Canonical, and the Ubuntu Council recognize a few contributors, and grant them the "status" of Ubuntu Member[2] as a sign of recognition of significant, and sustained contribution to Ubuntu or the Ubuntu community.
The membership gives you a few perks, like a certificate signed by Mark Shuttleworth, an @ubuntu.com email address, and a few other stuff[3], but these perks are nothing when compared to the experiences I had along the way. I got to test Ubuntu Touch, participate in a closed beta for Steam for Linux, have a face-to-face chat with Richard Stallman, talk with Mark Shuttleworth, and meet a huge number of people so much smarter than me at a young age, which helped shape who I am as an adult.
I have been calling Ubuntu my favourite operating system since 2008, and I am what I am today because of the journey I went through with it, but as of last week, I have replaced it with openSUSE Tumbleweed on my desktop, and will probably do the same with my servers. I no longer contribute in a serious way, and the decisions Canonical is taking really rub me the wrong way.
Hopefully, I will find a new home in the openSUSE community, and a new journey will start.
[1] https://loco.ubuntu.com/about-loco/