[citation][nom]WithoutWeakness[/nom]1: Ubuntu is free and open source. They don't make money off the OS. The code is mostly community-sourced so whether people buy the phones or not they would at most be losing a marginal amount of money. Therefore it can't really "flop" in the same way something like HP's TouchPad did (interestingly, after HP discontinued the TouchPad it made webOS open source in order to attract the same sort of community following Ubuntu has).2: They aren't shooting for the same consumer market Android and iOS are gunning for. They are likely looking for the OS to be adopted by businesses running Ubuntu and IT groups that want a unified experience between their work computers and mobile devices. This will never claim anywhere near the sizeable market share that Android and iOS dominate but it will be massively popular with users who want to get more out of their devices and how they interact with their desktop OS.[/citation]
He is trolling you. Ignore him, that's what everyone else does.
It is true that their app market is limited; however, it has the potential of running Android apps natively, which means access to an established market. Even if Google denies it access to PlayStore, there are alternate markets like SlideMe or Amazon Appstore that fill in nicely. Besides, GApps is probably the most "adoptable" .apk out there, meaning it gets installed every day on devices that were not supposed to get it.
Boy this could be the beginning of a BYOD era for smartphones (you bring the hardware, get the OS from Canonical, install, tweak, enjoy).