Yeah, there are several reasons why I don't recommend Ubuntu to people. That's one of them. Although, admittedly, it's toward the end of the list.

I've got one about Ubuntu ESM in Linux Mint - but only in virtual consoles

What is the motd?

Message of the day, usually displayed at login.

At least it is probably not one of those dumb MS tabloid ads "Bill Gates hates this one weird trick!"

Jokes aside, that would make me switch to Debian immediately.

Serious question. How comes I din't get any of those on desktop? And never did?

It gets displayed right after logging in, either directly through `login` or indirectly through something like SSH.

If you're using a desktop environment that's likely the reason: the message is hidden by your DE, and starting a terminal emulator does not cause a login.

You might be able to see it by switching off your DE and logging in manually through the virtual console.

You won't see it on a graphical session. If you ssh into a server (or remotely onto your pc) it will get printed. Or switch to another vitual terminal (Ctrl + Alt + F8) and log in, and it should print whatever is in /etc/motd

I'm pretty sure MOTD is only shown on server installations

Message of the Day.

Message of the Day