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The Ubuntu Community UBports has one mission: to have the open source software Ubuntu on every device, starting with smartphones. UBports’ actions are based on collaborative development where developers are putting Ubuntu on different smartphones. During the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona end of February UBports will show a very special combination: Ubuntu on the Fairphone 2. With this successfully working device two worlds come together: sustainability and open source.
The reason that UBports has chosen to put Ubuntu on the Fairphone 2 is that this community feels a lot of sympathy for this phone. Fairphone has a clear mission: making a phone to create positive impact across the value chain of electronics. This ethical product is also modular, which means you can repair it yourself and create a longer lifespan of your device. Next to showing sympathy to an ethical initiative like Fairphone UBports found it important to show a successfully ported device running on Ubuntu. This open source operating system forms a strong alternative to Android in the guaranteed security and non vendor lock-in it offers for its users. Hence UBports’ mission: Ubuntu On Every Device.
In order to keep UBports productive and draw new projects, its initiator, the 19-year old Norwegian Marius Gripsgard launched UBports Foundation. You can meet the members of the Foundation on the biggest Mobile event of the world, MWC '17 in Barcelona. They can show you how the Fairphone 2 and Ubuntu complement each other in the user experience. With this combination the smartphone becomes a device where the user is in control over its own data and can contribute to a better world at the same time. This goes in line with Fairphone’s goal to give people more ownership over their smartphone so that they can open it up, keep and maintain it longer, both on hardware and software levels.
Douwe Schmidt, Community Manager at Fairphone: “With the Fairphone 2 we created not only the first modular phone in the world, but also a platform for others to build upon. With their amazing work of bringing Ubuntu to the Fairphone, the people of UBPorts join the growing Fairphone community. Our community has always played an important role in achieving fairer, more sustainable and more open devices and we are enormously thankful for this. We are happy to have UBPorts on board now and support them.”
UBports Foundation will be showcasing its work at the Canonical booth, the company behind Ubuntu. Canonical is planning to tell about the latest developments around the convergence of its devices and UBports Foundation will share its mission ‘Ubuntu On Every Device’ with the visitors and tell about the added value of Ubuntu on your device:
- A broader choice
- Security guaranteed
- No vendor lock-in.
UBports Foundation celebrates its community initiatives with the creative project #YourTribe. The Foundation invites Ubuntu Phone lovers to make pictures of their Ubuntu phone and the ones of their social company when they are in a bar, at the cinema, during a concert, a game night, etc. The Ubuntu phones symbolize the social interaction of someone’s tribe, the group of people that make you feel you belong. The members of UBports experience their community as their tribe and want to give people the chance to express and share that same tribe-feeling, through the Ubuntu Phone. Pictures can be shared on social media with the hashtag #YourTribe and the best pictures win a prize.
