Shareware awards just a scam? MacUpdate, Versiontracker and IUseThis.com vs the Windows world
January 21st, 2010
We buy and use a lot of software here at Foliovision. We have all kinds of weird stuff running for checking web rankings and logging backlinks in our SEO business. We don't like Adobe much for price gouging so we buy all kinds of graphics bits and bobs to
Basically our rule is that if a software program can do it faster, then have a software program do it. This approach allows us to offer our clients more service within their budget. So we have contact with a lot of software. While out shopping online (how's that for a pleonasm) I've often seen sterling awards pages for what looks like really rubbish programming.
inventory builder bogus software awards
Where do these ugly little banners come from and how the software developers earn them?
It turns out just by submitting software. No, you say, impossible. Somebody's looked at the software. No, no one has ever looked at the software.
Prove it, you ask.
I don't have to. A gentleman by the name of Andy Brice already has.
He submitted a bogus piece of software to 1033 sites. His bogus soft included a screenshot like this:
bogus software submission screenshot
Andy's fake app was approved and listed on 218 software directories. Incredible. Even more shocking, he won 16 awards. Sixteen 5 star awards would be enough to give even the worst piece of malware a veneer of respectability.
So what is a shareware purchaser to do?
Buy a Mac. In the Mac universe, there are only three software download sites of any import with VersionTracker.com and Macupdate.com battling for top dog for the last three years, with IUseThis.com trailing.
The ratings and comments on all three are legitimate and minimally censored in favour of the developers. Even I'm aghast at some of the things I read on Macupdate in particular (Nate, for the most part, please keep them up, following the profiles of some of these curmudgeons is incredibly entertaining and keeps people coming back to Macupdate).
The sites are not perfect. One developer had friends inside Macupdate whom he tried to use to censor commentary (Misha, I believe). In the end, after some comments being pulled and the tempest in a teapot rising higher Nate finally intervened and put the review back online and warned off the developer.
In any case, these three sites don't hand out prizes. They allow developers to display user ratings badges on their sites like this:
If a developer posts an incorrect Versiontracker or MacUpdate badge he or she will be asked to pull the badge down immediately. In any case, it is standard practice for the badge to link directly to the developer's site. If a developer encourages sock puppet votes he's blacklisted. Unfortunately the list is only three developers long, so I'm not inclined to believe it's complete. On the other hand, perhaps Nate and team have caught and warned 200 developers but it didn't get to blacklist levels.
A couple of years ago, I had the feeling MacUpdate might become a bit smug as VersionTracker atrophied. IUseThis.com came along just in time and made MacUpdate pay more attention to the convenience of users of the site first. What kind of nuisance am I talking about? There was a period of six months where it was impossible to search MacUpdate from outside the site - you had to load their overly busy, distracting home page to do so. Finally they quit that about a year ago.
So in the Mac universe there are just three sites of any import. On any of them fake feedback is likely to be called quickly. There are no fake awards. If a Mac user sees any other award badges, s/he will ignore those banners.
Straightforward access to high quality shareware is another reason I decided to take Foliovision Mac-centric at the end of 2009. Previously we had only had one and then two Mac users in the company. Now we have moved to fifty-fifty. We do have some very bad copycat developers like Koingo Software (from beautiful BC just like me) who hawk their second class wares everywhere, but you can usually suss them out pretty quickly.
It would be nice if CNET would pull about three quarters of the javascript and half the ads off of Versiontracker so we could go back to a two horse race. I'm not quite sure what ails IUseThis.com but at least they are there as an insurance policy if MacUpdate starts to go off the same overly monetized rails as Versiontracker. But all in all, as Mac users we are quite fortunate in our developers and our shareware sites.
Especially in comparison to the Windows world.
By Alec
You might also like
- Domain Submission Center scam
- Windows 7 Licensing or How Microsoft Lost Our Business
-
In search of a good CSS Editor with FTP editing on Windows: BBedit Equivalent?
-
Detoxing a Windows Box: Getting Rid of Autorun Entries, Cleaning the System Tray
9 comments on “Shareware awards just a scam? MacUpdate, Versiontracker and IUseThis.com vs the Windows world”
01
Hi Alec, thanks for the favorable comments about MacUpdate. If my memory serves me correctly, when we blocked searches performed outside of the site, I believe it was part of a process to (1) reduce server load for fake queries, (2) block wares apps from querying the site and lifting content from our pages. It took a bit to re-build our search so it was more efficient and way better than any other Mac software search (search for iTunes on VT and it’s not even on the first page of search results — MU has it as the first listing) and make it efficient for our servers.
Overall, I don’t think you need to worry about MacUpdate not improving because of competition falling behind. We have so many ideas to improve services for users, and help developers promote their software. A good example of this is the newly released MacUpdate Desktop. Check it out:
http://www.macupdate.com/desktop/
02
Hi Joel,
Thanks for stopping by. Great to hear that you have more improvements underway!
I did notice that the search results are quite good. I’d like it to be easier and more intuitive to do a search including both terms, i.e. I think the rankings should be heavily weighted to items including all terms. Right now if you use two terms, one which is common and the other which is rare i.e. itunes encoder the results are too long at 12 pages and heavily weighted to items which are only iTunes related. In fact I think the first search should include only items which include both terms with an offer for a subsequent search for items with either term.
I’m not sure I’d trust MacUpdate on my desktop yet, given my experience of being shut out with searches not from the home page and having a moderator initially delete feedback as a personal favour to a developer friend. On the other hand, recently MacUpdate did promptly provide me and another user with the 700 MB disk image from a bundle (after the software owner took it down). That encouraged a lot more trust.
What is really bothering me about your desktop application is that you have removed AppFresh from the MacUpdate database. I’ve tried AppFresh and will not likely run it often (I have enough software that I don’t really want to bother updating it all all the time). But AppFresh is really good.
Kicking them out of your database is dishonest and underhanded. The fundamental social contract of MacUpdate is to provide free access to all non-malware Mac apps. By excluding a nominal competitor, you become a dishonest broker. Of course a single application is not the end of the world. But it’s the thin edge of the wedge. If you can do that to Metaquark, who will you do it to next? How can I as a user be sure which developers have been included and which have been excluded.
You allow some real crap in your database and to exclude Fresh is quite simply low. As long as AppFresh is not in your app database (if you wait six months to kill the AppFresh first through lack of exposure that doesn’t count), I will neither try MacUpdate Desktop, nor pay for it, nor consider a paid subscription to MacUpdate. You get enough of my money from MuPromos and MacUpdate Bundles that I’m already underwriting your unfair dealings with Metaquark.
I hope you rethink this policy promptly. This is the sort of behaviour I’d expect from Microsoft and not a central hub of the Mac community.
03
We never listed AppFresh is our database, nor have we listed VT Pro. The same is for VT’s site, or any other site that has a base competing product. MacUpdate isn’t a place were all software is promoted. It’s like the iTunes App Store — tons of stuff doesn’t make it every day. It’s not dishonest. Companies shouldn’t be required to promote their competition within their own walls. And of course, it’s not fair for me to say that you can’t choose not to try MacUpdate Desktop. That’s your choice.
04
Hello Joel,
If you are setting yourself up as a software developer then you shouldn’t be running MacUpdate.
AppFresh is not competition. They are an application. You are a website.
I’m not the only regular MacUpdate user and buyer who is disgusted by your dishonesty and your abuse of privilege here.
Why do you think people started using MacUpdate? Because you didn’t do the stupid obnoxious self-serving things which Versiontracker does.
Is Versiontracker really the example you want to follow?
You have broken the social contract with your users and your developers. This little game of speaking out of both sides of your mouth will cost you a lot more than it will win.
If you had any confidence in your own programming team, you would let MacUpdate Desktop compete on its own merits.
Very, very poor form.
05
It looks like we’ll agree to disagree.
MacUpdate is not just a website. We’re not even a company that is limited to only focus on Mac software (we do TONS of things in our local communities and our non-Mac work is not publicized because our motives are not founded on getting positive public recognition).
MacUpdate has been a website since 1996, and we’ve also been developing software (some free and some shareware) for longer than the foliovision.com domain name has existed. To say that MacUpdate isn’t allowed to develop software seems like a very controlling statement. And to say that MacUpdate is dishonest because we don’t actively promote directly competing software with a main revenue source that keeps our free macupdate.com site alive makes no sense, nor is it very encouraging to hear.
We develop MacUpdate Desktop because it fits perfectly with helping us keep peoples’ Mac software updated. And we make it a $20 shareware app because it costs us a ton of money to develop, hire people to keep our database the most accurate, and keep our servers and bandwidth paid for. MacUpdate Desktop is the backbone of MacUpdate in the same way the iPod and iTunes have become backbones for Apple. If Apple was required to sell the Zune in their stores or promote Microsoft Media Player on their website, that’s just not fair. Any company that is forced to promote direct competition of products that are the financial backbone of the organization is something that will likely never be supported in a free market.
MacUpdate has very little ads cluttering the site, and any user can create a free MacUpdate member account and choose to hide all of the paid ads — at no cost.
We allow free hosting off developers’ files on our servers and bandwidth — at no cost to the developer (freeware has no obligation. shareware we ask them to link to MU’s page on their site so it can remain free for the devs).
MacUpdate goes out of our way to be honest with people, to be the most accurate and timely resource, to give people tools to keep their Mac updated better than anything that’s ever been available, and we help developers promote their software on MacUpdate free of charge. It saddens me to see people try to limit organizations, by putting them in boxes, trying to define what they are and aren’t (especially as an outsider) and trying to force their will on others, as if that is a positive method to use. Typically this is poor form, and forcing people to do things often won’t result in people getting what they really want.
06
Interesting article. That is scary that the non-app could win so many “awards.” I’ve never paid too much attention to them and I’ve been wary of developers/sites that put too much faith in them: your software should be good because it’s good – not because someone who makes cute little web badges says its good.
I find your comments at odds with the article though – you chastise the Windows world for listing everything – and then get mad at MacUpdate for not listing everything. Then too you say an app developer shouldn’t be able to run a site that lists software?
Who put you in charge of the universe?
If I ran MU or VT I wouldn’t list my competitors’ products either. I don’t expect Bing to give me Google results and I don’t expect Burger King to sell me a Big Mac.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if there was a software listing site that a) listed everything in the world and b) had the storage and bandwidth to keep every version ever produced?
I must say I don’t visit the update sites that often. I am so sick and tired of every app that I run reminding me (often at the worst possible moment or when I need something done quickly) that a new version is available. Yes I know I can turn off updating in prefs – but when I do decide to update those prefs usually get overwritten.
I think it has made developers very lazy and versions get put out long before they would have in the “old days.” I’ll go back to my porch now…
07
Hi Joel,
There is something so sad about what you’ve written:
Most of that is true. Then why break your own clear mandate to try to kill someone else’s shareware application?
If you like, outcompete AppFresh by making MacUpdate Desktop better. But don’t abuse your position as arbitrar of the Mac shareware world. Or you might not compete very long.
You have lots of other revenue sources. Your bundles and your daily MuPromos. The way you’ve separated MuPromo from the main site and only advertised it on your own property keeps a healthy separation of church and state. That is not the case with barring applications which compete with those of you or your friends (Misha tried to protect his friend Tim Breslin’s TastyApps revenue by deleting comments about Tim’s software and customer service).
Where do you draw the line Joel?
At what point is a successful competing application judged a thread and eliminated from your database? If it’s yours, if it’s a friend’s, if someone pays you to do so. Where is that line, Joel?
That you are “developing software (some free and some shareware)” just makes your position as arbitrar of the MacUpdate database that much more untenable.
Had you been clever about it you could have coopted AppFresh by making some part of its functionality dependent on people having MacUpdate paid memberships, instead of banning it.
In terms of other companies behaving as badly as you are, I recommend you go and use Google right now. Look up “pay per click”. Among related searches, they show: “yahoo pay per click”. Look up “video sharing site” and wikipedia and metatube come in places one to three. Not YouTube.
Google does promote their own properties. But they don’t exclude other people’s properties. Yes, perhaps Bing would do something like that. But there’s a reason Microsoft is struggling and Google is thriving. And you Joel are on the wrong side of modern business philosophy.
Coming closer to home, Apple does publicise Windows and VMWare and Bootcamp right in their own store and all over their website.
What’s worse, barrring apps from MacUpdate just because you want that part of the shareware market is just the wrong thing to do. It’s a pity that you can’t see it. You have other revenue sources. Take a stand on principle, not short term revenues.
Don’t be so greedy. Your place in the sun is based entirely on trust and on your ethical standing. When MacFixIt did so, Versiontracker was replaced in a few years by MacUpdate. Learn from history and don’t abuse your position.
08
Hi John,
Thanks for stopping by.
Neither MacUpdate nor Versiontracker store most of the software on their own servers. For the most part, they are only serving a link to the software on the developer’s own server.
MacUpdate is a shareware listing service which purports to be open and inclusive (excluding only out and out illegal software and malware: go and check, all the DVD ripping software – a borderline case – is listed there).
In terms of application updates, I thoroughly agree with you. I’ve disabled automated version checking in most of my apps. In those that don’t let me turn it off, I’ve barred them from phoning home forever with Little Snitch. These constant microreleases are a huge burden on the user with more than ten apps.
I’m not master of the universe but I will call out a clear conflict of interest and bad behaviour when I see it.
09
I’ve used VersionTracker (AND MacFixIt) for years and ever since CNET took over it’s gone way, way down hill. MacFixIt is now a pitiful joke compared to what it once was..
I still use VT, but now use MacUpdate much more. It has far many more software listings everyday than VT.
Also, if the Flash and ads irritate you, do what I did…Install Click4Flash and Safari AdBlocker. Now I can opt to run Flash frames on web sites and see NO ads! Both are free and make web surfing faster and more pleasurable.
Leave a Reply