Every week we scour the web for really good, honest freeware. It gets harder and harder each week to find good clean – unbundled software. This week we found a program called GimpShop — and having used Gimp before we were intrigued by this new incarnation of Gimp which promised to be every good as Photoshop — only GimpShop is freeware.
Now EB and I both know there are few freeware programs that you like better than really good graphics programs — so we were anxious to give this software a spin and make it our freeware pick – if i was anywhere near as good as the reviews we read. But after going through its installation routine — we can’t believe anyone would give this program even a half a thumbs up –because this is one of the most annoying bundlers we’ve ever seen.
Even when I clicked “Cancel” the installation continued — it needed me to click yet another box confirming I wanted to stop. I didn’t confirm I wanted to stop the installation so it continued to download even though I clicked “Cancel”. Normally, with a legitimate program when you click cancel the installation stops and if you confirm you want to stop it the installer closes. Not with this program.
Instead of babbling on about how bad this program’s installation routine is, we’re going to give you a pictorial guide – and you can see for yourself how unbelievably bad this is.
GimpShop makes it look like it wants to put a shortcut to GimpShop on your desktop — but not so. Read the text circled.
GimpShop adds insult to injury when, at the end of the installation, they offer to put icons on your desktop so you can take advantage of other great offers. You have to figure that the programs bundled with GimpShop aren’t that great if they have slither their way on you computer like snakes.
This installation is an insult. If someone accepted all these “offers” there computers would be full of junkware. There isn’t a worthwhile program bundled with GimpShop.
We don’t care how good GimpShop is — we’ll never know because we wouldn’t trust any company who bundled there software in such a manner. GimpShop’s developers should be ashamed.
We’d have a lot more respect for these developers if they charged a small fee for the program — because calling GimpShop freeware, is a lie.
Thank you for the Cloudeight InfoAve alerts about bundlers like GimpShop. This app is a good example
of the deception and “shell games” that developers
have sunken to. I am encouraging all my friends to
make Cloudeight their home page, to read all your
InfoAve tips, and to support Cloudeight by making all
their Google searchs from this home page. Thanks, again!!
Thanks TC & EB for steering us clear of the potholes in the Internet highway. Every day we see more appearing and one wonders how long before they become impossible to miss by inexperienced computer users, unless they read your valued advice on a regular basis.
Normally I would say, it’s freeware, you gotta read the small print, always be careful, etc. But this is ridiculous! Sure the developers gotta make money, but this is deceptive and dishonest. I don’t know if “there oughta be a law”, but people definitely need to let developers know that this is not ok. The best way to do that is to walk away and use something else. It’s not a great way to make money if nobody uses it.