> [We] recommend Ubuntu for OSINT virtual machines [...]
> We feel that Ubuntu is being aggressively misleading with the rollout of Ubuntu Pro, and we do not recommend any OSINT users attach this service to their investigative VMs.
Or, you know, you could stop recommending Ubuntu as the preferred distro of choice. This is clearly user-hostile and there are numerous good alternatives available.
I think it’s really smart for projects like Linux Mint to keep actively maintained distros off of Ubuntu or Gnome or whatever. Give the user the option, but have a fallback.
I’m not optimistic canonical is going to just turn back from this path of Snaps and DRM.
>Linux Mint to keep actively maintained distros off of Ubuntu or Gnome
you mean Linux Mint Debian Edition, yes it is exactly the reason they keep it going; who knows what Canonical might do tomorrow. Ubuntu is no longer "Linux for Human Beings"
I’m biased because my first experience with Ubuntu was so bad that ut put me off of Linux for literally a decade.
Now, I get the impression that Ubutnu is far more important for backend than frontend. So, yea, “for humans” not so much. That is what I think Pop and Mint are doing well with.
The positive part of snaps, and I don't like snaps for myself, is that snaps keep updating on an unmaintained server. So as a default for VPS providers seeking to hand hold users Ubuntu perhaps makes sense.
At least that's what I understand.
However on a server I use Debian (stable) as I purposefully don't want to be at the 'cutting edge'. [I also use Debian on my laptop because it just works.]
1) I haven’t used it on desktop in some time, but not that far back they had Amazon ads in Gnome. Plus motd ads for Ubuntu stuff (like Pro, in fact). And now ads in apt output.
2) Spying is opt-in, to their credit, and only at install, so you just have to make sure you aren’t auto-piloting your way through the installation and enable it by accident, but that’s still another thing to worry about that may not exist in other distros. Not much of an issue in automated-deployment situations.
> We feel that Ubuntu is being aggressively misleading with the rollout of Ubuntu Pro, and we do not recommend any OSINT users attach this service to their investigative VMs.
Or, you know, you could stop recommending Ubuntu as the preferred distro of choice. This is clearly user-hostile and there are numerous good alternatives available.