Default Search Change

[Jono Bacon]

Hi Glorious CC and TB Members!

I wanted to drop you a note to inform you of two changes that are being planned for Lucid that could generate some discussion for your respective councils.

I wanted to give you a quick heads up to inform you of this before the announcement goes out tomorrow. I would appreciate if you could not share this information until tomorrow (26th Jan) when it is announced on ubuntu-devel.

Change #1

In Lucid, the default home page will respect the search provider settings that you have set in the "Chrome". (The "Chrome" is Mozilla's term for the little search box to the upper right, reachable by Cntl-K, for instance). For Lucid, this will definitely work for switching between Google and Yahoo!, it's not clear what other providers will be in scope for Lucid. If a user has Google set as their search provider, they will have exactly the experience they do today. If they switch to Yahoo!, the default home page will switch to using a Yahoo! search. If they switch back to Google, the default home page will switch back to using the Google search, exactly like today.

Change #2

Change #2 is changing the default search provider in Firefox to Yahoo! Note that this change won't in any way effect the ability of a user to choose and use the search provider of their choice. For new installs, Yahoo! will be set by default instead of Google. For users who prefer a search engine other than Yahoo! it will be a simple matter of switching to that search provider in the chrome.

Why?

We are pursuing this change because Canonical has negotiated a revenuesharing deal with Yahoo! and this revenue will help Canonical to providedevelopers and resources to continue the open development of Ubuntu andthe Ubuntu Platform. This change will help provide these resources aswell as continuing to respect our user's default search across Firefox.

If you have any questions or queries surrounding this move, don't hesitate in getting in touch with Rick Spencer<rick.spencer at canonical.com>   (head of the Ubuntu Desktop Team) or myself.

Thanks!

	Jono

-- 
Jono Bacon
Ubuntu Community Manager
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