I really, really need some suggestion on this issue: www.ubuntu.it

[simone.brunozzi]

Hi there,
I'm Simone Brunozzi from Italy.
I own the web domain www.ubuntu.it (and www.kubuntu.it), because I bought it long before Ubuntu was a big hit, or Canonical had any trademark on Ubuntu in Italy. So, it is perfectly legal that I own it.

Apart from that, a guy from the italian LoCo team asked me if I want to give the domain to Canonical, to represent an official internet starting point for web surfers.
In this moment, the website is just a blog, and it is clearly stated in the title of the blog that "this is a technical-philosophycal blog on Ubuntu".

Now I am struck with this question: give it away to Canonical, or not?

Please, consider that I love Ubuntu, love Linux, and if it was just a domain, it would not be a problem to donate it.

The fact is that in the last 20 months or so, I worked on that website, I diffused its name, and its web address has been linked in many places... many people come to that site because it's me, not just because it's a good website name. I have a good pagerank, good backlinks, all generated from my activity and blog entries.
In few words, I feel that I "own" that piece of internet. I also feel that this friendly-but-official request from Canonical must NOT be ignored, because it's not in the spirit of Ubuntu. (God, if it was just www.microsoft.it instead of www.ubuntu.it , you'd see the lightnings!!)

Now I'm very confused about it, and I ask for your help.

If you were IN MY EXACT SITUATION (Please, read this twice: IF YOU WERE IN MY EXACT SITUATION), what would you do?

a. give away the domain
b. keep the domain
c. make a clear sentence on the website stating that this site is not official
d. something else

Please, try to motivate clearly your would-be decisions on it.

Thanks for any comment and suggestion!

[KiwiNZ]

I would email Mark Shuttleworth and request that you and he talk over this.

[Mr. Picklesworth]

You could do something like what was done with www.firefox.com

That way both pages are still there and nobody gets confused.

[simone.brunozzi]

I would email Mark Shuttleworth and request that you and he talk over this.

Good idea, but I'm sure Mr. Shuttleworth is not interested in talking with an unknown guy from Italy. In fact, I suppose that the italian LoCo team is in charge of that.

Thanks anyway! :-)

[simone.brunozzi]

You could do something like what was done with www.firefox.com

That way both pages are still there and nobody gets confused.

Good idea, and I looked at it before I posted here... I think that such a solution is just an unuseful mouse click for the user, but it could end like the less-bad scenario... let's see.

Thank U so much.

[KiwiNZ]

Good idea, but I'm sure Mr. Shuttleworth is not interested in talking with an unknown guy from Italy. In fact, I suppose that the italian LoCo team is in charge of that.

Thanks anyway! :-)

You maybe surprised.

[Polygon]

maybe you can do something like mozilla did for firefox.com , they acquired the domain name but they still link to the guy who gave them the domain.

advantages: Canonical gets the domain , and people who click the ubuntu.it link will have a choice to going the canonical page or to your blog, so users wont stop coming because you changed urls

[ago]

I would email Mark Shuttleworth and request that you and he talk over this.

I agree, and it is good chance to talk to Mark. If I were you I would probably give it to Canonical but I think you could obtain an important role in the website, you probably deserve that anyway. I would then create a blog section (open to others as well) within the website, and continue your own blog in there (an italian fridge???).

PS1: nice site!
PS2: I am half from PG myself.

[PingunZ]

Mark Shuttleworth is a very kind man, I'm sure he'd like to talk to you about this.
But, only mail him when you really don't know what to do, its really wise to ask some advice here first :)
I would give it away to canonical, but ask them for another domain. ( like ubuntu-it.com ). See it like this, the maintainers of OS you're working on, writing all your articles about wants your domain. Ubuntu is free -> They do you a favor by giving it away for free :) Do them a favor by giving your domain away for free ^^

I think giving it away/asking for another domain makes the most sense.

I hope that was helpfull :)

Cheers

[K.Mandla]

Good idea, but I'm sure Mr. Shuttleworth is not interested in talking with an unknown guy from Italy.
I have heard he's quite approachable. ...

[simone.brunozzi]

I agree, and it is good chance to talk to Mark. If I were you I would probably give it to Canonical but I think you could obtain an important role in the website, you probably deserve that anyway. I would then create a blog section (open to others as well) within the website, and continue your own blog in there (an italian fridge???).

PS1: nice site!
PS2: I am half from PG myself.

Interesting... worth investigating.

1: thanks!
2: oh really? Ever come back in Perugia?

[simone.brunozzi]

Mark Shuttleworth is a very kind man, I'm sure he'd like to talk to you about this.
But, only mail him when you really don't know what to do, its really wise to ask some advice here first :)
I would give it away to canonical, but ask them for another domain. ( like ubuntu-it.com ). See it like this, the maintainers of OS you're working on, writing all your articles about wants your domain. Ubuntu is free -> They do you a favor by giving it away for free :) Do them a favor by giving your domain away for free ^^

I think giving it away/asking for another domain makes the most sense.

I hope that was helpfull :)

Cheers

Hello!
Yes, asking for some advice here is what I'm doing! :-)

I agree in the fact that I will not sell the domain anyway, but in case just give it away (Ubuntu style); I've had an offer of about 5000 euros for the domain, and I refused (it seemed serious).

Thanks

[weatherman]

yeah, I'd go with the firefox.com solution, seems reasonable to me.

[tseliot]

Kiwinz is right about Mark Shuttleworth ;)

Anyway Canonical already owns http://www.ubuntu-it.org/ , therefore I think you should keep your domains unless an official request comes from Canonical itself.

If Canonical makes you an offer, then you might think about it (but the decision to make is always up to you).

And it's quite clear that your blog is not the official website.

[simone.brunozzi]

Kiwinz is right about Mark Shuttleworth ;)

Anyway Canonical already owns http://www.ubuntu-it.org/ , therefore I think you should keep your domains unless an official request comes from Canonical itself.

If Canonical makes you an offer, then you might think about it (but the decision to make is always up to you).

And it's quite clear that your blog is not the official website.

Thanks Alberto for your thoughts about it.
I would not accept an "offer" in the sense of money, although Canonical is a business company; I want to behave "the ubuntu way".

I'm actually evaluating different solutions... the Firefox one is not bad, but is not enough good from my point of view.

I'll probably consider talking with Mr. Shuttleworth about that, if I don't find a proper solution soon.

Thanks! Please, to everybody: continue suggesting and commenting about this issue. I'm not done with it.

[ago]

Ever come back in Perugia?
Maybe next we

[henriquemaia]

The www.firefox.com solution looks really nice to me. But I know it's easy to give an advice like this when you're not directly involved.

[simone.brunozzi]

Maybe next we

Good! Wanna take a drink together? Just drop me a PM :-)

Cheers,

[simone.brunozzi]

The www.firefox.com solution looks really nice to me. But I know it's easy to give an advice like this when you're not directly involved.

Yeah, that's the point: being directly involved is much different... but in any case, advices are always welcome, even if it's not easy to completely feel and understand the situation.

Cheers,

[RAV TUX]

Hi there,
I'm Simone Brunozzi from Italy.
I own the web domain www.ubuntu.it (http://www.ubuntu.it) (and www.kubuntu.it) (http://www.kubuntu.it%29), because I bought it long before Ubuntu was a big hit, or Canonical had any trademark on Ubuntu in Italy. So, it is perfectly legal that I own it.

Apart from that, a guy from the italian LoCo team asked me if I want to give the domain to Canonical, to represent an official internet starting point for web surfers.
In this moment, the website is just a blog, and it is clearly stated in the title of the blog that "this is a technical-philosophycal blog on Ubuntu".

Now I am struck with this question: give it away to Canonical, or not?

Please, consider that I love Ubuntu, love Linux, and if it was just a domain, it would not be a problem to donate it.

The fact is that in the last 20 months or so, I worked on that website, I diffused its name, and its web address has been linked in many places... many people come to that site because it's me, not just because it's a good website name. I have a good pagerank, good backlinks, all generated from my activity and blog entries.
In few words, I feel that I "own" that piece of internet. I also feel that this friendly-but-official request from Canonical must NOT be ignored, because it's not in the spirit of Ubuntu. (God, if it was just www.microsoft.it (http://www.microsoft.it) instead of www.ubuntu.it (http://www.ubuntu.it) , you'd see the lightnings!!)

Now I'm very confused about it, and I ask for your help.

If you were IN MY EXACT SITUATION (Please, read this twice: IF YOU WERE IN MY EXACT SITUATION), what would you do?

a. give away the domain
b. keep the domain
c. make a clear sentence on the website stating that this site is not official
d. something else

Please, try to motivate clearly your would-be decisions on it.

Thanks for any comment and suggestion!

My suggestion:

Keep the site, join the Italian LoCo team, and host on your site along with your philosophical Ubuntu blog, a home for the Italian LoCo team, no need to give it away or sell.

much like numerous other LoCo teams:

http://www.ubuntu.com.au (http://www.ubuntu.com.au/)

http://www.ubuntu-cl.org (http://www.ubuntu-cl.org/)

http://www.ubuntu-zh.org (http://www.ubuntu-zh.org/)

http://www.ubuntu-hr.org (http://www.ubuntu-hr.org/)

http://www.ubuntu.cz/

http://www.ubuntu-fi.org/

http://www.ubuntu-fr.org (http://www.ubuntu-fr.org/)

http://www.ubuntuusers.de (http://www.ubuntuusers.de/)

ubuntu-it.org (http://www.ubuntu-it.org/)
(even through the Italian team already has a domain name, you could set up a redirect or a sub-domain)

http://ubuntu.hu/

_________________________________________

...and yes, Mark is very approachable.

[DoctorMO]

I would give it to conical. no need to hang on to a root domian name and the people of italy deserve a good place to go for ubuntu software.

[simone.brunozzi]

Hi Yozef,
and thank you for your suggestion.

I'm not sure about one thing: joining a LoCo team is an invite-only act, or you can propose yourself to join?

Thanks!


My suggestion:

Keep the site, join the Italian LoCo team, and host on your site along with your philosophical Ubuntu blog, a home for the Italian LoCo team, no need to give it away or sell.

much like numerous other LoCo teams:

http://www.ubuntu.com.au (http://www.ubuntu.com.au/)

http://www.ubuntu-cl.org (http://www.ubuntu-cl.org/)

http://www.ubuntu-zh.org (http://www.ubuntu-zh.org/)

http://www.ubuntu-hr.org (http://www.ubuntu-hr.org/)

http://www.ubuntu.cz/

http://www.ubuntu-fi.org/

http://www.ubuntu-fr.org (http://www.ubuntu-fr.org/)

http://www.ubuntuusers.de (http://www.ubuntuusers.de/)

ubuntu-it.org (http://www.ubuntu-it.org/)
(even through the Italian team already has a domain name, you could set up a redirect or a sub-domain)

http://ubuntu.hu/

_________________________________________

...and yes, Mark is very approachable.

[simone.brunozzi]

I would give it to conical. no need to hang on to a root domian name and the people of italy deserve a good place to go for ubuntu software.

Hello DoctorMO!
Thanks for your opinion; I will consider it along with the other ones.

Cheers,

[Kindred]

I would probably just keep it and use it as it is. Looking at the domain names Canonical already has they are hardly consistent.. fair enough if they had all the root domain names - but they don't, not even close. In fact ubuntu-it is more fitting in with the domains that already exist and Canonical already own and will use that.

Well that's my perspective anyway.

[RAV TUX]

Hi Yozef,
and thank you for your suggestion.

I'm not sure about one thing: joining a LoCo team is an invite-only act, or you can propose yourself to join?

Thanks!

Just E-mail or PM the IT team leader and let him/her know you want to join...

I am a team leader of The "NU Ubuntu Team" (Northeastern USA Ubuntu Local community Team; ME,NH,VT,MA,RI,CT,NY,NJ,PA,DE,MD,DC,VA (http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=184438)), and most people let me know when they want to be a part of the team.

goodluck with that,

Jozef

[simone.brunozzi]

Thanks a lot (A LOT!!), Josef!!

All the best,

Simone



Just E-mail or PM the IT team leader and let him/her know you want to join...

I am a team leader of The "NU Ubuntu Team" (Northeastern USA Ubuntu Local community Team; ME,NH,VT,MA,RI,CT,NY,NJ,PA,DE,MD,DC,VA (http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=184438)), and most people let me know when they want to be a part of the team.

goodluck with that,

Jozef

[simone.brunozzi]

Thanks Kindred!

Best,

Simone


I would probably just keep it and use it as it is. Looking at the domain names Canonical already has they are hardly consistent.. fair enough if they had all the root domain names - but they don't, not even close. In fact ubuntu-it is more fitting in with the domains that already exist and Canonical already own and will use that.

Well that's my perspective anyway.

[simone.brunozzi]

Sorry,
I posted in the english forum instead of italian forum.
Deleted. :-)

[mattheweast]

I'm not sure about one thing: joining a LoCo team is an invite-only act, or you can propose yourself to join?



Ciao Simone,

There is a "contribute" tab on the Italian website - it goes here: http://www.ubuntu-it.org/index.php?page=contribuire

[simone.brunozzi]

Ciao Simone,

There is a "contribute" tab on the Italian website - it goes here: http://www.ubuntu-it.org/index.php?page=contribuire

Thanks a lot Matthew!

:-)