What happened to the Ubuntu Foundation?

Posted Apr 6, 2006 15:16 UTC (Thu) by cjwatson (subscriber, #7322)
In reply to: What happened to the Ubuntu Foundation? by wtogami
Parent article: The end of the Fedora Foundation

The communication since the original announcement hasn't been perfect, but the purpose of the Ubuntu Foundation is more like a trust than the active purpose that the Fedora Foundation had. That is, in case Canonical's commercial activities don't turn out to be sustainable, then the Foundation and its endowment are there to guarantee that Ubuntu can at least meet its stated commitments, such as five-year support of Ubuntu 6.06 on servers, and continue to produce new releases; it would also provide a legal framework for the project and its community. Unless and until that happens (and, at present, we hope it remains an unlikely prospect), there isn't much point eating into rainy-day funds, so primary funding of Ubuntu development will still be from Canonical, and the Foundation will remain as a trust fund.

Either way, project governance remains with the Ubuntu Community Council and Technical Board, each of which at present have one non-Canonical-employed member, but that isn't fixed.

Colin Watson
Ubuntu developer and Community Council member