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posted by janrinok on Thursday May 28 2015, @03:12PM   Printer-friendly
from the this-is-not-the-host-you-are-looking-for... dept.

Google, or someone using their hosting service, noted that SourceForge had established a mirror to the official GIMP-for-Windows site and were now offering downloads which contained adware:

It appears that +SourceForge took over the control of the 'GIMP for Windows' account and is now distributing an ads-enabled installer of GIMP. They also locked out original owner of the account, Jernej Simončič, who has been building the Windows versions of GIMP for our project for years.

So far they haven't replied to provide explanations. Therefore, we remind you again that GIMP only provides builds for Windows via its official Downloads page.

SourceForge's mirrored sites facility is described thus:

The Open Source Mirror Directory is an extension to our existing software directory, where we'll be mirroring projects that are not hosted on SourceForge, and SourceForge projects that have been abandoned.

The problem, though, is that GIMP-for-Windows is not an abandoned project, but moved from SourceForge to Google because the writers "had concerns about the presence of misleading third-party ads on SourceForge".

SourceForge has responded, acknowledging that Gimp-Win had abandoned SourceForge due to misleading ads and claim "They were not alone in those concerns — we were also concerned — leading us to establish a program to enable users and developers to help us remove misleading and confusing ads." They also admit "Mirrored projects are sometimes used to deliver easy-to-decline third-party offers..." which suggests that they have merely changed the way that they deliver their ads - but not necessarily the ad's content. So, some might say, they've rectified the situation by providing both misleading ads and misleading hosting.

SourceForge also say "Since our change to mirror GIMP-Win, we have received no requests by the original author to resume use of this project. We welcome further discussion about how SourceForge can best serve the GIMP-Win author." Perhaps letting the writer choose where he hosts his project would be a good place to start.

Sourceforge hijacks GIMP For Windows project, adds malware to downloads

SourceForge (SF) has taken over control of the GIMP for Windows SF project and is now distributing an adware/malwared installer for GIMP. They also locked out the maintainer, Jernej Simončiči. Sourceforge claims it was "abandoned" and they're providing a service by "mirroring" the original, though it's unclear how much value malware adds for the end user, rather than for SF. (This comes two years after SF claiming its malware was just "misunderstood".)

Since being busted, SF is now serving an .exe that matches that at the official download site.

Other projects recently hijacked by SF include many Apache projects (Allura, Derby, Directory Studio, the Apache HTTP server, Hadoop, OpenOffice, Solr, and Subversion); Mozilla Firefox, Thunderbird, and FireFTP; Evolution and Open-Xchange; Drupal and WordPress; Eclipse, Aptana, Komodo, MonoDevelop, and NetBeans; VLC, Audacious, Banshee.fm, Helix, and Tomahawk media players; and many others.


[Editor's Comment: First Submission and 2nd Submission. Submissions significantly edited before publication]

 
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 28 2015, @05:27PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 28 2015, @05:27PM (#189201)

    was thinking the same thing, although they have more than enough work to do here.

  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by NCommander on Thursday May 28 2015, @06:01PM

    by NCommander (2) Subscriber Badge <michael@casadevall.pro> on Thursday May 28 2015, @06:01PM (#189223) Homepage Journal

    We actually had this. I was against using github back at go live so the initial development of our branch of slashcode was on a copy of GForge which is a fork of the original VA Linux Sourcefrge.net. our github mirror became more popular than the gforge instance so I retired it a month after golive.

    If there was demand, a soylentcode site could be launched, though given the sheer amount of code hosting sites I'm not sure there is a lot of point ...

    --
    Still always moving
    • (Score: 1) by magamo on Thursday May 28 2015, @07:00PM

      by magamo (3037) on Thursday May 28 2015, @07:00PM (#189260)

      How about doing projects reporting/news site, ala freshmeat.net/freecode, since that is now defunct, and nothing quite like it, or as good as it has yet to appear. That may be a worthwhile thing.

      • (Score: 2) by NCommander on Thursday May 28 2015, @08:00PM

        by NCommander (2) Subscriber Badge <michael@casadevall.pro> on Thursday May 28 2015, @08:00PM (#189287) Homepage Journal

        We could do this once we deploy rehash and have proper nexus support if volunteers are willing to make submissions.

        --
        Still always moving
        • (Score: 2) by bryan on Thursday May 28 2015, @08:34PM

          by bryan (29) <bryan@pipedot.org> on Thursday May 28 2015, @08:34PM (#189309) Homepage Journal

          A few alternatives [ibiblio.org] popped up after the FreeCode demise. https://freshcode.club/ [freshcode.club] seems to be one of the more popular upstarts.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 29 2015, @08:22AM

            by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 29 2015, @08:22AM (#189566)

            Chaosesque Anthology uses freshcode

    • (Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Thursday May 28 2015, @07:36PM

      by nitehawk214 (1304) on Thursday May 28 2015, @07:36PM (#189270)

      What is wrong with Github?

      --
      "Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
      • (Score: 2) by NCommander on Thursday May 28 2015, @07:57PM

        by NCommander (2) Subscriber Badge <michael@casadevall.pro> on Thursday May 28 2015, @07:57PM (#189284) Homepage Journal

        I'm not the biggest fan of third party hosting services; I've been screwed over before. GitHub however makes a lot of got tasks stupidly easy and is more user friendly than GForge or just a git repo hosted on one of our servers

        --
        Still always moving
        • (Score: 2) by bryan on Thursday May 28 2015, @08:56PM

          by bryan (29) <bryan@pipedot.org> on Thursday May 28 2015, @08:56PM (#189328) Homepage Journal

          An alternative to relying on GitHub's service is to install GitLab Community Edition [gitlab.com] on your own server. The software is very similar to what GitHub is offering.

          Gitorious [wikipedia.org] (previously hosting a few large repositories such as QT) merged with GitLab [gitlab.com] a few months ago.

        • (Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Friday May 29 2015, @03:43AM

          by nitehawk214 (1304) on Friday May 29 2015, @03:43AM (#189478)

          Ahh yeah, this makes sense. I've been using BitBucket at work, which is mostly just a crashier slower GitHub. Though it is cheaper for small companies and great if you already have a Jira lifecycle.

          But yeah, if you are doing hosting, you might as well just run Git or a suite depending on what you really need.

          --
          "Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
    • (Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Friday May 29 2015, @12:44PM

      by LoRdTAW (3755) on Friday May 29 2015, @12:44PM (#189635) Journal

      I wouldn't bother with code hosting. Keep this site focused on news and discussion.

    • (Score: 2) by Reziac on Thursday June 18 2015, @02:50AM

      by Reziac (2489) on Thursday June 18 2015, @02:50AM (#197652) Homepage

      The point is that Soylent has built trust.

      --
      And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.