I have not given up on Canonical or its distros. I am now using Kubuntu and
have for over a year now. I started my Linux adventure with Mandrake which
was a KDE only. My next big distro was MEPIS which was also KDE. Then I
switched to Ubuntu and used GNOME for a time. So in many ways going back to
KDE is a good fit. I like Kubuntu a lot. It has all of the advantages of
Ubuntu, such as big repositories and the ability to use PPAs, but none of
the draw backs. There has been no Ubuntu One, tinkering with window buttons,
or MeMenu which does not work for me. I don't have Mono and I can use parts
of Ubuntu that appeal to me.

All through my Linux adventure I have used many distros on the side, so I am
well familiar with other distros, how they work and like things about each
one. I have about seven or eight different distros installed at any given
time.

The distros that fit best with me are Fedora, aptosid (formerly Sidux, a
debian distro based on Sid), SimplyMEPIS 8.5 and PCLinuxOS. I would also
consider some Ubuntu based distros like Mint or SuperOS. I would have to
look into them some more before I decided if they could work.

Fedora has the most pluses, but its repositories are limited and I would
have to change how I do a few things. I can live with that if I have to.The
community s great. I like Aptosid and can do most of what I do in Ubuntu. My
problem is with the Debian community which I have no love for. SimplyMEPIS
could work. It is Debian based and I know it well. It's biggest problem is
its rate of development is slow for my tastes. I like more bleeding edge.
PCLinuxOS is like MEPIS, but is RPM based. It has a good community, but it
small and only has 32-bit. I could go with Arch on my netbook as my needs
there are more modest and it would be fun to get back to basics. I could go
with Sabayon on my desktop. It is a wonderful KDe distro based on Gentoo.

Mandriva and openSuSE are out. Mandriva has a commercial side that is
struggling and the project is always on the edge of collapsing. Novell is up
for sale and I am not happy with their decision to cave in to Microsoft.
They did not stand tall for open source when they could have. They have as
much as apologised, but I can't trust them.

I am staying the course, but considering all options. I am hoping that
healthy discussion will win the day and Canonical at least see the need to
improve their PR and explain themselves better. I think that they owe it to
the community to be transparent. I am also hoping that by community support
here that I can overcome some of my reservations.