No subject

someone (presumably officially related to the distro):

"We have what we call "express URL's" on our server, and one of these
got changed improperly, so some of you may have seen this. We fixed
it. It should go to freespire.org now.

As for gaming DistroWatch, that wouldn't have worked because all the
links would have been coming from the same referring source,
Linspire.com. We have THOUSANDS of hits on that express URL every
HOUR. IF that had in fact been the case, we'd have shot WAY WAY WAY
WAY up in the charts. We actually fell yesterday, with an average of
about 900 clicks. I'm sure DistroWatch has been gamed plenty over the
years and long since would have weeded out any clicks from the same
referring source, expecially when that source is the company behind
the distro.

And, an insightful comment by a plain-jane user:

"Even distrowatch recognizes the rankings for what it is...an idle
curiosity at best. [snip]

So, one cannot display information shown on a resource site to
preserve the integrity of an unscientific poll that
proves...well...nothing. The site is far more valuable than the
rankings. And it turns out we would have upped the ranking by 1 vote
per day. The fiends!!!!   "

It seems like your proof of prior unethical behaviour is questionable,
at best. _One_ vote per day seems like evidence of a big massive
subversive tendency?

> >> Canonical is, no doubt, aware of this. They're the ones who can decide
> >> what the effect of the campaign has been and they're the ones that will
> >> sort it out, if they deem it necessary.
> >
> > I'd be surprised if Canonical is shaking in their boots.
>
> Personally, I would be also. That was the point of the 'if they deem it
> necessary'. If they were worried, I'm sure we would have heard something.

I don't think there's anything to get uppity about there. Ubuntu is
what it is because of restrictions in its licencing and its mandate.
These restrictions can and do result in limitations which cannot be
addressed by Ubuntu. In step other players like Linspire. They provide
commercial/proprietary solutions alongside full OSS solutions. Ubuntu
CANNOT provide proprietary codecs for a variety of multimedia formats
because of patent and licencing issues. For many people (not me) these
are things that Ubuntu IS missing!!!

And, for the health of OSS as a whole its _bad_ not to inform people
that there are such limitations.

Linspire is using it for their personal gain. This is perfectly fine
(and, I'm anything but a rabid ultra/unregulated free-market
capitalist).

What it also does is ensures that people know what they're getting
into, that there ARE very REAL limitations to 'open source'. For a lot
of people being able to play RealPlayer, QuickTime, MP3s, etc. is very
important and Ubuntu cannot legally and within the limitations of its
own licence offer this OOTB (out of the box). Likewise, no open source
software can legally play encrypted DVDs (unless they've got a
benefactor). At the risk of sounding like a broken record, these are
very real limitations!

It seems to me this whole thread was a tempest in a teapot.