So the goal is to make Ubercart the best OSS cart product and at the top of google? You're already on page one for opensource shopping cart. The e-commerce module can't even claim that. Considering how relatively young Ubercart is, you guys should be completely thrilled that you rank as well as you do.
It seems quite counter-intuitive that the "best" product (or those aspiring to be) would artificially and deliberately restrict the ways in which a non-programmer could work with the system.
I'm quoting slantview because I feel his position is spot on and completely in the "Drupal" spirit of development; after all, isn't that why Ubercart was created rather than fighting e-commerce?
As someone who develops Drupal code for a living 60+ hours a week and contributes to the Drupal community in many ways (speaking, code, teaching, local meet ups), I think this is total crap that you can't just add an option to turn it off. Honestly. I know you guys work hard on this. We all do. Why don't I put a link on every Drupal 6 installation that uses memcache that says "powered by slantview" since i wrote a patch that ended up in core that enables drop in memcache without core patches? Because that is not how things work. In FOSS we write code because we love it. Because we want to share what we made with others and have them contribute.
Ryan, I know you are a good guy. I met you in Boston, and we had an interesting conversation at the Hard Rock. I am not trying to be lame or a jerk or anything, but I just disagree with this strongly, and disagree with Andy's POV. Open Source is not about "If you don't like it, f*** you." I just think that is the wrong mentality to have. If everyone had that mentality, we'd all be using closed source software, and you wouldn't have Drupal to build Ubercart on.
What if you needed Drupal core to change something for Ubercart to continue working and Dries said, well, I disagree, "F--- you." Wouldn't be so great for the community now would it?
Keep up the good work guys, but come on, seriously? How hard is it to put in a simple radio to turn it off. Actually, that is not a question. It is easy as pie. Why make such a big deal about this. If you don't want to work with the community, then go closed source and don't use any of my code that I contribute to Drupal in your application unless you link to my site. I work really hard on my code and I want recognition. Think about it.
Lastly, if you have people hiding links by changing the color, you are really screwing your seo anyway. http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/hidden-links/ Just let them turn it off, and the seo will come.
Patch included.