> This is a “drive-by installer”, designed to catch less technical users and the unwary, to fill their computers with malware / junk ware / crime ware... To misquote Marge Simpson; “They not only crossed the line, they threw up on it.”

And after a little research, it's clear that this article throws up on the truth.

1) “drive-by installer” Drive-by installers don't require user to download and intall, and are definatelly not OPT-IN like this one

2) "malware / junk ware / crime ware" - He listed all of the wares, except the one that it is, offer-installer is adware.

I'm no fan of opt-in adware, but plenty of quality apps depend on it. I've been using daemon tools for almost 5 years now, and I've never had an issue with it. For such a trivial tool with opensource alternatives, most people won't pay, but developers needs to pay their bills and a little adware gets the job done.

For click bait garbage articles like this I wish HN had someway to unvote.

Your objection is a matter of degree, not definition. The author's point is that we are better than this in the OSS community... and it's a valid point. Peole shouldn't get things they didn't want when they use OSS. I join the author in calling shenanigans on this.

There is a clear distinction between malware (virus, trojans, and worms) and adware in the antivirus community. As this is neither drive-by nor malware, it's no stretch; it's an outright lie.

Who are you to say how open source authors make their money? While I'm not happy about this shady move by Dice, it's the sensationalist writing, full of misinformation that I was calling out.

> There is a clear distinction between malware (virus, trojans, and worms) and adware in the antivirus community.

Fortunately for everyone, the "antivirus community", which produces software I would also classify as malware, does not get to dictate how the rest of us use words.

>Fortunately for everyone, the "antivirus community", which produces software I would also classify as malware

Why? I know some are better or worse than others, but...

>There is a clear distinction between malware (virus, trojans, and worms) and adware in the antivirus community. As this is neither drive-by nor malware, it's no stretch; it's an outright lie.

To a user who has their machine slow to a creeping halt or behave in unexpected ways because of these "opt-in" daemon adware suites, that "distinction" breaks down very quickly.

If you use those kinds of tactics, you are taking CPU cycles from people who did not want them taken. Where I come from , we call that stealing - and it makes you something less than an honorable individual if you do it. I spent years working in tech support, so I have the understanding necessary to make that statement.

I am also a developer and I know there are more honest - and proven - ways to make a living with OSS that don't fall on that side of the "shady" line.

I repeat my charge of Shenanigans.

It's malware. No one wants adware and toolbars. Even if you ask politely and they say yes, no one wants that, and no one should have it. A spade is a spade.

More than that, when I see those kind of opt in/out adware or toolbar things in an installer, I immediately lose trust in the underlying software I'm trying to install. Guilt by association.

as i said in response to another post, i hate adware and toolbars as much as the next person, but semantics is important: malware is malicious software. a toolbar that i did not intend to install, but is not malicious, is not malware.

What do you think those toolbars do? Inspect and Inject javascript into webpages, send my web browsing history to their master servers. It cant imagine a toolbar that isn't malicious.

I consider this sort of software harmful, but there is definitely an important distinction between it and software that actively tries to steal your credit card numbers, run a botnet, or send spam email. We need a word specifically for software that makes an attempt to abide by the law and avoid any outright malice, yet exists in a sort of moral gray area.

I propose "grayware."

"Malware" as I understand it is basically a catch-all term for software that is harmful (hence "mal").

Don't these toolbars usually report your browsing habits anyway though? If so they are spyware which clearly makes them malware.

How about "junkware" or "crapware"?

And I thought these were already the terms we use for this type of software...

Barnacleware.

Adware becomes malware when it resists removal.

Malware distributed by IAC / Ask.com, which is Google's largest distribution partner. Some Googlers should pressure them with some do no evil.

Seems like the author just didn't really understand the most common definition of "drive-by installer".

Either way, I find those installer "offers" are pretty distasteful even when they are deployed by good people with good motives. Roughly what percent of the people who installed the Ask toolbar actually understood what it was and wanted it to be installed? Surely a minority...

Your objection to OP is semantics, the gist of his point is true. Asking for one thing and getting unnecessary other crap that eats your time removing is completely against the ethos of OSS. Who cares if it is "offer-installer adware", it is UNREQUESTED, UNWANTED, TIME CONSUMING and TRUST ERRODING.

If you're only using DT for mounting, give Virtual Clone Drive a shot. That with ImgBurn seems to take care of everything I need.

Last I checked, Virtual Clone Drive didn't have any sneaky opt-in/ out ad-ware in the installer.

ImgBurn recently changed to an adware / crapware installer which is set for opt-out. However, the dev was nice enough to post instructions in his forum on how to de-crapify the installer.

Good for Lightning UK! Growing up he was one of my heroes with DVD Decrypter. I hope he can make a few bucks on advertising with its spiritual successor.

This article is sensationalist BS. After a little research it's clear that DevShare is adware not malware.

Adware is a form of Malware.

Its not "opt-in" if you explicitly click "NO" and still get the malware installed all over your machine. Getting rid of it is not as simple as an uninstall..

That is what happened the very last time I tried to download something from SourceForce.. (SourceForge).

Yes, everyone please ban SourceForge.

The article may get some things twisted with some warez definitions, but the main problem is: a once trusted site lets users download a different software than anyone is searching for - this leads to confusion at first because users don't know what they are downloading and installing anyway...

HN has downvotes if you have over 500 karma. There's always the flag button to report content you consider unfit for HN (this article would match that criterion in your case).

There's no downvotes for stories only for comments. Or at least there isn't for me (3k karma).

Exactly and I wanted to "un-vote", remove my previous vote. I'm not happy about the adware, so I initially voted for the story, but after checking some sources I discovered the article was full of inaccuracies.

If correct, that's really, really bad. Trying to download some random project from there just gives me a .deb, though, which I am hardly going to install.

I imagine it's OS-sniffing, so any Windows users around to confirm?

This was discussed on Reddit after Sourceforge announced the new installer three weeks ago: http://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/1jk1gz/sourcefor... , several users confirmed the crapware in the installers.

I mentioned on Reddit that the Ask digital signature shows in the UAC dialog.

It appears to be some opt in program called DevShare.

Here's a link to the filezilla forums where the dev team appears to be justifying its use: https://forum.filezilla-project.org/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3024...

http://sourceforge.net/blog/today-we-offer-devshare-beta-a-s...

http://sourceforge.net/devshare/why

No, I don't think it's OS sniffing since downloading the windows version of for example Filezilla doesn't allow you to change mirror and as the article explained, downloads from some other url than Sourceforge (or a mirror).

I'm on OSX and when downloading the windows version from the repository, I get the same file as the author. Try it yourself here and download the .exe: http://sourceforge.net/projects/filezilla/files/FileZilla_Cl...