I didn't back them for two reasons. The first is that the hardware will be late. Not their fault, but rather that hardware is always late. The hardware shouldn't be compared against what is on the market now, and not even on the purported release date, but rather a few months after that. I suspect it won't be that extraordinary.

The second is that Ubuntu have deliberately alienated me as a user. They are under no obligation to do any different - actions they have taken have been a different direction than suits me. The phone is ultimately not for a free(dom) software community, Linux community or collaborated UI community device - it is a Canonical/Ubuntu (Unity) one. In the AMA "So in this first generation Edge, no, we didn't look for open hardware specifically"

Examples of where they have gone different directions: keeping upstart versus systemd, not trying to play nice with Gnome 3, CLA, Amazon on by default, bzr, launchpad, a general preference towards writing new code versus fixing the many issues languishing in the bug tracker etc. They did do good stuff with trying to make a community, fresh software packages, PPAs etc.

If Fedora, Arch, Gentoo, SuSe, Mandrake etc users had a reason to buy the phone I'd bet it would be a lot more successful.