Download.com & Spyware

A question sent to me I would like to post publicly

Email:
"Download.com's New Software policy... No Adware.. No Spyware... and No Exceptions.. This Policy I agree with 100%.. Is Majorgeeks going to do the same..????? "


Reply:
"Majorgeeks has always been spyware free since day 1. Because of this, we feel no need to now brag about our policy, but rather simply stay the course we were founded on, testing applications before posting for quality purposes. An obvious exception to this is adware, which normally consist of cookies. We use some of these programs and if they are harmless, are allowed.

Unlike most other websites, we are dedicated to files that tweak, repair or enhance your computer, so posting spyware ridden apps would be counter-productive to our reason for existance. We also are relied on as a download site for years by many anti-spyware tools like Ad-Aware because of our policy.

Its nice to see Download.com and others climb on this bandwagon, 3 or so years after inflicting literally millions of people with spyware. A fine example is Messenger Plus, who we argued with publicly on our forums because we refused to post it, while download.com had it listed as millions of downloads. It is a shame these johnny come latelies do not also offer cash refunds to the same people they profited from for years. I hope you see the hypocrisy from the websites now saying they are spyware free? Its an admission of guilt and you should tread carefully at any website that profits from others misery.

Thanks for the note and I hope that clears it up.

Timothy Tibbetts (MajorGeeks.Com)
http://www.majorgeeks.com"

 

Only shame here is they are the 900 pound gorilla, so they say its so and people think its a great thing, I am simply dumbfounded they dont consider that their policy simply mean they have had no policy until recently, meaning from the dawn of spyware until a few weeks ago, it was ignored.

I was a bit disheartened to read that email from a person who thinks now that download.com is spyware free, everyone else, us included, should follow. IMHO we lead this charge from our start 3 years back and even further back with TweakFiles with our test before posting policy. I can only think of ONE other site who tests software and even rates when posting from years back... ONE other website. So everyone else is laughable. Its pissed off our fair share of authors telling them their programs do not meet our standards or are spyware ridden, but it appears theres enough visitors to make it worthwhile and we thank YOU for that. Please tell a friend about us if you are happy with the service we provide.

 

Well stated MA. We do not need to jump on any band wagon because we started the band wagon.

Geez! I wonder does download.com have a Spyware Forum where they help people cleanup all the crap they installed on their PC's over there years. I don't think so. Maybe they need to follow our lead!!!

 

900 pound gorillas are known for flinging poo.... good one

I saw they still had a few things there, my assumption is they have such a large database of files, they will have a hard time finding them all.

I guess it is still good for everyone at the end of the day, I just wish everyone had this policy from the day of discovery of spyware.

 

Thanks again everyone for your feedback.

Yes, I lay a huge blame on P2P file sharing networks, its so easy, but I blame a lot of it on the dot com crash leaving some smaller authors financially strapped and installing these sort of things to make money. When your doing million and millions of pageviews a day, you really have a responsibility to your readers who trust you. It's a real slap in the face of anyone who visited their website prior to this announcement. Imagine I move next door your house and do things like spy on you or occasionally break in and steal some personal info and then one day I knock on your door just to let you know that I will no longer do that anymore. I am thinking you might just be a wee bit upset?

 

Wow, thanks skifreak, cant beat a testimonial like that. There is no doubt we do this both because we love it and because we can make money ad it. Ad views pay, and we get commision on anything you buy where there is a Click To Buy link. We simply decided at the beginning that it is better in the long run to have 1\10th of the users we could have rather then infest people with spyware and crappy programs. So far, so good, thanks to people like yourself who get it and tell others about us. Cant say thanks enough!

 

Please do not post links to external sites when the downloads are available on MGs.

Also becareful of your choice of works. Ad-Aware SE is not "spyware" it is a spyware removal tool.