The Ubuntu issues

Kia ora koutou

Firstly, I want to apologise for the subject line. I can see now that
regardless of the merit (or lack thereof) of my arguments, that
subject line was a bit in-your-face. I also apologise if I've
misunderstood the purpose of this list. If it is intended to be an
open tech-support list for people who are new to GNU/Linux, not a
space for general discussion about the OS and free code software, then
my post may have been OTT. That said, I think choice of distro is
worth discussing, and not only in terms of technical criteria like
speed or stability. If was revealed (and independently confirmed) that
some distro was shipping the Linux kernel with a back door that gave
the censorship office access to a system and all its files, that would
be something the people on this list would want to know, right? Even
if it might result in loss of revenue for that distro, and maybe
threatened the tenure its long-suffering staff (who of course opposed
this decision, if they even know about it)?

I'm aware I'm sailing dangerously close to the wind by comparing major
unambiguous spying to a revenue-motivated package whose user impacts
have perhaps been underthought rather than actively ignored, and I'm
not suggested there's any kind of slippery slope involved, as that
would be a logical fallacy
((http://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/slippery-slope)). My goal with this
line of thinking is to establish whether any issue outside of the
purely technical on on-topic on this list.

Thomi:
>> I've tried really hard to write a rational, non-emotional email reply here. I hope I haven't offended you. If I wrote the email reply I feel like writing, I suspect this thread would go downhill very quickly. <<

No offence taken. I hope you won't be offended by the honest responses
I make below to some of the points you raised. While people's
emotional responses are their own responsibility (ie for the same
reason that "she made me angry, so I hit her" doesn't cut it), I am
genuinely sorry that some people are feeling upset or personally
attacked by the email I sent. That certainly was not my intention. I
don't set out to be an asshole, but I will not hesitate say what I
think is true, and important, just because someone thinks it isn't
"nice".

The fact that some people working for Mozilla may be on this list (or
OpenChat where the same issues are being discussed) would not stop me
criticizing Mozilla if I thought it was warranted, and the same
applies to Canonical. On the contrary, to the degree that the
companies leveraging free code have internal democracy, their
employees can use feedback coming through community fora to understand
how their user community sees what they do, and suggest changes of
policy where appropriate. If we can't influence the decisions of some
open source institutions through public debate and criticism, the only
power we have left is voting with our feet, and we have a right
(arguably a duty) to speak freely about our reasons for doing so.

In response to some more specific points:
Thomi:
>> RMS effectively threw his toys out the window over an unreleased, still-in-development feature. <<

Nice ad hominem from someone who just finished lecturing me about
picking my language. Also, your demand for only postive feedback is
ironic considering the company you work for originally released Ubuntu
12.10 with the slogan "Avoid The Pain of Windows 8" (fair, yes, but
positive?).
http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/opensource/ubuntu-1210-can-help-you-avoid-the-pain-of-windows-8-regardless-of-the-retraction/3945

Anyway, the article by Stallman which I linked ("Ubuntu Spyware: What
to do? ") is dated Dec 7 2012, well after 12.10 was released. Also,
you seem to be trying to imply that Stallman was on his own in
criticizing the Amazon lens package, which is not the case. A number
of users followed your advice and filed bugs against this packages,
for example:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unity-lens-shopping/+bug/1054776
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unity-lens-shopping/+bug/1055952

Also, the EFF posted their critique on Oct 29, which included this
fascinating quote from Mark Shuttleworth:
>> Don’t trust us? Erm, we have root <<
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/10/privacy-ubuntu-1210-amazon-ads-and-data-leaks

EH!?! Is he saying he has root access to my machine if it is running
Ubuntu? If not, what is he saying?

Thomi again:
>> The general rule of thumb here is that if you run a pre-release operating system, you're going to get packages that are under active development. If you can't handle that, don't upgrade. <<

http://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/tu-quoque
You are changing the subject. Stallman wasn't criticising the feature
for being unstable, or not working properly. He was criticizing it's
entire purpose and rationale.

Thomi:
>> I assume by "Microsoftish" you're referring to the desire to make money from our software. If so, then yes, yes it is. <<

http://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/strawman
It's pretty obvious that I'm not criticizing Canonical or the Ubuntu
Foundation for having revenue models. I'm criticizing some of those
revenue models for the same reason I criticize Microsoft revenue
models, because I believe that they violate user rights and freedoms
(to be fair, I probably should have said FaceBookish, but really
that's neither here nor there).

To those who argue that x, y, or z are acceptable because they allow
someone to make money, this is no defence,  stop trying to pretends it
is. We don't accept it as an defence when Microsoft, Apple, the RIAA,
or the MPAA attack user freedom. As for those accusing me of
potentially undermining the income stream of Canonical employees:
http://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/appeal-to-emotion

Thomi again:
>> (I'm not involved with Ubuntu One in any way, so I really cannot speculate as to the reasons the code isn't open - are you even sure that's the case? Did you look? Or are you just reporting what you read on the 'net?). <<

Well, I did ask Tim Penhey about it during drinks after the PyCon, and
he agreed it was the case, and defended it. So yes, I am sure, and as
for the smear that I am uninformed because (like most of us) I use the
net for much of my news and information:
http://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/ad-hominem

Thomi:
>> Buy me a beer sometime and I'll tell you about it. <<

Since you're making a good living out of free software, and I do my
work as an activist for free software, CreativeCommons, permaculture
and various other causes without pay, to ensure my independence from
particular vendors (actually I've had no income since October 2011),
how about you buy me a beer and tell me about it? ;)

Thomi (to Chris, but I think he though he was talking to me):
>> You wouldn't talk about someone's creation to their faces in this manner, so don't do it online. <<

That's an assumption on your part, and it's not true. As I mentioned
above, I hit up Tim about my criticisms of UbuntuOne at the pub. He
defended it. No offence taken on either side (as far as I know). The
other assumption you seem to be making is that I was trying to be
offensive ("trolling"). I'm offended that you so underestimate my
capacity to troll. If I was trying to be offensive I would have said
something like:
"Ubuntu is the product of an unholy orgy of snot-muchers and
fart-benders, with nothing better to do with their time than molest
innocent Linux users and torture small animals. Not only should no
decent human being even wipe their ass with a burned copy of Ubuntu,
every person involved in its production and distribution should be
stuffed into something Canonical, and fired into the sun. On that day,
Linux will truly be free from anal-probing overlords"

See the difference :)

>> File a bug, or do some translations, or do ISO testing, or write a juju charm, or write some documentation, or fix some bugs, or join the local Loco team, or host an installfest, or talk at your local high school... many of you do these things already - and I'd like to take this opportunity to thank you for your effort. <<

You're welcome. It's precisely because I've put a lot of effort into
doing a number of these things over the last few years, that I feel I
have earned a right to publicly criticize the distro and the
decision-makers behind it. I feel really frustrated when I get told I
should just shut up and put more unpaid time into a project which
tells me to quietly go away, when I have dissenting views.

Robin wrote:
>> [my criticism of UbuntuOne] doesn't even make sense. There's nothing proprietary on your system
to do with it so far as I know. The server side may (I'm not sure) be closed, <<

It's worrying that you defend this proprietary software without even
checking basic facts like whether it is (I did, as mentioned above).
While it's technically true that the UbuntuOne client for GNU/Linux is
free code (not sure about Windows or Mac clients), the client is no
use without the server. In practical terms both client and server are
part of a unified system, which is bundled into the distro because the
client is (quite prominently). Using Ubuntu as part of the name
implies that the entire system is free code; in the words of the
Ubuntu Promise:
“Ubuntu applications are all free and open source – so you can share
them with anyone you like, as often as you like.”

If the product was called CanonicalOne (or anything without Ubuntu in
it), and if it warns me that the server-side is proprietary when I
started setting it up, I would have no problem with that, because I
would be able to give informed consent to having my data handled using
proprietary software. I don't object to Canonical earning revenue, or
even leveraging Ubuntu to do it. I object to the misleading way they
went about it in this case. If they were to apologise for the
confusion, and either:
* change the name and introduce a warning
OR
*release the code
I would be happy to encourage people to use the service instead of
DropBox. In the latter case, it would become a reason to recommend
Ubuntu, rather than one of the reasons to choose another distro.

Robin:
>> but while I prefer server code to be open, it's less important to me because I know that if I wanted my own, I could read the code and implement one anyway. It's not like the API is hidden. <<

This is fine, as long as the OS is only intended to be used by
experienced sysadmins, confident with both client and server-side
coding. Does this describe the target audience of Ubuntu? What
fraction of the new users that Ubuntu have brought into using
GNU/Linux would be able to do what you describe, let alone the
millions we want to see abandon Windows and come over to the free side
in the future?

Robin:
>> it's probable that it's not suitable for release as it's tied closely to their environment. <<

You mean it depends on a stack in which other elements are are also
proprietary? If so, this is an argument for releasing all that code,
not a defence of keeping it proprietary. If not, do you mean it
depends on a server-side stack which is unique to them? This might
stop people running their own copy in production, but it doesn't stop
them code auditing, or customizing it for other uses, any of which
might be beneficial to the original developers. Or did you mean
something else?

Robin:
>> Of course, the solution would be to help Joey Hess in getting git annex up and running and nice and smooth, as that looks really awesome. <<

GIT-annex looks great, but it says on the front page:
>> git-annex is designed for git users who love the command line. <<

Again, it's clearly not aimed at the target market of Ubuntu. Average
people are storing more and more of their everyday information on
their computers. Everything from financial records to family photos
and videos. As the people of Ōtautahi (ChCh) found out, it's important
to not only have offsite backups, but out-of-region backups. Remote
storage services which sync with local drives are the only practical
way for the home user to do that, and they need to be graphical, and
user-friendly. I don't think users should have to be subject to the
whims of proprietary code on other people's servers in order to have
that need fulfilled.

Robin:
>> It's not Amazon spyware. That's a total misrepresentation.

It's called the Amazon shopping lens. According to the EFF, it sends
your search queries to Amazon, and any other third party Canonical
decides to include in the scheme; EFF quote from the Dash legal
notice:

>> Unless you have opted out, we will also send your keystrokes as a search term to productsearch.ubuntu.com and selected third parties so that we may complement your search results with online search results from such third parties <<

What part am I misrepresenting?

Robin:
>> It's like saying that google is spyware because you're telling it what you want to know about (and it gives you results.) <<

What third parties does Google send your search queries to?

Robin:
>> Many browsers also send things to google as you're typing, just fyi. <<

Really, which ones?

>> Also, if you look in the "privacy" section of the settings, you can turn off all network related search
functions. Cos it also searches youtube and stuff for you too... I
removed it which is easy to do,
unlike spyware.<<

This is another standard defence of this package, and it's doesn't
stack up. Any piece of spyware can be disabled or removed. How hard
that is depends on how deeply embedded it is in the OS (easy if its
part of a third party package which can just be uninstalled, very hard
if its copied itself over a core system file, but still possible), and
how technically-literate the person trying to remove it. If it is
designed to deliver ads to users without asking them to opt-in, or
deliver their information (even search queries) to advertizers for any
reason, it's still spyware, regardless of how easy it is to remove.

One of the reasons I moved to GNU/Linux is to avoid the constant
hassle of protecting against or removing viruses and spyware from
Windows. If those releasing Ubuntu consider it acceptable to include
spyware in their OS, I will move again. As I did with the Windows to
GNU/Linux move, I will tell people about my move, and why I made it,
for their information. If they choose to stay with a vendor which
cannot prevent or knowingly includes spyware, that's their lookout,
but I do not feel it would be ethical for me to keep this information
to myself.

Robin:
>> Shame on you for attempting to chop down the fastest advancing member of the Linux
community. You're trying to ruin it for the rest of us. <<

http://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/appeal-to-emotion

Gene:
>> Something more accurate would be: Steve takes a nice photo of a sunset, and makes it available online for free... <<

http://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/strawman

Nathan:
>> Not sure of the technical accuracy of the details of above email but having an os that students and myself can easily install, connect and use is most gratifying. Thanks to Canonical for developing such a user friendly OS. <<

Fair enough, and that's one of the things I loved about Ubuntu for
many years, and one of the reasons why I'm sad to be changing distros.
However, to be fair, what Canonical did well - like Red Hat, IBM,
Novel and others before them - was build a revenue stream around a
community-created system (Debian GNU/Linux), and use some of that
revenue to improve that system. The system will continue with or
without any of these commercial vendors, and if Ubuntu aren't able to
address these user freedom issues to the satisfaction of free software
advocates, new companies will rise to take their place. Mint moving
towards being directly Debian-based may be a sign of the times. We'll
see.

People can get as grumpy with me as they like for pointing all this
out, but I'm just the messenger.

Stewart:
>> This is a stark departure from a post made a few days after I had suggested that very same distro which I include below. <<

Steward, what I wrote was:
>> Just a note to all those who were recommending Debian as an light-weight OS for GNU/Linux beginners. <<

I'm not a beginner, and Debian Squeeze is not particularly
light-weight. I stand by my comments.

I am trialling Debian because I know its pedigree, I like the fact
that its development is community controlled, not dictated by its
financers, and a lot of people whose opinion of GNU/Linux I respect
sing its praises. Squeeze is not particularly reliable on my laptop,
and I will try running Testing, or perhaps the Mint Debian Edition
Matt recommends.

A final point, aimed at everyone who seem less concerned with whether
my criticisms are accurate or not, than with the possible effect of
speaking openly about them. Some of the responses here imply that I
owe some loyalty to Ubuntu/Canonical, on the basis of their history of
service. Back in the mid-80s, the labour movement were told by the
management of the major unions that they owed loyalty to the Labour
Party for similar reasons. Falling into a 'black-or-white' fallacy,
the union bosses were afraid that challenging Labour on the policies
they were pursuing under Rogernomics could only result in Labour
losing the 1987 election to a National government. The labour
movements inaction allowed the NZ state to taken over and big chunks
of common infrastructure asset-stripped by corporate raiders, meaning
that today private corporations (eg Telecom) extracts massive profits
from us, on the basis of infrastructure that our grandparents' and
parents' taxes paid for (many of them natural monopolies which should
be publicly run). Worse for the unions, the loss of confidence in the
power of democratic participation allowed the incoming National
government to pass the Employment Contracts Act, a visciously
anti-worker law which decimated the unions, and from which they never
fully recovered.

How's this relevant to software freedom and open source development?
We only owe loyalty to any organisation for as long as its action
support and benefit these causes, and even that loyalty does not
immunize them from critical feedback. There are good reasons for the
fact there is no monolithic "LinuxCorp" organisation controlling the
development of free code, and the diversity of organisational styles,
sizes, and approaches that do exist increase our resilience in the
face of determined attacks by organisations like Microsoft, Apple, and
Adobe, who benefit from proprietary software and back-room development
being the norm. If we allow entrenched institutions, rather than
ethics and principles, to determine our strategy and tactics, those
institutions can be entered by our opponents and turned against us.

Yours in freedom
Strypey

-- 
Danyl Strype
Community Developer
Disintermedia.net.nz/strype

"Geeks are those who partake in our culture."
- .ISOcrates

"Uncomfortable alliances are not just necessary; they reflect and
speak to the tremendous possibility of our political moment."
- Harmony Goldberg and Joshua Kahn Russell
http://www.nationofchange.org/new-radical-alliances-new-era-1337004193

"Both Marxists and Chicago-school libertarian economists can agree
that free software is the best model."
- Keith C Curtis
http://keithcu.com/wordpress/?page_id=407

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