IF A CERTAIN APPLICATION IS REQUESTED AND NO FREEWARE EXISTS BUT AN ADWARE, DEMO WARE OR COMMERCIAL VERSION DOES, SHOULD WE MENTION IT ?
No. (17) WHY ? Mainly because it isn’t needed. (A) Almost every program has a freeware counterpart. (B) If *you* don’t know a freeware solution it doesn’t follow that there isn’t one. (C) People who go to a freeware newsgroup expect to find out about freeware. There are newsgroups for the discussion of adware, spyware, shareware etc. for people who have these interests. (D) In the unlikely event that freeware isn’t available then the lack of response to the poster’s query should suggest to him/her that that is the case. This means that he/she should be looking elsewhere for his/her program and/or ask again a few months later (in case something new is written in the mean time). (E) If you think that a poster should know about a non freeware option then you can email him/her your suggestion. This saves readers of the group bandwith and the time to read about non freeware options.
Related Questions
- I need a pure OSS (open source) version of my product; however for certain customers, I also need to offer commercial licensing with no LGPL components. What should I do?
- IF A CERTAIN APPLICATION IS REQUESTED AND NO FREEWARE EXISTS BUT AN ADWARE, DEMO WARE OR COMMERCIAL VERSION DOES, SHOULD WE MENTION IT ?
- Why do certain functions in my SE version (a full version according to the magazine) only run in demo mode?
