As far as I'm concerned, a single unsolicited message from anyone with no personal connection to myself constitutes spam. Obviously opt-in lists are a different story.
Anecdotally, most people aren't going to go through the couple or three clicks to unsubscribe. This is what spammers rely on.
The people hosing their system like that aren't likely to be able to use a recovery partition. I would guess they'd take the computer to a shop to get it fixed.
I tried this for like six months. Couldn't stand it. I get far better results adjusting environmental lighting. An LED strip casting a glow behind my monitor made the most difference.
I suppose anything that doesn't conform to your world-view is 'smug heteronormative privilege'. If you want a big happy feel-good discussion I suggest you go back to Tumblr. HN is for constructive discussion.
I find it very hard to believe that anyone, let alone the presumably technologically proficient people at Canonical, would actually think that sponsored search results are useful. When was the last time anyone clicked a sponsored Google result?
The head of the GCSE at the time is now our Governor General. So the guy directly at fault is untouchable and the Prime Minister flatly denied (lying) all knowledge of any spying.
We're not so squeaky clean.