Contributor mweinelt

Based on idea 5321, by Eldmannen (about removing yahoo).

We should remove ebay from the default installed searches, because:
- It reduces competition with other auction sites.
- Recently there was a uproar about changes in ebay which make in some case make it unfair. I agree!
- Ebay VERY heavily pushes Paypal, which is acknowledged by many to be very dodgy. A lot of people know someone who has been screwed by ebay. And here in aus, I had to upgrade my account because they had a bug which prevented me accessing my money (which is very unprofessional). The freenet Project owner was also screwed by ebay (and it demonstrated they don't research at all claims made against customers), and another friend of mine was charged 2x the amount he was supposed to be receiving because someone used a stolen credit card against him (so seems they profit from illegal credit cards).
- If ebay was a bank, they would have a 24/7 riot outside their building by customers who were screwed.
- Ebay doesn't exactly listen to feedback. If are a typical large company, where you have no way of providing feedback (if you scream at them over the phone, maybe they will let you speak to a manager). But they clearly dont care much (no forums).

Its to our advantage to promote competition within the auction sites. More competition means lower costs for us, and better payment methods. We should try to encourage the development of a world wide auction site that is more consumer/seller friendly, that actually promotes active feedback and improvement.

There is nothing stopping a patch being applied to the firefox code to prevent ebay being a default search engine (and it shouldn't be hard to do).

While reading over the brainstorm site people suggest adding a lot of different things to the base installation of Ubuntu, and some of them have good arguments (but most don't in my opinion).

I propose that after the installation process the user would be asked to choose from a couple of installation options for programs such as;
1. Suggested (default selected)
2. Manual
3. Advanced

The Suggested option would install a "default" Ubuntu programs list.

The Manual option would give the user a list of tasks that they expect to do (e.g. photo editing, note taking, pc based emailing (not webmail like hotmail/yahoo) word processing, simple games, music listening, movie watching etc...). Then, the computer could install the programs pertaining to the selections (e.g. evolution for pc based email, or openoffice for word processing) from the install disc or internet connection.

The Advanced option would probably not install any of these programs, maybe just simple things like nautilus and a terminal. The idea here is an experienced user already knows exactly what programs they want to use for specific tasks and this would save them the trouble of removing the default word processor, notes application, torrent application, mail application etc.

Feel free to comment and fine tune these ideas, they are rough. But I like the idea of letting the user say don't waste my time installing programs I will not use or replace later anyhow.

If a link to a forum thread is provided, that forum thread should be automatically updated with a link back to the brainstorm post. If no link is provided an AJAX search box could suggest related topics at ubuntuforums.org (in a similar fashion to the 'Possible duplicates' list).

google and ubuntu can collaborate to sync all the ubuntu desktop data with the google services.this way the user can access the data from anywhere and use it to keep it safe[back up]

below are a few examples of what could sync .
thunderbird = gmail [imap]
calendar = google calendar
rss feeds in firefox = google reader
address book = google contacts in gmail
pictures folder = google photos
documents folder = google docs

what else can you think of ? do add your comments

this can be done in collaboration with google which already has these services available.
i dont think they would mind and its a pretty neat idea for people on the move or users who love google as well as ubuntu. :)