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Taking a Stand Against Unofficial Ubuntu Images (ubuntu.com)
Canonical isn't pleased with cloud providers who are publishing broken, insecure images of Ubuntu despite being notified several times. In a blogpost, Mark Shuttleworth, the founder of Ubuntu, and the Executive Chairman and VP, Product Strategy at Canonical, made the situation public for all to see. An excerpt from the blog post: We are currently in dispute with a European cloud provider which has breached its contract and is publishing insecure, broken images of Ubuntu despite many months of coaxing to do it properly. The home-grown images on the cloud, VPS and bare metal services of this provider disable fundamental security mechanisms and modify the system in ways that are unsupportable. They are likely to behave unpredictably on update in weirdly creative and mysterious ways (the internet is full of fun examples). We hear about these issues all the time, because users assume there is a problem with Ubuntu on that cloud; users expect that 'all things that claim to be Ubuntu are genuine', and they have a right to expect that. We have spent many months of back and forth in which we unsuccessfully tried to establish the same operational framework on this cloud that already exists on tens of clouds around the world. We have on multiple occasions been promised it will be rectified to no avail. We are now ready to take legal steps to remove these images. We will seek to avoid affecting existing running users, but we must act to prevent future users from being misled. We do not make this move lightly, but have come to the view that the value of Ubuntu to its users rests on these commitments to security, quality and updates.
Most likely it's more an issue of using the name Ubuntu.
-=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
It's the name that's the problem, not that they're distributing source code.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
The name and logo of the distro aren't GPL. Anyone is free to create their own Ubuntu derivative, but they can't call it Ubuntu without approval.
That does us no good. Give us a name!!
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
Not just OVH, any second rate hosting company does it. DreamHost does as well, 1and1. They're a pain in the neck to work with because any update breaks everything and you're stuck with old versions of Apache, nginx and PHP because of it. Sure it helps them because they can deduplicate the shit out of the memory and storage but it's broken.
If you're paying less than $20/mo for a VPS, you're shafted.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
The article is a bit vague. I believe the relevant snippet comes from this part:
This better explains WHAT is happening as the original article seems to leave the reader guess WHO, which isn't the point to begin with.
And there it is. I came here to see some idiot claiming the GPL has anything to do with this.
Despite its ability to be abused, this is a textbook case of Trademark law being used correctly. Someone is misrepresenting a product that is not Ubuntu as Ubuntu and selling it. The entity that trades under the "mark" Ubuntu can force them to stop, thus protecting the consumer from fraud.
Such is the life of those that mix companies and open source.
No, not really. Microsoft open sourced many of their components in the .Net framework, but if I take an old version, apply 1000+ custom patches that break everything, and then try to call it "Microsoft .Net", they would be pissed - and they'd have every right to be. They may give away the code, but that does not mean they're giving away their reputation, and if this company doesn't bother to even attempt to address complaints, then they need to find a new name for it. I personally think companies are draconian over the abstractedness of copyright and imagined profit losses, but even I think Canonical has a legitimate case here.
"Set a man a fire, he'll be warm for the rest of the night. Set a man afire, he'll be warm for the rest of his life."
A website I reported here a few months ago (that didn't make the front page) that has now been taken down. The URL was www.uhuntu.com , yes that's an "h" instead of a "b" in ubuntu. The website looked almost exactly like ubuntu.com, and even mirrored some of the download links, although I didn't check all of them.
It's not a copyright issue, it's a trademark issue. You're not allowed to break Ubuntu and still call it Ubuntu.
See also the Debian/Mozilla trademark silliness.
I have a VPS that costs me $12/month. It's a full KVM VPS. No hosting mods whatsoever. I control the kernel and all the packages on it.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
If you've heavily modified it, replaced key functional systems with custom-made versions, and looking to sell it in quantities? You bet your ass you should, otherwise Ford will string you up to dry for trademark infringement, and be right to do so.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
Uh, no, as a virtual machine reseller they are selling a broken copy of Ubuntu as a service. Canonical is within their rights to ask them to stop using their software's name (say, to OVH Linux) if they aren't going to fix the issue.
For a car analogy: If an independent Ford dealership started filling up their cars' gas tanks with sugar you better believe Ford will come in and put a stop to that real fast.
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
*Any* use of the name is likely to be a trademark infringement. That's why projects like CentOS, that repackage Red Hat, have their work cut out for them. To be fully in compliance, you have to remove *every* reference to the original name, *every* proprietary icon, etc.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
What if they removed all of the Ubuntu names on the exterior, the webpage, the file name, etc? Ubuntu still has their name all over the interior, no?
[Rent This Space]
Actually, this not how it works in the automotive world. Car registration is tied to VIN number and I can replace every single component in the car, save unibody (or frame+shell) and still call it Ford. I actually can turn this into business venture, called performance tuning or customization, and sell these modified cars as Fords to other people.
They can modify it all they want but it is no longer Ubuntu. It has a different kernel, different drivers, and handles virtualisation very differently.
If a user had scripts running on Ubuntu and then migrated over to the new service provider, those scripts would likely stop working. These companies are using the Ubuntu name because the experience will be similar, however, there will be confusion where the user expects the experience to be identical.
Better would be to call it "Based on Ubuntu" or "Ubuntu-esque" or "VPSbuntu".
[Rent This Space]
Branding is not silly. In fact, it is essential to getting a good product of the ground and into widespread use. Those neat Mozilla / Firefox Videoads are at least as important to Firefox acceptance as the newest Adblocker Plugin are. If they need to protect their brand and Debian sees no way of integrating a product called "Firefox" because the FF branding/trademark conflict with Debians rules, then they will have to ditch the brand, even though the product is the same. You could argue that Debian is being silly aswell, but in this case neither are - they just follow different core principles from wich both entities aren't willing to back down, both for very very valid reasons.
I'd say in todays sharing economy, branding is getting more and more important.
In conclusion:
Use a FOSS product, but dilute the brand that comes with it, and the key sponsor will come down on you like a pile of bricks. And for good reasons too. In this case Mark Shuttleworth and Ubuntu have acutally been quite generous. They should start sueing the companies in question and make some noise about why exactly they are doing it.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
I'm surprised to read that. Are you sure it is OVH ? I would expect many providers to suck at understanding such problems, but OVH tends to be on the very competent side, so if that is true, I would wait for OVH version of the problem before drawing a conclusion on who's wrong.
Said the packager of the most bug-ridden distro in open source history.
Online provides baremetal servers (though not very powerful) for 9€ per month (Dedibox SC).
It's not just VPSs. A project I cofounded used a dedicated server running Debian from dreamhost (chosen because it was cheap and came with unlimited bandwidth). In setting the server up we removed apache and installed nginx.
Doing so broke the boot process!
IIRC Dreamhost support managed to find a way to manually boot the box but couldn't help with actually fixing it and then we found a way to hack up their scripts so it would boot by itself again.
note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
The GPL cannot give me permission to use the Ubuntu trademark.
Canonical may be willing to enter an agreement to allow use of the Ubuntu trademark, but only under certain conditions. After all, my modifications may reflect poorly on their valuable name.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
I've got a 20 year old Ford car, should I rename it?
Not necessary, because it's the same physical car.
Redistributing OS images is more like manufacturing new cars. You can't build replicas of your car and offer them for sale as genuine"Fords".
You could probably sell them as modified Fords. As long as the customer understood what he was getting.
If a customer had a problem with a Ford that turned out to be a modified Ford and the modifications were the problem (or even if they weren't) then Ford would likely take action. They rightly don't want their valuable brand name tarnished by someone's modifications.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
The Microsoft of the FOSS world.
The evil Coca Cola company wants to stop me from adding drain opener to their product and then calling it "Coke".
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
According to TFA, they are distributing MODIFIED images. So it's not genuine Ubuntu.
It is the name.
Coca Cola would not like me to add drain opener to their product, call it "Coke" and distribute it.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
Just best to use them as a container and launch your own distro from official sources.
Website Just Down For Me? Find out
I'm paying less than $20 per quarter (actual rate is €15.12 IIRC) for Gentoo running on Xen. emerge -auND --with-bdeps=y --backtrack=100 @world works the same on it as it does on my desktop at home.
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
No, you'd be wrong about that. State vehicle registration law does not override federal trademark law. As soon as you are damaging the value of their mark, you're history.
Not exactly. Factual use of a trademark by a third party is not infringement. As long as what you are selling is an actual Ford product, you are free to call it a Ford without Ford's permission, and they cannot stop you. If your company customizes or modifies a product and resells it, you can call it what it is by using the original manufacturer's name and product name. You cannot imply that you are that original company though. See, for example, Lingenfelter's marketing of Chevrolet-compatible parts and customization of Chevrolet vehicles. Similarly, you can use a third party's trademark to factually identify what your product works with. For example, an independent company that makes iPhone cases can call them iPhone cases and identify which models they work with. They cannot label their own product an iPhone though, or imply that it is made by Apple.
I am a geek attorney, but not your geek attorney unless you've already retained me. This is not legal advice.
Not just OVH, any second rate hosting company does it. DreamHost does as well, 1and1. They're a pain in the neck to work with because any update breaks everything and you're stuck with old versions of Apache, nginx and PHP because of it. Sure it helps them because they can deduplicate the shit out of the memory and storage but it's broken.
If you're paying less than $20/mo for a VPS, you're shafted.
For that price range, you can just get a small AWS server and not have these problems (especially if you can pay for 3 years up front).
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
My $5/mo VPS gives me FreeBSD and a plethora of other options.
You're the one who's wrong.
If you modify a <MAKE> vehicle, even extensively, you absolutely can sell it as a modified <MAKE> because that's what it is.
I an buy a McDonald's Big Mac, take a shit in it, and sell it as a McDonald's Bic Mac, with Shit. At worst I'd need to declare that I'm not McDonald's and McDonald's owns "McDonald's" (even though they stole it from some dude) and "Big Mac".
All right, I'll bite. Where can I get FreeBSD for $5/mo? I used to use BSDVM, but they went under. The others I found were pretty much all grossly overpriced or unacceptably broken in some way.
https://www.digitalocean.com/p...
Have you ever seen lowered Honda Civic with oversized muffler, drop-in blidning HIDs, base-only stereo, and a painted plywood spoiler? As much as I would like to call that illegal, you still can and do see them being sold as Civics.
DigitalOcean's Linux/BSD images are just fine thanks.
Yep. We are in the process of moving all our servers to DO.
I think when somebody buys it, they understand that this has been modified. They don't think they're getting an unmodified Ubuntu.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
Why do you believe that would be?
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
How many other people are on those servers. I've tried plenty of instances but once you start using your actually assigned quota's (1 CPU and 512MB RAM) you will notice an intense slowdown. Or you're sitting on a server with some other people that are heavy users, same problem.
I've tried a bunch of them, for home/dev use, perhaps, but for real work, not suitable. And whenever you ask how many other customers they have, they either don't tell or it's astronomically high.
DigitalOcean: doesn't tell anything about their infrastructure and if you use too much resources they cut you off with a "TOS violation". From what I can measure, I estimate 50-100 hosts per 'real' server but don't use more than 20% of your CPU for a period of time because you'll be out.
DreamHost: the oversell must be close to 200 hosts per server. Continuously 100-200ms ping rates, their 'shared MySQL' would take 500ms to even complete a simple query. The host got cut off several times per month for various technical reasons.
1and1: Another over-seller, absolutely awful support, after a while they just tried to up-sell me packages that would have no impact on the performance - I'm not running out of storage dimwits.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
The first capture the flag hacking event hosted by my college's volunteer systems team (which supplemented the IT staff) had this problem. Every system had the same SSH keys, so it was easy to man-in-the-middle your opponents, gain their credentials, then log into their actual systems. One of the teams that discovered this (and won the contest) went on to host the next year's event. (This was not recent.)
Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
How broken they might be, but keep loyal to the spirit of open source. People have the right to use and modify your stuff. So let them do it and STFU.
I would not expect a lot of real CPU for $12/month. It works for me (small mail/web server, VPN endpoint, etc.).
If I were relying on a machine for work, it would probably be better to pay for a dedicated machine, or to install my own hardware in a datacenter.
The problems I have seen have been the time when they started shutting down the infrastructure and one class of VMs. I only found out because I noted that the RDNS wasn't working. They claimed that they had sent me an email telling me that I needed to migrate to a new VM, but they had not sent emails to me about this.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
okay, so this is about trademarks. canonical's trademark is being brought into disrepute by the irresponsible action of some cloud providers: it's perfectly reasonable for them to sort this out. now, here's where i have an issue with canonical: why do they think it's okay to have *canonical* not brought into disrepute, when they are themselves acting in a criminal capacity, bringing the *linux* trademark into disrepute by illegally distributing linux kernel source code after they lost their right to do so under the GPLv2, by including the (binary) incompatible ZFS kernel module?
Run away from DreamHost. They're cheap but you get what you pay for, though 1and1 is now price competitive with far higher performance from my benchmarks.
But DreamHost is actually shutting down and scrapping their East-1 cloud environment in January. Data will be lost permanently in less than a month. But that's okay because they told us months ago and are giving away the service for no charge before it gets torn down. But is it?
Okay, so move to next-gen East-2 with their "SSD" storage, but then find out storage is not any faster than their "magnetic" storage on East-1.
DreamHost has become very disappointing recently. I used 1and1 and DigitalOcean and get 10x the storage speed than I do with DreamHost at the very same cost.
Kriston
Oof, be prepared to not like the slow storage. It may be SSD, but it benchmarks marginally better than magnetic.
Maybe they should buy some 10g switches and set up a Fibre Channel fabric. Their competitors at $5/month have 10-20x faster storage speed.
Kriston
How hard is it to boot a minimal install iso on grub using ramdisk... I got my vps on ovh but i installed my ubuntu.