[asdfkjhasdfhuh]

slightly wrong. Ubuntu succeed in part because of what you mention, plus lots of marketing money. debian have caught up now. and most people seriously wanting up to date is over at gentoo or arch.

But back to the "ubuntu exists" premise you started, it is because a rich guy wanted to take over debian and sell an enterprise solution based on it.

remember at the time enterprise was all the rave. google was pushing their enterprise suite, and there was ton of startups (zoho, etc) it was a crowded space then and red hat, suze were completely fumbling with their linuxes.

[stubish]

Marketing money? For about the first decade I think the only marketing was shipping CDs for free to anyone who wanted them. A billboard or two might have been rented over the decades in highly targeted circumstances. There is approximately zero marketing.

[asdfkjhasdfhuh]

you think free CDs worldwide is cheap?!

they paid for "CD vending machines" at several locations where you could get free cds... that is more expensive than a billboard and practically buys you a spot on specialized magazines. They were going those marketing campaigns all over the place.

[stubish]

Oh yes. Free CDs worldwide was incredibly cheap as a form of marketing, especially when you have the ability to source the cheapest bulk pressing and shipping deals world wide. As are vending machines, compared with the ludicrous prices charged for a billboard in a relevant position. I can't even recall if the vending machines were Canonical or local Ubuntu user groups doing it for shits and giggles/course credit. A tiny drop of money compared to competitors marketing budgets.