You are completely correct.
You could not opt out and it was not disclosed.
While I often speak well of Zorin as a whole, I am certainly not above being critical. And this was one of those things.
While the census does not gather any personal data, this one fell on the Principle of the action, more than the result.
The reason I do not categorize this as being similar to the actions of Canonical:
Zorin OS was using the census to simply know how many people were using Zorin OS (Popularity contest app - it is useful for metrics.) They were not sending that data to others.
Canonical was sharing user information with Amazon. It was for marketing and profit.
The incident with Zorin Census was One Incident. A person can understand its reason, even if it defied the principle. ZorinGroup has never repeated that.
Canonical has repeated it - again and again. With Snaps, the Store, Amazon and proprietary software usage.
I do not trust Canonical. They broke trust several times.
This would be disclosed in their Terms or Service.
But this is kind of what I am talking about. I understand the motivations and agenda of Canonical and its employees. I know you are against data collection like that but it is a necessary evil.
But the more important point I am making is I KNOW that Ubuntu is not going to take any ridiculous information and I KNOW it is not going to have any malware.
Not to throw Deepin totally under the bus but that is the kind of thing that can happen when we do not understand the agenda and motivations of a distro we are using. (Not even the distro as a whole but every individual contributor at that)
Do you understand what I am trying to say? I trust a bit of necessary evil compared to the evil that I do not know the agenda of.
I do and I see your points. You define a difference between nominal collection for the sake of monetary gain. A "necessary Evil."
You also know that Ubuntu will never include malicious content. However... This is a matter of definitions. The Amazon inclusion was considered Spyware. Spyware is malware.
To me, once a company intentionally misleads or lies - trust is broken. As Canonical has done that, on more than one occasion, I have evidence based lack of trust.
It is, for me, not about opposing data collection. It is about opposing being deceived.
It is the same grounds I get upset with Gnome for and ironically, Canonical expressed such displeasure with Gnome, as well.
It would be included in their ToS. That would not be considered "spyware" imo.
I can definitely respect users not liking it though. But I am much more concerned about what some of these random distros may be doing than what Canonical is.
I really wish Canonical had the money to continue their path years ago. But due to financial constraints they had to downsize the project to get back to profitability
I would compare this with people playing really loud music in public spaces where people go to relax, like parks, beach, mountains, etc. It is allowed, there's nothing that says you can't do it, but you are still a **** if you do and people are asking you to stop.
Page 13 if you are interested to look for yourself. This is from 2020 (Latest to be released) 141 million in revenue and about 136 million in expenses.
The downside to Ubuntu being a business is some of the decisions we have been talking about. But the upside is 135 million dollars pumped into the Linux ecosystem. Removing that would have far reaching consequences.
I agree whole heartily ..... if a company either doesn't say it is mining info or lies about mining it they are misleading people no matter what their reasons ..... however if they do have a published statement that your info will be collected and shared with their partners (which may include any and anyone) then if I use their product it is my fault .....
I won't no matter how much I like or need their services or product .... this is just how I feel and why I don't use any Google services or products .... there are others but no need to list them here .....
While Google doesnât âlieâ about anything I also avoid Google as much as possible. They feel like they have a right to every drop of information they can get their hands on.
Switched to iPhone over this very issue. While Apple isnât perfect in this regard they are way better than Google.
You are right they don't lie about using your info and was not a great example but they are the biggest miners I could think of at this early hour of the morning ....
I think Google is actually an excellent example. You see, Canonical has been misleading. Including instances such as promising to not replace apt packages with snaps, then breaking that promise and replacing apt packages with Snaps without informing the user. And this went so far as that a user entering sudo apt install <package> was redirected without notice to a snap, without them being informed or noticing the Switch.
Okay yes, they stopped doing it when confronted... But if I stole your wallet but gave it back when I got caught, would you consider all forgiven?
Google most often does have a notice in writing of what it does. I am slightly reminded of "Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy" here... But technically, most of it is there. Yet, Google has lied, has misled. And gotten caught.
Just because a company will begrudgingly behave sometimes, does not mean that we can discount when they did not behave.
Canonical betrayed users trust with their featured Snaps and in so doing, the damage from that is still prevalent in Linux to this day. You must install Snap to use it on Linux Mint and their Devs will growl when you do (and I fully agree with the Mint Devs opinions on Snap in this.)
There is nothing wrong with changing your mind. Mozilla themselves prefer for it to be a Snap instead of a Deb package. I donât think that any of the mentioned issues with Canonical are that big of a deal.
Without starting another Snap debate I donât like a distro taking any side in it. Users should decide this matter. Essentially the only exceptions I will make is Fedora and Ubuntu is they are heavily invested in their own platforms and should push their own ecosystem.
What they should have done is include an extra message on the apt version to say the Snap is recommended by the Mozilla developers.
They took an Apple/MS approach on this in deciding what was the best for us. But they shouldnât make that decision.
But Mozilla themselves do not want to maintain a Deb anymore. They just want a Flatpak and Snap version. I understand why Canonical did it, but that doesnât mean I agree with it.
It also doesnât mean I am going to demonize Canonical for doing what they thought was for the best. I will never totally agree with any distro.
Let me use another word that ends with 'ize...
Minimize.
Rolltide, disagreeing can be a fine thing. It allows us to examine our ideas and assumptions and weight of their merit.
To apply a sense of Coding Logic to this:
If you are dismissive of or minimize an argument that has Merit... Such as that Ubuntu behaved improperly, which you agree with that assessment... Then you may be missing the point of Examining The Merit.
You are focused on defending your position at all costs. Even if your counter argument lacks enough merit to outweigh the opposing position.
If I point out something verified, and you agree that it did happen - but then say it was not a big deal, did you really examine it?
Something being installed to a persons computer without their consent Is A Big Deal. Always.
Something misleading about its nature in order to quell discontent Is A Big Deal. Always.
So when you say it is not a big deal... really, the argument falls very flat. It comes across more like you cannot accept the merit, than it does that you really actually believe that the Amazon and Snap incidents and broken promises that led up to the Snap incident and the misleading statements made before and after the incident were really no big deal.
And if it truly is no big deal for you, for many of us it is a big deal to be violated like that. You can really only respect that.
The counter argument to this is your are "maximizing"
I admitted they were heavy handed and I disagree with the decision multiple times. But I do not give it as much "weight" as you do. It is a minor issue to me.
Canonical did not willy nilly change a Deb to a Snap. They did one specific package that the package developer themselves requested.
This was in their ToS from Day 1. Not sure how that is a broken promise. They are a business and make business decisions.
