Ubuntu

Ubuntu is a Debian-based GNU/Linux distribution aimed at being friendly to newbies. Ubuntu is the most widely used GNU/Linux operating system in the world, and is widely regarded as being the easiest to configure and use. Sadly Ubuntu ships with the plague that is Unity, along with Amazon Spyware built right into the search tool. Luckily all of this can be painlessly removed, and you can be left with an easy to use operating system that respects (most) of your freedom, and isn't impossible to use or maintain.

Getting Ubuntu

Ubuntu comes in several different versions, the most popular as of this writing being 12.04, which can be found here.

Controversy

Canonical, the company supporting Ubuntu, are criticized for their lack of contribution to upstream. They often fork software and change it to fit their system.

Richard Stallman has also criticized Ubuntu, considering it malware.

Removing Amazon Spyware from Unity

sudo apt-get remove unity-lens-shopping

For newer Versions of Ubuntu the Website fixubuntu.com holds a copy-paste-script to remove any add-ware from Ubuntu. As of january 2014 it is:

V=`/usr/bin/lsb_release -rs`; if [ $V \< 12.10 ]; then echo "Good news! Your version of Ubuntu doesn't invade your privacy."; else  gsettings set com.canonical.Unity.Lenses remote-content-search none; if [ $V \< 13.10 ]; then sudo apt-get remove -y unity-lens-shopping;  else gsettings set com.canonical.Unity.Lenses disabled-scopes "['more_suggestions-amazon.scope', 'more_suggestions-u1ms.scope', 'more_suggestions-populartracks.scope', 'music-musicstore.scope', 'more_suggestions-ebay.scope', 'more_suggestions-ubuntushop.scope', 'more_suggestions-skimlinks.scope']"; fi; if ! grep -q productsearch.ubuntu.com /etc/hosts; then echo -e "\n127.0.0.1 productsearch.ubuntu.com" | sudo tee -a /etc/hosts >/dev/null; fi; echo "All done. Enjoy your privacy."; fi

Replacing Unity

Purging Unity from 12.04.3 LTS

To install the Cinnamon Desktop Environment (A GNOME 3 Fork):

   $ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gwendal-lebihan-dev/cinnamon-stable
   $ sudo apt-get update
   $ sudo apt-get install cinnamon