Ubuntu starts selling proprietary software
September 19, 2008
What was once (and still is) one of the best Linux distros, Ubuntu, has now starting to swirl down to the bottom of the distro ladder.
The majority of Linux users install the illegal software, mplayer (or equivalents), so they can play DVD’s and other non-free video codecs.
Canonical decided to sort out this problem by breaking their own philosophy, “Every computer user should have the freedom to download, run, copy, distribute, study, share, change and improve their software for any purpose, without paying licensing fees.”
Those non-free codecs have a royalty, so Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu, have started charging money for legal versions of these codecs.
How are they going to help spread “free” software if they start charging $40 to play a DVD? Sounds like their fibbing about “free software” doesn’t it?
Honestly, I cannot see this one working out, however we shouldn’t point the finger at them too much, they are just trying to cover the legal aspects. Those codecs are not open source and are protected by patents and copyrights. So if you want to play DVD’s in ANY operating system, you need to pay a royalty.
Most of the time, our OEM’s like dell, give this software to us free of charge, as they buy it in massive bulk orders, which makes them very cheap and they are able to give it free with purchases.
But my main worry is that Canonical are going to start selling some more software, maybe they will get weaker towards there free software philosophy and start selling abundants of software? maybe even a pay-to-download software repository?
Who knows? But was this really a good move?
I don’t think anyone likes paying royalties. However one must be realistic about this: if desktop Linux is going to seriously challenge Windows (or Mac OS X) it needs to work right out of the box. As long as paying for these codes is an option and not mandatory - I don’t have a problem with it.
Also remember that: “Free software is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of free as in free speech, not as in free beer.” Selling open source on dvd isn’t really an free software issue.
PS: If you might want to take a look at Gnubuntu.
http://www.ubuntux.org/gnubuntu-a-completely-free-ubuntu
So you think they should pay $40 for every disc they give away? Even if they buy it in quantity, there is no sustainable business model when you lose more money the more successful you are. Sounds like a great way to go out of business. I don’t like using unlicensed software and they provide a service to make it easy to be legal.
I know what you are saying though - RedHat did the same thing to us and then repented and started the fedora series. I don’t expect that they will go that far though.
I’m a debian person myself, so it doesn’t much matter to me.
If I were to ever make the jump to linux I would not be prepared to pay for it. I think of Windows as free as my machines come pre-built from the store I get them from. Paying to swap operating system would just not appeal to me.