To your search box point, the search box is to move Ubuntu to the mobile and to the online market just like Android, Apple and even FxOS have a search box direc

To your search box point, the search box is to move Ubuntu to the mobile and to the online market just like Android, Apple and even FxOS have a search box directly to either Google search or app search (FxOS does app search of course). The point is they try to move away from "browser search" to "Oh I need something quickly and I just need to press ctrl/command-F search this". If they do have a button to disable the feature (and assuming they do this properly) there is no violation of privacy. Of course I am sure I would be much happier to opt-out during installation process. That's a topic you have to raise to ubuntu dev. With enough people say fu they will introduce this opt-out.