Defamation?
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I’m aiming to guage the opinion of software developers to a problem I am facing. I am still a student studying Computer Engineering and Science at university. I have a passion for software development and during my spare time I develop software on a contract basis. I am a director of an Australian company named PsychoSoft Pty. Ltd. We have developed a number of apps for local government as well as some private work. Earlier this year I developed a context menu shell extension for myself (to improve my own productivity). I made a little installer for it, posted it on my webspace and provided the link to a number of friends I thought would find it useful. Quite a number of them did, and they told their friends about it, and so on and so forth. It is probably important to note that I am still a student and presently we have enough work to keep me very busy, and as such we have not yet developed a company website. If you go to www.psychosoft.com.au[^] you will see the extent of our development. It consists solely of a boring under construction page with a link to the shell extension I wrote (so my friends could find it easily). This evening I stumbled across the following article which appears to have appeared in the Australian Financial Review on the 17th September of this year. While I respect the authors points and agree that many users will simply install or run anything and that this is a security concern, I do not appreciate some of his comments nor his tone. And although he concludes that he *thinks* my software is not malicious and even calls it a ‘very good little utility’, he has also referred to it as ‘a potential time bomb’. I feel some of the comments he has made are defamatory. And I also feel that he should have made an attempt to contact me before writing the article. As essentially a starting company, this negative publicity can not be good. The article can be found here: http://afr.com/it/2002/09/17/FFX97NU956D.html[^] I also stumbled across a pdf of the same article somewhere else. I would really appreciate the opinions of this community. Do you think the article is defamatory? Do you think I should do anything about it, even if it is providing my friendly feedback to the author? Do you think I should
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I’m aiming to guage the opinion of software developers to a problem I am facing. I am still a student studying Computer Engineering and Science at university. I have a passion for software development and during my spare time I develop software on a contract basis. I am a director of an Australian company named PsychoSoft Pty. Ltd. We have developed a number of apps for local government as well as some private work. Earlier this year I developed a context menu shell extension for myself (to improve my own productivity). I made a little installer for it, posted it on my webspace and provided the link to a number of friends I thought would find it useful. Quite a number of them did, and they told their friends about it, and so on and so forth. It is probably important to note that I am still a student and presently we have enough work to keep me very busy, and as such we have not yet developed a company website. If you go to www.psychosoft.com.au[^] you will see the extent of our development. It consists solely of a boring under construction page with a link to the shell extension I wrote (so my friends could find it easily). This evening I stumbled across the following article which appears to have appeared in the Australian Financial Review on the 17th September of this year. While I respect the authors points and agree that many users will simply install or run anything and that this is a security concern, I do not appreciate some of his comments nor his tone. And although he concludes that he *thinks* my software is not malicious and even calls it a ‘very good little utility’, he has also referred to it as ‘a potential time bomb’. I feel some of the comments he has made are defamatory. And I also feel that he should have made an attempt to contact me before writing the article. As essentially a starting company, this negative publicity can not be good. The article can be found here: http://afr.com/it/2002/09/17/FFX97NU956D.html[^] I also stumbled across a pdf of the same article somewhere else. I would really appreciate the opinions of this community. Do you think the article is defamatory? Do you think I should do anything about it, even if it is providing my friendly feedback to the author? Do you think I should
I don't know if the person you refer to is right or not (going to read the article later), but there is one thing I can tell you right now : I gave a glance through your link to your site homepage and, against all odds, you simply provide a link to a .exe file and don't make yourself liable and accountable for the issues that may occur due to the installation of this software program. Don't get me wrong, I haven't tested your software and thus won't say anything about it. But I am telling that you way you promote it (no feature list at all for instance) is very UNLIKELY to make people feel like downloading it, first, and then installing it. Unless of course they are totally blind, geek, or both. A good thing to would be to make sure your program installs without admin rights, so at least if I install it with reduced rights (no registry access unless explicitely permitted, etc.) we can trust much more already about the fact your program is not a virus or whatever one might think of. [edit]I have just read the article you refer to. The author is probably on the conservative side, but as a matter of fact I have exactly the same feelings about PsychoFolder than him. You can't seriously expect that a program downloaded from a blank website (no reliability, no feature list, ...), a silent install, no documentation, and no user-friendly way of telling the user you are now working, to be taken as granted. As is, this program is not welcome on my machine, regardless of the feature(s) it has. What you are doing is the same than publishing a codeproject article with no content, only a .exe in the zip file. You would be flamed, and soon your article would be removed from the list. PS : I don't see your point with "defamation". As a former shareware author, if I had distributed my programs that way, I am pretty sure I would have been flamed end-to-end, deservedly.[/edit]
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I don't know if the person you refer to is right or not (going to read the article later), but there is one thing I can tell you right now : I gave a glance through your link to your site homepage and, against all odds, you simply provide a link to a .exe file and don't make yourself liable and accountable for the issues that may occur due to the installation of this software program. Don't get me wrong, I haven't tested your software and thus won't say anything about it. But I am telling that you way you promote it (no feature list at all for instance) is very UNLIKELY to make people feel like downloading it, first, and then installing it. Unless of course they are totally blind, geek, or both. A good thing to would be to make sure your program installs without admin rights, so at least if I install it with reduced rights (no registry access unless explicitely permitted, etc.) we can trust much more already about the fact your program is not a virus or whatever one might think of. [edit]I have just read the article you refer to. The author is probably on the conservative side, but as a matter of fact I have exactly the same feelings about PsychoFolder than him. You can't seriously expect that a program downloaded from a blank website (no reliability, no feature list, ...), a silent install, no documentation, and no user-friendly way of telling the user you are now working, to be taken as granted. As is, this program is not welcome on my machine, regardless of the feature(s) it has. What you are doing is the same than publishing a codeproject article with no content, only a .exe in the zip file. You would be flamed, and soon your article would be removed from the list. PS : I don't see your point with "defamation". As a former shareware author, if I had distributed my programs that way, I am pretty sure I would have been flamed end-to-end, deservedly.[/edit]
.S.Rod. wrote: But I am telling that you way you promote it (no feature list at all for instance) is very UNLIKELY to make people feel like downloading it, first, and then installing it. I'll certainly agree with that. I have not made any attempt to promote this software because i simply haven't found the time to bother. I stuck it on the web and told my friends about it, informing them what it did either verbally or a quick blurb in an email. They have downloaded it, liked it and then told their friends what it does... As i said, i have been intending to make a web page and then promote it a little. But I just haven't had time. .S.Rod. wrote: A good thing to would be to make sure your program installs without admin rights, so at least if I install it with reduced rights (no registry access unless explicitely permitted, etc.) we can trust much more already about the fact your program is not a virus or whatever one might think of. The install copies one file (a dll) and then registers this dll in the windows registry as a context menu shell extension for folders. I realise registry access could be seen as a potential bad sign - but it has to be done to register a shell extension.
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.S.Rod. wrote: But I am telling that you way you promote it (no feature list at all for instance) is very UNLIKELY to make people feel like downloading it, first, and then installing it. I'll certainly agree with that. I have not made any attempt to promote this software because i simply haven't found the time to bother. I stuck it on the web and told my friends about it, informing them what it did either verbally or a quick blurb in an email. They have downloaded it, liked it and then told their friends what it does... As i said, i have been intending to make a web page and then promote it a little. But I just haven't had time. .S.Rod. wrote: A good thing to would be to make sure your program installs without admin rights, so at least if I install it with reduced rights (no registry access unless explicitely permitted, etc.) we can trust much more already about the fact your program is not a virus or whatever one might think of. The install copies one file (a dll) and then registers this dll in the windows registry as a context menu shell extension for folders. I realise registry access could be seen as a potential bad sign - but it has to be done to register a shell extension.
Alex Deem wrote: not made any attempt to promote this software because i simply haven't found the time to bother Coding a software program is only 50% of the whole job. Another 50% is required to "advertise", or qualify your program. Sadly, the effects of this daily job are only rewarded in the long term. That's at least what I have learned from the past as a shareware/freeware author. Alex Deem wrote: The install copies one file (a dll) and then registers this dll in the windows registry as a context menu shell extension for folders. I realise registry access could be seen as a potential bad sign - but it has to be done to register a shell extension. I am afraid that namespace extensions or browser helper objects are not welcome because, regardless of the feature(s), they impact so deeply users when they use WindowsExplorer or InternetExplorer that it's almost best to live without them. Ironically, a total Windows Explorer replacement would be better for instance, since visually people would figure out better what they install, and what they can uninstall. My suggestion is you automatically open a readme.txt document when PsychoFolder is installed, and provide full details of what is installed, how to use it (even if that looks obvious), and how to uninstall it (shortcut to add/remove programs, plus the manual procedure : all the registry keys to be removed, and the fully qualified filename).
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Alex Deem wrote: not made any attempt to promote this software because i simply haven't found the time to bother Coding a software program is only 50% of the whole job. Another 50% is required to "advertise", or qualify your program. Sadly, the effects of this daily job are only rewarded in the long term. That's at least what I have learned from the past as a shareware/freeware author. Alex Deem wrote: The install copies one file (a dll) and then registers this dll in the windows registry as a context menu shell extension for folders. I realise registry access could be seen as a potential bad sign - but it has to be done to register a shell extension. I am afraid that namespace extensions or browser helper objects are not welcome because, regardless of the feature(s), they impact so deeply users when they use WindowsExplorer or InternetExplorer that it's almost best to live without them. Ironically, a total Windows Explorer replacement would be better for instance, since visually people would figure out better what they install, and what they can uninstall. My suggestion is you automatically open a readme.txt document when PsychoFolder is installed, and provide full details of what is installed, how to use it (even if that looks obvious), and how to uninstall it (shortcut to add/remove programs, plus the manual procedure : all the registry keys to be removed, and the fully qualified filename).
.S.Rod. wrote: Coding a software program is only 50% of the whole job. Another 50% is required to "advertise", or qualify your program. Sadly, the effects of this daily job are only rewarded in the long term. That's at least what I have learned from the past as a shareware/freeware author. This is the first piece of software i have written that has been released to a public audience, and that has sort of happened accidently. I guess in hindsight it is easy to see that telling a few friends to try it out can lead to a large number of users. Six Degrees right? :) .S.Rod. wrote: My suggestion is you automatically open a readme.txt document when PsychoFolder is installed, and provide full details of what is installed, how to use it (even if that looks obvious), and how to uninstall it (shortcut to add/remove programs, plus the manual procedure : all the registry keys to be removed, and the fully qualified filename). Thanks for the suggestion. I think the readme file is a great idea. I think I'm going to push promoting the software up my list of priorities, seeing as it has already been doing and OK job of promoting itself! Cheers, Alex
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I’m aiming to guage the opinion of software developers to a problem I am facing. I am still a student studying Computer Engineering and Science at university. I have a passion for software development and during my spare time I develop software on a contract basis. I am a director of an Australian company named PsychoSoft Pty. Ltd. We have developed a number of apps for local government as well as some private work. Earlier this year I developed a context menu shell extension for myself (to improve my own productivity). I made a little installer for it, posted it on my webspace and provided the link to a number of friends I thought would find it useful. Quite a number of them did, and they told their friends about it, and so on and so forth. It is probably important to note that I am still a student and presently we have enough work to keep me very busy, and as such we have not yet developed a company website. If you go to www.psychosoft.com.au[^] you will see the extent of our development. It consists solely of a boring under construction page with a link to the shell extension I wrote (so my friends could find it easily). This evening I stumbled across the following article which appears to have appeared in the Australian Financial Review on the 17th September of this year. While I respect the authors points and agree that many users will simply install or run anything and that this is a security concern, I do not appreciate some of his comments nor his tone. And although he concludes that he *thinks* my software is not malicious and even calls it a ‘very good little utility’, he has also referred to it as ‘a potential time bomb’. I feel some of the comments he has made are defamatory. And I also feel that he should have made an attempt to contact me before writing the article. As essentially a starting company, this negative publicity can not be good. The article can be found here: http://afr.com/it/2002/09/17/FFX97NU956D.html[^] I also stumbled across a pdf of the same article somewhere else. I would really appreciate the opinions of this community. Do you think the article is defamatory? Do you think I should do anything about it, even if it is providing my friendly feedback to the author? Do you think I should
My opinion is that seeing as the newspaper controls the media, any attempt to pursue this will make you look worse, because they will be careful to slant it in such a way as to make it look like you're upset that the 'truth' has been revealed. Life is not fair, and the media are scum. Sorry. Christian No offense, but I don't really want to encourage the creation of another VB developer. - Larry Antram 22 Oct 2002 Hey, at least Logo had, at it's inception, a mechanical turtle. VB has always lacked even that... - Shog9 04-09-2002 Again, you can screw up a C/C++ program just as easily as a VB program. OK, maybe not as easily, but it's certainly doable. - Jamie Nordmeyer - 15-Nov-2002
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I’m aiming to guage the opinion of software developers to a problem I am facing. I am still a student studying Computer Engineering and Science at university. I have a passion for software development and during my spare time I develop software on a contract basis. I am a director of an Australian company named PsychoSoft Pty. Ltd. We have developed a number of apps for local government as well as some private work. Earlier this year I developed a context menu shell extension for myself (to improve my own productivity). I made a little installer for it, posted it on my webspace and provided the link to a number of friends I thought would find it useful. Quite a number of them did, and they told their friends about it, and so on and so forth. It is probably important to note that I am still a student and presently we have enough work to keep me very busy, and as such we have not yet developed a company website. If you go to www.psychosoft.com.au[^] you will see the extent of our development. It consists solely of a boring under construction page with a link to the shell extension I wrote (so my friends could find it easily). This evening I stumbled across the following article which appears to have appeared in the Australian Financial Review on the 17th September of this year. While I respect the authors points and agree that many users will simply install or run anything and that this is a security concern, I do not appreciate some of his comments nor his tone. And although he concludes that he *thinks* my software is not malicious and even calls it a ‘very good little utility’, he has also referred to it as ‘a potential time bomb’. I feel some of the comments he has made are defamatory. And I also feel that he should have made an attempt to contact me before writing the article. As essentially a starting company, this negative publicity can not be good. The article can be found here: http://afr.com/it/2002/09/17/FFX97NU956D.html[^] I also stumbled across a pdf of the same article somewhere else. I would really appreciate the opinions of this community. Do you think the article is defamatory? Do you think I should do anything about it, even if it is providing my friendly feedback to the author? Do you think I should
Personally I find nothing wrong with the article. It basically states what to be carefull about and does state that your app looks good but does not have any info to make one feel comfortable. That is the point of the article, not any comments towards you. I have to agree with the article. May I suggest on your web site you state what you have said here. PsychoSoft Pty. Ltd. provides custom development for private firms. This is being provide to share with friends and should not be considered a product of PsychoSoft. Or something like that. "I will find a new sig someday."
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I’m aiming to guage the opinion of software developers to a problem I am facing. I am still a student studying Computer Engineering and Science at university. I have a passion for software development and during my spare time I develop software on a contract basis. I am a director of an Australian company named PsychoSoft Pty. Ltd. We have developed a number of apps for local government as well as some private work. Earlier this year I developed a context menu shell extension for myself (to improve my own productivity). I made a little installer for it, posted it on my webspace and provided the link to a number of friends I thought would find it useful. Quite a number of them did, and they told their friends about it, and so on and so forth. It is probably important to note that I am still a student and presently we have enough work to keep me very busy, and as such we have not yet developed a company website. If you go to www.psychosoft.com.au[^] you will see the extent of our development. It consists solely of a boring under construction page with a link to the shell extension I wrote (so my friends could find it easily). This evening I stumbled across the following article which appears to have appeared in the Australian Financial Review on the 17th September of this year. While I respect the authors points and agree that many users will simply install or run anything and that this is a security concern, I do not appreciate some of his comments nor his tone. And although he concludes that he *thinks* my software is not malicious and even calls it a ‘very good little utility’, he has also referred to it as ‘a potential time bomb’. I feel some of the comments he has made are defamatory. And I also feel that he should have made an attempt to contact me before writing the article. As essentially a starting company, this negative publicity can not be good. The article can be found here: http://afr.com/it/2002/09/17/FFX97NU956D.html[^] I also stumbled across a pdf of the same article somewhere else. I would really appreciate the opinions of this community. Do you think the article is defamatory? Do you think I should do anything about it, even if it is providing my friendly feedback to the author? Do you think I should
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I don't know if the person you refer to is right or not (going to read the article later), but there is one thing I can tell you right now : I gave a glance through your link to your site homepage and, against all odds, you simply provide a link to a .exe file and don't make yourself liable and accountable for the issues that may occur due to the installation of this software program. Don't get me wrong, I haven't tested your software and thus won't say anything about it. But I am telling that you way you promote it (no feature list at all for instance) is very UNLIKELY to make people feel like downloading it, first, and then installing it. Unless of course they are totally blind, geek, or both. A good thing to would be to make sure your program installs without admin rights, so at least if I install it with reduced rights (no registry access unless explicitely permitted, etc.) we can trust much more already about the fact your program is not a virus or whatever one might think of. [edit]I have just read the article you refer to. The author is probably on the conservative side, but as a matter of fact I have exactly the same feelings about PsychoFolder than him. You can't seriously expect that a program downloaded from a blank website (no reliability, no feature list, ...), a silent install, no documentation, and no user-friendly way of telling the user you are now working, to be taken as granted. As is, this program is not welcome on my machine, regardless of the feature(s) it has. What you are doing is the same than publishing a codeproject article with no content, only a .exe in the zip file. You would be flamed, and soon your article would be removed from the list. PS : I don't see your point with "defamation". As a former shareware author, if I had distributed my programs that way, I am pretty sure I would have been flamed end-to-end, deservedly.[/edit]
.S.Rod. wrote: you simply provide a link to a .exe file and don't make yourself liable and accountable for the issues that may occur due to the installation of this software program. I really don't get where you get these ideas from. Are people in France only liable for their actions when they accept that they are ? He is liable for the actions of his software, if he says so or not. Saying he accepts liability only implies there is something to be liable for. Christian No offense, but I don't really want to encourage the creation of another VB developer. - Larry Antram 22 Oct 2002 Hey, at least Logo had, at it's inception, a mechanical turtle. VB has always lacked even that... - Shog9 04-09-2002 Again, you can screw up a C/C++ program just as easily as a VB program. OK, maybe not as easily, but it's certainly doable. - Jamie Nordmeyer - 15-Nov-2002
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Must have been a slow day for the guy who wrote this! You get what you pay for I guess. If he didn't like what he found when he got to your website he should have moved on to http://www.menwholooklikekennyrogers.com/[^] Joel
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I’m aiming to guage the opinion of software developers to a problem I am facing. I am still a student studying Computer Engineering and Science at university. I have a passion for software development and during my spare time I develop software on a contract basis. I am a director of an Australian company named PsychoSoft Pty. Ltd. We have developed a number of apps for local government as well as some private work. Earlier this year I developed a context menu shell extension for myself (to improve my own productivity). I made a little installer for it, posted it on my webspace and provided the link to a number of friends I thought would find it useful. Quite a number of them did, and they told their friends about it, and so on and so forth. It is probably important to note that I am still a student and presently we have enough work to keep me very busy, and as such we have not yet developed a company website. If you go to www.psychosoft.com.au[^] you will see the extent of our development. It consists solely of a boring under construction page with a link to the shell extension I wrote (so my friends could find it easily). This evening I stumbled across the following article which appears to have appeared in the Australian Financial Review on the 17th September of this year. While I respect the authors points and agree that many users will simply install or run anything and that this is a security concern, I do not appreciate some of his comments nor his tone. And although he concludes that he *thinks* my software is not malicious and even calls it a ‘very good little utility’, he has also referred to it as ‘a potential time bomb’. I feel some of the comments he has made are defamatory. And I also feel that he should have made an attempt to contact me before writing the article. As essentially a starting company, this negative publicity can not be good. The article can be found here: http://afr.com/it/2002/09/17/FFX97NU956D.html[^] I also stumbled across a pdf of the same article somewhere else. I would really appreciate the opinions of this community. Do you think the article is defamatory? Do you think I should do anything about it, even if it is providing my friendly feedback to the author? Do you think I should
Peter Moon is IT special counsel in Abbott Stillman & Wilson Lawyers. Feedback to peter.moon@privacy.com.au Well I think it says it all. Lets see 1. He didn't run a virus checker over the installer. 2. He didn't monitor the registry to check the changes. 3. He was not in a sandbox 4. He downloaded a program over the internet, not knowing the circumstances. 5, He-didn't check the dll out after installing it. How the flip can this guy be an IT special counsel. Is he a dork or what ? I'm gonna do a scan for more of this experts opinions to build a case on the guy. As be appears to me to be a charlatan . Regardz Colin J Davies
Sonork ID 100.9197:Colin
You are the intrepid one, always willing to leap into the fray! A serious character flaw, I might add, but entertaining. Said by Roger Wright about me.
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Peter Moon is IT special counsel in Abbott Stillman & Wilson Lawyers. Feedback to peter.moon@privacy.com.au Well I think it says it all. Lets see 1. He didn't run a virus checker over the installer. 2. He didn't monitor the registry to check the changes. 3. He was not in a sandbox 4. He downloaded a program over the internet, not knowing the circumstances. 5, He-didn't check the dll out after installing it. How the flip can this guy be an IT special counsel. Is he a dork or what ? I'm gonna do a scan for more of this experts opinions to build a case on the guy. As be appears to me to be a charlatan . Regardz Colin J Davies
Sonork ID 100.9197:Colin
You are the intrepid one, always willing to leap into the fray! A serious character flaw, I might add, but entertaining. Said by Roger Wright about me.
He writes a weekly column called 'Hands On' for the Australian Financial Review (appears in the IT section on Tuesdays). He also appears fortnightly on ABC Melbourne talk back radio helping people fix their computer woes. I'm going to listen to one of his broadcasts in the hope it is amusing :) Here is a page briefly about him courtesy of the law firm he works for. http://www.asw.net.au/people/peter_moon.shtml[^] Enjoy yourself :p ~Alex
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He writes a weekly column called 'Hands On' for the Australian Financial Review (appears in the IT section on Tuesdays). He also appears fortnightly on ABC Melbourne talk back radio helping people fix their computer woes. I'm going to listen to one of his broadcasts in the hope it is amusing :) Here is a page briefly about him courtesy of the law firm he works for. http://www.asw.net.au/people/peter_moon.shtml[^] Enjoy yourself :p ~Alex
Thanks, so he is a well known charlatan AFAIMC May be it would be good to open a site www.it_charletons.org to expose these people. My local radio show has one also, great journalist but biased and absolutely useless advice. These people are leeches. I agree your App was presented badly by you, but you were not promoting it. So if he didn't know you, why didn't he contact you to find out about it first. Why didn't he use the other steps I suggested in a prior post before installing it. Regardz Colin J Davies
Sonork ID 100.9197:Colin
You are the intrepid one, always willing to leap into the fray! A serious character flaw, I might add, but entertaining. Said by Roger Wright about me.
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Thanks, so he is a well known charlatan AFAIMC May be it would be good to open a site www.it_charletons.org to expose these people. My local radio show has one also, great journalist but biased and absolutely useless advice. These people are leeches. I agree your App was presented badly by you, but you were not promoting it. So if he didn't know you, why didn't he contact you to find out about it first. Why didn't he use the other steps I suggested in a prior post before installing it. Regardz Colin J Davies
Sonork ID 100.9197:Colin
You are the intrepid one, always willing to leap into the fray! A serious character flaw, I might add, but entertaining. Said by Roger Wright about me.
Colin Davies wrote: Thanks, so he is a well known charlatan AFAIMC Isn't that the only type?! X| Colin Davies wrote: I agree your App was presented badly by you, but you were not promoting it. Exactly. And while i do agree with the general message of his article i think he should have chosen an example which was in fact malicious, or at least done some respectable research into the behaviour of my app. I'm listening to a streaming version of his last broadcast and it seems that this guy is similar to the one on your local station. IMHO its almost impossible to solve computer related problems in 2 minutes of talkback! He's offering advice like 'upgrade your OS' and even telling one guy that he needs a rebuild. ICK... it's 9pm, still 30 degrees and i'm sweating like an elephant, think i'll head for the pool :-D
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I’m aiming to guage the opinion of software developers to a problem I am facing. I am still a student studying Computer Engineering and Science at university. I have a passion for software development and during my spare time I develop software on a contract basis. I am a director of an Australian company named PsychoSoft Pty. Ltd. We have developed a number of apps for local government as well as some private work. Earlier this year I developed a context menu shell extension for myself (to improve my own productivity). I made a little installer for it, posted it on my webspace and provided the link to a number of friends I thought would find it useful. Quite a number of them did, and they told their friends about it, and so on and so forth. It is probably important to note that I am still a student and presently we have enough work to keep me very busy, and as such we have not yet developed a company website. If you go to www.psychosoft.com.au[^] you will see the extent of our development. It consists solely of a boring under construction page with a link to the shell extension I wrote (so my friends could find it easily). This evening I stumbled across the following article which appears to have appeared in the Australian Financial Review on the 17th September of this year. While I respect the authors points and agree that many users will simply install or run anything and that this is a security concern, I do not appreciate some of his comments nor his tone. And although he concludes that he *thinks* my software is not malicious and even calls it a ‘very good little utility’, he has also referred to it as ‘a potential time bomb’. I feel some of the comments he has made are defamatory. And I also feel that he should have made an attempt to contact me before writing the article. As essentially a starting company, this negative publicity can not be good. The article can be found here: http://afr.com/it/2002/09/17/FFX97NU956D.html[^] I also stumbled across a pdf of the same article somewhere else. I would really appreciate the opinions of this community. Do you think the article is defamatory? Do you think I should do anything about it, even if it is providing my friendly feedback to the author? Do you think I should
As others have pointed out, IMO it's a matter of liability. I find nothing wrong with the utility, per se, but you've posted it on the main page of your company's web site. If that doesn't have "endorsed" written all over it, I don't know what does. To anyone who knows nothing about "Psychosoft Pty. Ltd.", this is what they produce and market. Well, obviously, even for those who know nothing about the company, there's gotta be more to it than this one small utility, but the impression it makes is that the utility is part of it. I've learned a long time ago to distance myself, as a developer, from the company I work for--I don't represent them and they shouldn't be held liable for any of the little utilities I write in my spare time. I've written plenty of quick-and-dirty utilities (none with a "proper" setup program or even a readme), but I went out of my way to ensure than none of them would ever be associated with the company I work for, past, present or future. At a minimum, if you want to put your utility "out there", and insist on using your company's web site as a host, then the minimum you should do is not to post a link to it. If you want to share it with your friends, provide them with a direct link in an email or such--but don't post a URL to the main page of your company's site. If, on the other hand, you *want* as many people as possible to try out your utility, then make the disclaimers obvious. And as a golden rule, don't use your company's name in your own personal projects. Ever.