much unfriendly, some users will be encouraged to setup a light daemon generating a multiple of random queries for each real ones. Then Canonical will try to filter out the noise, and the escalation with more clever scripts inundating their servers with trash will continue :)
This almost seems like a sick joke at this point. Not only are they loading up the system with advertising, but it's so poorly implemented at this point that Canonical is slowly becoming a caricature of modern software companies. What does anyone have to gain from this? When did opening a web browser and typing "amazon.com" become too much work? Have we reached the point where the only thing people want out of their computers is a shopping/advertising hub?
Seriously, this fails on so many levels that I'm completely baffled. This is supposed to be a major new feature, but it obviously will become completely non-functional when you get disconnected from the net. Ignoring all the other problems, why is there a major OS-level feature that works COMPLETELY differently depending on whether or not you are connected to the internet? I'm trying but I can't find any way to stretch this so that it actually makes sense.
Heh. I wonder if BSDs are taking the crown of "alternative operating system" from Linux, while Linux becomes an actual mainstream thing.
Uh, current Ubuntu user here. I'm all for this.
Current Xubuntu user here (2 desktops, 2 laptops). I don't particularly care how Unity is distorted, other than remarking that this sort of thing ensures I stay away from it. We had Gnome 2 on all the PCs, but switched every one of them to xfce when both Unity and Gnome 3 showed their differing ugliness while testing them in a VM.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
It simply seems that Ubuntu has seriously started to look into ways for collecting more money. Remember, it started with the donation page being shown when you download the ISO. What do you think, will more robust money backing make better open source software?
I actually don't have much of a problem with this, but I really dislike them sending searches to Amazon by default. It should be an opt-in behaviour, not default.
Ubuntu it's officially now a Kindle with flickering videos and no games. Ubuntu, Linux for human beings turned into Linux for consumer beings.
"I wanted to update/install my nvidia drivers, so I opened the dash and typed "drivers". IT DISPLAYED GOLF CLUBS on sale at Amazon!"
Presumably the new version will buy them for you as well.
http://rocknerd.co.uk
By the way, here's how Jono Bacon responded to the criticism from Stallman.
> Canonical is not really that interested in the opinions of its current users ..
If not satisfied, then why not ask for your money back ..
AccountKiller
if Ubuntu and all its variants could detect a fucking 1280x1024 @ 60hz monitor without having to hand edit a depreciated text file that does not exist like it did in ubuntu 9
ya know, before you went all retarded?
I read through the whole thing and I can tell you that he said nothing at all. No reason for the decision, no address of the privacy concerns, no nothing. He wrote a huge page of politician dribble.
The boneheaded decisions of Canonical, plus the existence of Mint Linux, have all but decimated the Ubuntu userbase. Yes, I know there must be some Ubuntu users out there still, but they're somewhere at the fringe of society: you know nobody in your circle of friends, colleagues, family or acquaintances who uses Ubuntu.
It's like IE: who the fuck uses Internet Explorer at this stage? Yeah, there must be people using it, according to various webstats... but nobody know those characters.
IOW, Ubuntu has become the IE of the Linux distro world: they exist somewhere out there, but nobody gives a shit about them, except malware writers.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
What a whiny non-response from Jono Bacon. His counter argument to Stallman is: [summarized] "Privacy is personal, there is only one RMS who cares about privacy in his own way, so we can collect your data. Look at Facebook and Apple: see, we're better!".
The community is fine with new features and trying out new things, but we just want the defaults to be sane. Only turn on Amazon searches or Canonical feedback as an op-in mechanism. A default install of any gnu/linux distro should be privacy-aware and not require disabling any features.
It sounds like he's making excuses for their decision. His love of all things Apple does explain a lot as well. Sounds like he's hoping they can develop an OS with an 'ooooh shiny' factor that makes people forget their ideals.
This is just the direction that Ubuntu wants to go in which is good for them if they want to create a consumer operating system to compete with the likes of Android, OS X and Windows. I personally don't find the new interface all that offensive, but nor do I use it (I'm an E17 guy). I do, however, recommend it to others looking for an alternative to Windows and they seem to like it more often than not. In the case of "not" I generally point them to KDE or XFCE. The beauty of Linux operating systems is that there are hundreds (thousands?) out there to pick from and they're customizable. You can always uninstall this feature. I must state though that Ubuntu should have made it "opt in" instead of a default behavior.
So if you don't like what Ubuntu is doing, go with something else. Now, I understand RMS's complaints here and would say that using this is tantamount to using something like a mainstream OS, but I have to argue that is what Ubuntu is going for and people like RMS and other Free Software advocates are no longer its target demographic. It is now an OS for the average Joe (or at least trying to be) and the Linux people who are so offended by this have the many derivatives of Ubuntu as well as a dazzling array of other distros to choose from and to direct others to.
Remember "Canonical, the sponsor of the Ubuntu project, today announces that Ubuntu is now available pre-loaded on the new ASUS Eee PC series". Never shipped.
"Canonical and Dell have teamed up to offer an extensive range of Dell desktop and notebook configurations, certified and suitable for home use, business use or software development." No mention of such products on Dell's site. Do they just make this stuff up?
I'll say this before and I'll say it again, if you haven't ditched Ubuntu for Mint, now is the time
http://linuxmint.com/
Its also funny to note that install base of Ubuntu has taken a nose dive in the last year(two?). with mint taking up the slack.
I wonder why.
Try reading some comments here, then. They'll explain how allowing people to purchase things more easily, if they choose to, will destroy free software and the whole western civilization.
It's essentially the same to use as Ubuntu 10 -- the last version before all the Unity crap, crippled Gnome and spyware commercializing -- plus, the software and updates are carefully vetted and upgrades are not so annoyingly frequent. And, of course, there's none of this commercialization BS.
I've been running it in a VM to prepare for the switch and it will be soon.
> Adult Lens & YouPorn Scope
I can perfectly imagine the one click buying integration with this one...
The boneheaded decisions of Canonical, plus the existence of Mint Linux, have all but decimated the Ubuntu userbase. Yes, I know there must be some Ubuntu users out there still, but they're somewhere at the fringe of society: you know nobody in your circle of friends, colleagues, family or acquaintances who uses Ubuntu.
The geek's circle of friends must be smaller than most.
Dell Ubuntu Laptop Developer Speaks About Future Plans
Splashtop introduces remote Ubuntu to Android and iPhone
10 reasons to choose Ubuntu 12.10 over Windows 8
The point being that Ubuntu remains a remarkably successful distribution --- particularly in markets where Linux can seem all but invisible.
It's the same issue that people have with Windows 8, or Internet Explorer for that matter - a de facto monopoly. It isn't quite to Apple's level, where they forcibly shut out competition, but you can see that's where it's headed.
A default install of any gnu/linux distro should be privacy-aware and not require disabling any features.
Minor nitpick: This should apply to all software, hardware and (web) services not just GNU/Linux distros.
It's hardly the end of civilisation as we know it..........
That's not what you'll be saying when our shiny, touch-sensitive, skeuomorphic exterminator overlords stride down the boulevards crushing all non-upgraded human flesh beneath their animated dancing beachball boot heels.
You are not a brain: http://books.google.com/books?id=2oV61CeDx-YC
Why do you use it then? If you don't, why is it so important to you? The following ten thousand lines are the things which I think suck....
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Can't wait until Ubuntu starts altering grep and find to start using libcurl to report search terms to amazon. Maybe even return ads to a new IO stream: stdadvert.
Are you upset that Firefox sends searches to Google by default?
I fail to see the problem.
Same here. They've seen their Linux business go bust, since the platform never became a profitable one, so they've decided to transform themselves, while there's still time, into a current version of Beyond.com. Can't say I blame them.
But they insisted on going to GNOME 3 and won't allow MATE in the repos - just the same arrogant "get used to it" attitude as Ubuntu.
I just don't understand what Canonical has planned. They created the most user friendly distro going and things were great. Then they decided to make Ubuntu tablet-centric. Okay...but there are no tablets running Ubuntu out there. Maybe they'll get together with Gabe Newell to create a SteamBox. I just don't get the overall plan. Is it to become attractive to tablet makers as an alternative? That's about the only route left right now and it's not a bad idea. In the meantime the general community is left looking for something a little more hacker-friendly. Debian and Mint are the obvious options.
A web browser sending web searches to a web search engine is different than a desktop manager sending desktop searches to an online store.
It was me, I did it, I moved your cheese
A web browser sending web searches to a web search engine is different than a desktop manager sending desktop searches to an online store.
It's not different enough.... in modern OSes, the "Desktop" or "Start screen" is becoming just as much an online resource as a web site is; as everything is moving into the cloud, even the desktop.
It is not unreasonable or unexpected for a search initiated from the desktop to be able to expand the search to online resources as well.
You wish.
I would love if Ubuntu actually made good on it's empty promises. However, thus far I have been better off with Google if I want to find some way to "spend money on Ubuntu software". This includes thing that are supposed to be in their stupid store.
They do a very poor job of being an Apple wannabe.
If you are expecting them to "be like Apple", then you will be disppointed with Ubuntu on it's own terms. You won't need any rant from RMS.
So they are a big screw-up no matter what your perspective is.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
As long as you can turn it off (and on) which out too much work, I have no problem with this. In fact it might have some other benefits.
It may give a voice to certain sector of the population that is not usually well represented; I always forget to put change my user agent info back after I have to access some specific page. I think Linux users, on average, take care of their privacy a little better maybe just because they have an inkling of how and have the tools readily available. Does this mean they are under-represented in the marketplace? Are they invisible to the extrapolation algorithms that help decide how to set up pages, how much to stock of certain products, and what might be the next fad?
As a simple example: Does Amazon know that Linux compatibility is a defining feature when X% of the population looks for a video card? Those kind of compatibility questions are rarely addressed on the product page in a useful way; I always have to look it up elsewhere.
If Ubuntu does not identify me specifically but it sends a lot of queries, they are showing that a lot of people want Linux oriented stuff. I personally would be ok with that.
Might even help in nerd oriented materials like dice and sci-fi/fantasy stuff. At least that is what I mostly search for locally and online.
Ubuntu, just like their slogan says, is the linux for human beings. And by human beings read average Joe.
The easier and more intuitive they make the OS for the av. Joe the higher is going to be the probability for them to be widely adopted and to be supported by OEMs, thus also increasing third party software development interest by everything between FOSS and closed developers. The interest of hardware makers in making drivers available for Ubuntu will also increase. And higher will be the probability of having open hardware instead the crap Microsoft and Apple are trying to push down in our throats. Plus 95%+ of the benefits Ubuntu get can be transfered to any other Linux distro, so everybody wins.
While from the point of view of an advanced user Ubuntu may be going to the dark side, its "corruption" will benefit the linux community indirectly in many ways.
Hans Reiser could have used this defence as well: "OK, so I killed my wife. But then, that's only one woman. Jack the Ripper killed six women. Thus I killed less women than Jack the Ripper. So you see, I'm still a good guy!" :-)
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Amazon doesn't sell stuff in India like it does in the US. There isn't even an option for a user like me to buy anything. So what is the sense in saying "We make it convenient for the user to search and buy stuff right from the dash"? And are advertisements and shopping the only ways to make Ubuntu convenient for the user?
I could care less what you, RMS, or anyone else believes, ya self important jagoff. The fact is, I USE Unity, and I know better. Those who don't have first hand experience really don't need to be running their uninformed mouths. Period.
Ubuntu: If at first you don't succeed, blindly slap a sudo in front of it
About my decision to dump it.
reading comments like yours also show how shills deliberately misstate the problem with strawman arguments and then attack them with gusto.. you go girl!
I hate that too! - at first, I thought it was a bug, now I am sure its a mosquito!
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
-> Ubuntu
-> Shark
Sky subscribers are morons. They pay to be advertised at !
Hipsters took it over. I'm going to windows.
You say this based on what?
Out of all my colleagues using Linux, one uses Debian, one uses Fedora, and all the rest use Ubuntu.
What makes you think Ubuntu's install base has "taken a nose dive"? Distrowatch click rates? Those are just interesting numbers, with poor correlation with actual install base.