Announcement
Collapse
No announcement yet.
Canonical Unveils The Ubuntu Software Store
Collapse
X
-
The whole application store concept is a good one. I worked on early versions of a similar dpkg-based effort back in 2001 called Click-n-Run. Now that Apple has proven the concept can be successful, it's appropriate for another Linux distribution to try again. Since Ubuntu, and Linux in general, have more clout than my former employer did back in 2001, I hope this effort will be successful, and developers like myself will have an additional avenue for writing Free software for a living (even if it's software-for-ransom style).
-
Originally posted by Yfrwlf View PostThe Ubuntu store should be a place where you can buy slices of a project/program which will be open source upon release or whatnot, or where you can pay for small features to an existing program to be added and then open sourced. Ideally that's what the future should be, is paying developers directly or nearly directly for their work, just as any other artist or laborer takes commissions now days.
Originally posted by nanonyme View PostI doubt they'd put any non-free applications on the store anyway. Designing a safe system for money transaction isn't trivial.
Leave a comment:
-
Originally posted by Feech View Post"they are hoping to have improved sharing and tracking of software within the Ubuntu Software Store and the abilities to see what software your friends may have installed"
Oh yeah, they have found the missing piece.
Leave a comment:
-
I doubt they'd put any non-free applications on the store anyway. Designing a safe system for money transaction isn't trivial.
Leave a comment:
-
-You can't make software installation more idiot-friendly!
Mark Shuttleworth: Yes we can!
"they are hoping to have improved sharing and tracking of software within the Ubuntu Software Store and the abilities to see what software your friends may have installed"
Oh yeah, they have found the missing piece.Last edited by Feech; 28 August 2009, 04:01 AM.
Leave a comment:
-
Possibly a great idea.
It is possible that they will simply submerge the advanced features of Synaptic into the menus and make it look like app-install. This would make things a lot cleaner and more simple, IMO. Of course, if they tie this to themselves it will make it less nice for the other distros... but that may not be a bad thing. Ubuntu has done much to make linux an easy user environment, and Shuttleworth is the kind of guy linux needs. If they add proprietary apps to the store(maybe a co-operative with CodeWeavers) this could give linux a really big boost.
Also, I don't think of this as advertisement but rather a way to give most users(not just stereotypical nix users) an easier way to add features to their desktop. So what if Canonical makes a bit of money? I'd rather them(canonical) get it and put it back into development of the platform than lose the user to Windows/Apple. At any rate, it's only the package gui, how much time do most users spend in there on an average day? It's not as though Canonical plastered "buy service from us!", "want to run Word?" all over the desktop. It's in one place and to view the advertisements requires one actually open the app(much like one encounters ads in the browser, though it's not precisely the same, I realize).
Again, this is all assuming they leave Synaptic functionality(maybe even add some of the nice features in OpenSuse package gui).
This was a bit scattershot, so please ignore the order a bit
Best/Liam
Leave a comment:
-
I think Canonical and other companies should be focusing on selling closed source programs which, after getting so many purchases, would have to change their licenses to open source ones. Paying for development in little pieces/bounties or in bigger blobs is IMO the way of the future. Consumers want to and will share software, so companies need to accept that fact and adjust their business models accordingly.
The Ubuntu store should be a place where you can buy slices of a project/program which will be open source upon release or whatnot, or where you can pay for small features to an existing program to be added and then open sourced. Ideally that's what the future should be, is paying developers directly or nearly directly for their work, just as any other artist or laborer takes commissions now days.
Such a system would lay the whole "piracy" thing to rest.
Leave a comment:
-
I think this has fantastic potential because it would encourage the porting of commercial applications. The flip side is, as stated, that it discourages free apps to a degree. I think overall though, it would ease the feeling by many commercial developers that Linux users will be unwilling to pay for any software. I am thinking here particularly about games. Making paid apps easier to get are more easily supported, a la andrid market, would be a boon to the viability of creating linux apps for companies.
I agree that I would want to keep synaptic and gdebi for ease, speed and tweaking but this also depends on how they plan to design the app store (am too lazy to try out the first build).
The other obvious disadvantage to the above positive would be the specificity of this to ubuntu, again limiting its potential to promote commercial application development.
Leave a comment:
-
This is interesting. As I see it, this could be a really nice feature for newcomers and such. Also, I think to be financially successful, which Ubuntu likes to be, you have to offer some kind of an all-in-one package system, much like how Android or Apple does it.
I also guess this isn't the greatest feature for power-users, as they most likely already know how to do handle there system and find new software, but for a real mass market, this seems to be the way to go.
I remember back than, when I first started to use Ubuntu Linux on a regular basis, it was quite hard and took a long time to know all those important package names and handle the package tool properly.
Lets see how it turns out. I for some reason like the idea.
Leave a comment:
-
Originally posted by TwistedLincoln View PostHaving the App Store as an optional extra program, or as a replacement for the "Add / Remove Programs" app isn't a bad idea. But replacing Synaptic, gdebi, etc? Terrible idea.
Leave a comment:
Leave a comment: