September 17th, 2008 by Mordy Gilden
Software development communities are what make an open platform OS great.
In the Windows Mobile world, XDA-developers member A_C, is famous for developing iPhone-UI inspired applications known as the S2 series (S2Play, S2U2, S2View). A_C distributes these completely free of charge for the benefit of the community and WM users everywhere, and are in a constant state of “under development”, despite being more stable than some commercial products out there.
The problem is, some unscrupulous people have decided to take advantage of A_C’s free software policy, and sell them as packages of “iPhone theme” bundles.
These bundles are being sold on a number of websites, from www.iphonethemeforppc.com to ebay. A_C has been trying in vain to put a stop to it, but its too large a task for one man.
So, in retaliation, A_C has decided to stop all development of the S2 series unless people learn their lesson.
Since A_C’s applications have a large cult following in the WM community, this whole fiasco has created the internet-version of an angry mob. Users on various message boards have started banding together to harass anyone on net who has the audacity to steal A_C’s software to profit from it.
As far as I know, this may be the first time a strength-in-numbers approach such as this has applied to software development. Meanwhile, S2 development has indeed stopped, leaving some users who were looking forward to compatibility updates (Treo 800w users, I feel your pain) devastated.
The moral of the story?
You ultimately hurt yourself in the end by preventing any future updates.
For the sake of continuing development, don’t steal software! Its bad, m’kay?
