This post is more than three years old so may contain incorrect information, or opinions I no longer hold.

Why I'll Leave Ubuntu Linux

04 Mar 2013 | ~4 minute read

For the last two and a half years I have been an avid user of all things Ubuntu. But recently I’ve not been able to “settle” with Ubuntu, this is because of a number of reasons which I thought I would elaborate on below…

Where are they headed?

Recent decisions from Canonical (the makers of Ubuntu) have lead me to question where their priorities lie. For example, the inclusion of the Amazon Shopping lens and now the “creation” of their new Ubuntu Touch OS for mobiles and tablets. I say “creation” because it has since come to light that this new OS is nothing more than Cyanogenmod with a custom front end.

I’ve already made my feelings on the Amazon Lens clear on RefuGeeks, however the “laziness” of the developers to simply create what is basically an overlay for Android and attempt to pass it off as their own work – as at no point do Ubuntu give credit to the Cyanogenmod team during any of their announcements. This leads me to believe that Ubuntu are starting to get make their priorities making money over the users needs or wants.

A quick buck?

I’ve already touched on this above. Adding the Amazon lens instead of a more useful lens like a Google (or even Bing!) lens doesn’t make sense to me; unless of course the justification for such a decision is profit over user requirements. Canonical said they wanted to make Unity a place where a user can search for “anything anywhere” this simply isn’t possible with an Amazon lens. So why add it?

This is my opinion only – this may be wrong and nothing may have changed internally for Ubuntu. Nevertheless, this is my blog and I am entitled to express my opinion (as are you in the comments section). :)

Ubuntu doesn’t work for me anymore…

I’ve always said that I am an open source advocate/enthusiast. I am not a fan boy. This means that I love the ethos of FOSS (Free Open Source Software) and I’ve always used Ubuntu as it’s what worked best for me. If that stops being the case then I will move away from Ubuntu. It used to be PinguyOS, but Gnome 3 doesn’t work for me either so I’ve moved away from that long ago.

I use Android because it’s the best for me also, I think this is very important to bear this in mind. I will always put my needs first , if Apple released some amazing update that made the iPhone work better for me, or OSX for that matter. Then I would immediately change over, I bear no affiliation to any manufacturer, I will always use what’s best for me. As everyone should IMHO (that’s why fan boys annoy me so much).

Anyway I digress…Unfortunately Ubuntu no longer fits in with my way or working either. I spend a lot of time online so moving to the cloud seems like the next natural progression for me. So to that end I have decided to move away from Ubuntu and use a Chromebook instead.

This will still allow me to push my FOSS advocacy and it will also allow me to better utilise an ecosystem that I am already heavily involved in – Google. I used Google Apps, Google Calendar, Google Search, YouTube, Android on all my mobile devices, Google Analytics for my sites and many other Google offerings.

The only reason I haven’t moved to Google Drive is because there is no native client for Linux. Using a Chromebook will solve all of my problems. My device will be fast, internet-centric and incorporate extremely well with all of my other devices & services. I will still of course continue to play around with Ubuntu and many other Linux distro’s as I still have a “normal” PC that I can play with and I do love Linux – it just doesn’t work the best for me.

It’s a real shame that Ubuntu are making these kind of decisions, don’t get me wrong, this isn’t an Ubuntu bashing post. I can see why they have done it – they want to become more commercial and available to the masses. This unfortunately means that they have to make some decisions that many community users will not necessarily like. That’s fine, I have to put my needs first, and to a certain degree Ubuntu needs to put their needs first. But I have made a choice to move away from Ubuntu and have taken the opportunity to move completely to the cloud. And Ubuntu could have made different decisions that gave them more respect in my eyes – I think utilising a similar setup to Red Hat would have been more beneficial and given them more respect from the open source community.

I wonder how many others will be doing the same or similar thing as me….thoughts?

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