this post was submitted on 18 Nov 2023
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I use Arch btw


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[–] [email protected] 114 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (11 children)

This is the "ad". Personally, I don't think a little plug like this is worth any kind of fuss. If it were a real ad or something, then yea I would get it.

[–] [email protected] 128 points 11 months ago (4 children)

An ad is an ad and this definitely is an ad. This is the kind of shit that made me quit Windows and it would make me quit Ubuntu if I was using it.

[–] [email protected] 67 points 11 months ago (2 children)

This. Any unsollicited communication that's meant to make you investigate or buy a commercial product is an advertisement. That's all. Is it less intrusive than the TikTok ad in Windows start menu, I think it may be, but it's still an advertisement, by definition.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 11 months ago

Is it less intrusive

For me it is, I would've never ever expected an ad on cli, on a local install, on my machine.

Logged into an ec2 and see an advert? Sure. But not on my own shit. It's a true "ah fuck I can't believe you've done this" factor.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Ubuntu Pro seems to be free for regular users (on up to five machines).

Would bother me a lot more if it wasn't a free service. Now it's ehh

[–] [email protected] 13 points 11 months ago (1 children)

As I mentioned in another comment, it's still a commercial offering, that happens to have a free tier. Would we be okay with a YouTube link in the same spot?

Honestly, it doesn't bother me that much. It's more that you can see a more and more corporate-y trend in Canonical's decision making, which I personally don't really care for. If I used Ubuntu with the default shell I'd probably just override the MOTD and go on with my life.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Would we be okay with a YouTube link in the same spot?

Like, promoting Youtube or just a link to a Youtube video promoting Ubuntu Pro or what do you mean?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (1 children)

A link promoting any other commercial product with a free tier. Like AWS, or YouTube.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 11 months ago

I wouldn't be really bothered if Google promoted Youtube in their product. I'd expect it, really.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 11 months ago

I think this is the best take. This alone if it went nowhere is fairly harmless.

But I think we know what it really is, is the start of a slippery slope.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Different strokes and all that. I'm personally ok with the way this is done, but I can also see why people wouldn't like it at all

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

I use Ubuntu and I haven’t seen ads in the terminal.

But I see everyone complaining about them.

What am I missing here?

[–] [email protected] 52 points 11 months ago (1 children)

While I'm not bothered by this in particular, like other people have said, it feels like the top of a very slippery slope that I would be bothered by

[–] [email protected] 14 points 11 months ago

That's pretty much how I feel about it. This specific method is alright by me, but it could very easily become something intrusive.

[–] sederx 32 points 11 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Technically, but it's coming from the same servers your packages are being downloaded from, right?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I don't think that's from a server but instead it's baked into apt. Or some post-install trigger.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago

Post-install trigger was my guess.. I used to have to build .rpm's unfortunately but no apt experience yet.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 11 months ago (1 children)

this plus the snap crap they've been doing was enough for me to switch to Debian

[–] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (2 children)

I went through the entire cycle.

  • Ubuntu
  • Pop_OS!
  • Mint
  • Manjaro
  • Arch
  • Fedora

And finally I’m at Debian.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago (1 children)

And he still hasn't arrived at Gentoo.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

He's still compiling

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

Did you just tell us that you did in fact use Arch?

[–] [email protected] 18 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

I've been getting ads like these for years on my ubuntu server.

n additional security updates can be applied with ESM Apps.
Learn more about enabling ESM Apps service at https://ubuntu.com/esm

This is on a machine running 20.04. Never bothered me. All my other machines are Debian now, and at some point I'll switch that one too.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, plus given you can get pro for free it really seems more like a announcement than an ad. Slippery slope though.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 11 months ago (1 children)

What's an ad if not a commercial announcement?

[–] [email protected] -1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I guess it doesn't seem as much of an ad if it's something free they're promoting. As it would be for most users.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 11 months ago (1 children)

It's a commercial offering with a free tier.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Yes and most users would be in the free tier

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

So it's still an ad to a product, or it's not?

[–] [email protected] -1 points 11 months ago

I guess it doesn't seem as much of an ad if it's something free they're promoting. As it would be for most users.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 11 months ago

Yeah, this isn't that bad. It's just a suggestion after running an apt upgrade. NPM has similar plugs which I don't find too annoying.

In fact its not even as intrusive as NPM's funding requests, as it is only 2 lines of text, plus it looks like Ubuntu Pro is free for personal use.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago

I see a lot of people comment that this isn’t that bad and that it might even be acceptable, and that’s exactly the problem here: it’s a gateway drug and if we normalise this, Canonical will keep pushing the limits of what they can pull off before it’s not acceptable anymore, and that sounds when it’s too late.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago

I agree that I wouldnt call that an ad, but it's a pretty distasteful plug

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

This is not what I would consider an ad. I also remember seeing it only once

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I mean.. It is literally an ad. I don't see how you could not consider it one. You could claim it doesn't bother you or isn't too intrusive or something, but it most certainly is an ad.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

I agree that it's not a very intrusive ad

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

I have never seen this ever