Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed • Hacker News Board

Re: Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed

#141

Post by Jare » Sat, Sep 22, 2012, 9:40 PM UTC

andreasvc wrote: post #122

dfc wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You said: "In general it's not good to use that command because it can leave your system in an inconsistent state -- when there are packages which depend on the package you just removed." I demonstrated that dpkg will not remove packages with dependencies. Furthermore some packages are so crucial (ie: essential) that dpkg does not even bother checking dependencies before erroring out. How does that not change your po…

The reason I gave was incorrect (I was confused with what happens when you install a .deb file without installing its dependencies), but the point of apt-get being better than dpkg for this still stands.

Stands on what exactly?

Re: Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed

#142

Post by tomrod » Sat, Sep 22, 2012, 9:45 PM UTC

scythe wrote: post #129

tomrod wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meh, Lubuntu or just go Openbox.

When I used LXDE, it had a long way to go before it could be considered equivalent to Xfce, and I ended up switching back. The ultra-lightweight window managers may be in fashion, but Xfce is mature and polished and easy enough for my mother to use, and I can't say that about Lubuntu. The typical Ubuntu user probably won't miss much on Xubuntu. When they find that mrxvt doesn't let them use Ctrl-C/V to copy and paste…

Wu Wei?

Re: Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed

#143

Post by tomrod » Sat, Sep 22, 2012, 9:47 PM UTC

jackowayed wrote: post #135

Inufu wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better partner with Lenovo, Linux runs really almost perfectly on Thinkpads.

It's still not perfect. I had a ThinkPad T520 this summer for work with 11.04. This is one of the highest quality ThinkPads. To make Unity and the DisplayPort port (as opposed to just VGA) work, I had to go into the BIOS and change a graphics setting to make it not automatically switch between the integrated and better graphics card. This made unity work, but it also made something terrible happen when I actually plu…

Xrandr? Check out my post on messing around with this in openbox (if it helps): https://sites.google.com/site/thomasroderick/blog/9102012--x...

Re: Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed

#144

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Sep 22, 2012, 9:47 PM UTC

jackowayed wrote: post #135

Inufu wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better partner with Lenovo, Linux runs really almost perfectly on Thinkpads.

It's still not perfect. I had a ThinkPad T520 this summer for work with 11.04. This is one of the highest quality ThinkPads. To make Unity and the DisplayPort port (as opposed to just VGA) work, I had to go into the BIOS and change a graphics setting to make it not automatically switch between the integrated and better graphics card. This made unity work, but it also made something terrible happen when I actually plu…

[deleted]

Re: Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed

#145

Post by nilved » Sat, Sep 22, 2012, 9:53 PM UTC

bkerensa wrote: post #118

nilved wrote: post #94

I wonder how easy it is to convert to Linux Mint.

Linux Mint doesnt offer Kernel Security Updates... good luck with that.

Linux Mint (as far as I'm aware) doesn't directly attack your security with a default package.

Re: Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed

#146

Post by nilved » Sat, Sep 22, 2012, 9:59 PM UTC

hyperbovine wrote: post #66

How dare they attempt make money in return for the tens of thousands of hours I have spent using their free product.

I don't think people are as concerned with the advertising itself as they are the privacy implications.

Re: Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed

#147

Post by fromhet » Sat, Sep 22, 2012, 10:05 PM UTC

kintamanimatt wrote: post #52

Why don't they just ask for money from users? Have two versions: an ad supported one which people can easily remove the ads, and a paid version that doesn't come with the ad package by default, and maybe a few extra "premium" perks like wallpapers, themes, whatever that aren't in the FOSS repos together with extra backup space. They could charge on a par with OS X, say a total of $29 for the next two versions.

That would make it very non-free software. And that is what ubuntu is trying to not be.

Re: Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed

#148

Post by mattdeboard » Sat, Sep 22, 2012, 10:08 PM UTC

mceachen wrote: post #41

avolcano wrote: post #11

Honestly, if Ubuntu dropped their ridiculous, underdeveloped, undersupported Ubuntu One services and partnered with Amazon to integrate theirs (Cloud Player/Cloud Drive/etc), that would be a MAJOR improvement for both them and the end-user. Excellent cross-platform cloud services and marketplaces integrated with the OS would be great for bringing less-technical users to the platform in the wake of the proposed "Windo…

But converting Ubuntu One to using Amazon services wouldn't be an affiliate deal, presumably, right? That would be a high-level, "we'll shut down a competitor to EC2/S3/… if you pay us X MM/year" sort of thing. It would also endanger their just-released-10-days-ago music store, if Amazon (their new X MM/year revenue stream), comes to them and asks forcefully. An affiliate deal seems to make a much lighter impact to U…

Ubuntu One is not a competitor to EC2/S3... is that what you meant or am I misunderstanding?

Re: Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed

#149

Post by fromhet » Sat, Sep 22, 2012, 10:09 PM UTC

rogerbinns wrote: post #64

What Canonical/Ubuntu should do is some text like this: "When you use Ubuntu we receive affiliate revenue based on your usage. How would you would like the money distributed?" Then have some sliders like the Humble Bundle to proportion it to the program authors, GNU/fdo etc, EFF and Canonical. Everybody wins that way - folks who don't like Canonical can set their share to zero percent. And just by using the system yo…

Why would Canonical do that? This is one of the streams that help pay designers and developers. When I bought my phone I did not complain about not giving the money to EFF or GNU. When I bought my car I did not wish for a slider about donating some to Audi OR Costco OR give it to the gov. It's just, well, not something a bussiness would do.

Re: Ubuntu Will Now Have Amazon Ads Pre-Installed

#150

Post by fromhet » Sat, Sep 22, 2012, 10:11 PM UTC

astine wrote: post #140

rbanffy wrote: post #137

Am I the only one here who thinks this is not disturbing at all? If you don't like it, it's not very difficult to turn off. If you find it too difficult to turn off, maybe Ubuntu is not the right operating system for you.

If this becomes an important money maker for Canonical, you just know that they will find a way to make it hard to turn off. This seems like the first step where they are willfully making the user experience worse rather than better, to fulfill a shortterm end. If this is the only way for Canonical to break even on Ubuntu, that says a lot about the future of desktop Linux in general.

Being profitable is not a 'shortterm end'.