+ - RMS Speaks Out Against Ubuntu-> 2
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An anonymous reader writes "In a post at the Free Software Foundation website, Richard Stallman has spoken out against Ubuntu because of Canonical's decision to integrate Amazon search results in the distribution's Dash search. He says, 'But not always. Ubuntu, a widely used and influential GNU/Linux distribution, has installed surveillance code. 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.) This is just like the first surveillance practice I learned about in Windows. ... What's at stake is whether our community can effectively use the argument based on proprietary spyware. If we can only say, "free software won't spy on you, unless it's Ubuntu," that's much less powerful than saying, "free software won't spy on you." It behooves us to give Canonical whatever rebuff is needed to make it stop this. ... If you ever recommend or redistribute GNU/Linux, please remove Ubuntu from the distros you recommend or redistribute.'"
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Yeah, that's what free means (Score:1)
As long as it's properly documented (Score:2)
Including commercial software into what essentially is free software is of course questionable.
Making a distribution like Ubuntu is not a no-cost enterprise and I very much understand the temptation to make some money by ways like this.
Besides, for a KDE user like me that Ubuntu 'Dash' never installs :)