dapper-commercial (was Opera 9)

[Andrew Zajac]

On 7/9/06, Matt Zimmerman <mdz at ubuntu.com> wrote:
> On Sat, Jul 08, 2006 at 09:45:19AM +0100, Matthew East wrote:
> > We need to make users aware that they can add this, otherwise only those
> > using gnome-app-install will see it...
> >
> > It's not in any of these places:
> >  * the opera news item on the website
> >  * the Software Properties tool
> >  * commented in /etc/apt/sources.list
> >  * http://www.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/components
> >
> > Perhaps an announcement could be prepared for -announce with the
> > information about this new repository, or maybe it can be added to some
> > of the above?
>
> Sounds reasonable.


Matthew, you took the words out of my mouth.  I was quite dissapointed
to only get such breaking news from a third-party sofware vendor.  As
well, the documentation pages which outline the differences between
the Ubuntu repositories needs to be updated ASAP.  This cannot happen
without an official announcement.

Is there a reason why this was sprung upon the Ubuntu community like
that, without any discussion or announcement?



>
> > Incidentally, I'm a bit confused about dapper-commercial - it seems to
> > use the word "commercial" to distinguish it from multiverse, but users
> > don't have to pay to use the repository, as far as I can see. So what is
> > the meaningful difference between this new channel and multiverse?
>
> Software in this repository requires special permission to redistribute, so
> it is kept separate from the normal archive (which is mirrored globally).


A lot of users find this undermines the commitment Ubuntu has stated
it has for free-libre software.  The appearance of such a repository
does seem to indicate that Ubuntu is only glad to distribute
proprietary software.

Is Ubuntu still committed to being free-libre?


azz