SourceForge stops adware on abandoned projects
Download site SourceForge announces that from now on it will only bundle its ad installer with programs with explicit permission from the owner. Last week there was criticism after GIMP was suddenly bundled with advertisements.
SourceForge promises in a blog post that it will no longer redirect download pages that it maintains itself to installers that contain ads, due to negative user feedback. “At this time, we only show third-party offers on some software projects, where the developer has explicitly consented, or when the project already contains such offers.”
The service was criticized last week after GIMP developer Jernej Simončič, responsible for the photo-editing program’s Windows installer, found he could no longer log in to the project’s SourceForge page. The page had been taken over by a SourceForge employee, and now served a version of GIMP packaged in SourceForge’s proprietary installer with ads.
SourceForge responded that the site didn’t hijack GIMP’s page, but just wanted to keep the project up to date. Since Simončič hadn’t updated the GIMP project page on Sourceforge for over a year and a half, the download site had set up a mirror. The site does the same with more software. Other well-known open source software such as Mozilla Firefox, audio editing program Audacity and media player VLC are also offered unofficially. The site stated in the blog post that these types of mirrors are always clearly identifiable as such and that it had not received a request from Simončič to bring the project page back into use.
In a statement on the official GIMP website, the developers state that they never agree to any ads in the installer. “SourceForge abuses the trust we and our users have placed in the service in the past,” the developers said. They invoke SourceForge to give project owners a way to pull projects off the site completely, without having to use a mirror instead.
SourceForge started its own installer in July 2013, after it was acquired by internet company Dice in September 2012. The company announced at the time that project owners would have to agree to the alternative installation method themselves; in return they would get a share of the ad revenue. Incidentally, users can also use the original installer on projects with the SourceForge installer when they click a small link below the normal download button.
The introduction of the proprietary installer was one of the reasons GIMP’s developers stopped updating the SourceForge page since 2013. The developers also disagreed with the ads on the site; according to them, SourceForge posted deceptive ads, trying to trick users with fake download buttons. Although SourceForge claims to tackle dubious advertisements, it doesn’t seem to do much for the time being. The download page continues to display banners that redirect the user to unofficial download pages of known software.
The SourceForge installer, here with an offer for Yahoo products when installing the Miranda IM chat program.