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From: dane@pangea.Stanford.EDU (Dane Spearing)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.misc
Subject: Re: StuffIt Deluxe
Message-ID: <1990Aug30.043630.4167@morrow.stanford.edu>
Date: 30 Aug 90 04:36:30 GMT
References: <2146@ux.acs.umn.edu> <1990Aug29.204448.23954@svc.portal.com> <5186@spt.entity.com>
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Organization: Stanford Univ. Earth Sciences
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In article <5186@spt.entity.com> mdc@spt.UUCP (Marty Connor) writes:
>I strongly favor a BOYCOTT of STUFFIT DELUXE[TM] for the purposes of
>distributing software until such time as their format is public
>domain, and it has at least been decided that it can be implemented
>efficiently on other platforms.
>
>The current situation is just a cheap way for Alladin (sic) and Raymond Lau
>to try and pull off another defacto standard under the guise of being
>nice guys.
>
(stuff deleted)

WOAH!!!  Slow down there!  Seems a few folks are getting a bit hot under
the collar about Alladin coming about with a commercial version of StuffIt.
First of all, let me say that I've been an avid and registered user of
StuffIt Classic for quite a few years, and have been quite happy with it.
Secondly, I did indeed purchase StuffIt Deluxe when it came out (albeit,
at a cheaper price, being an already registered user), and am quite happy
with it, as well.

I'm afraid I'm not in favor of a boycott for the following reasons:
(1) any public archive (eg - suemx) that is silly enough to encode/compress
    it's files with an only commrecially available product is just asking
    for failure.  No public archive would be stupid enough to do it.  Thus
    I sincerely doubt that the StuffIt Deluxe format will ever become as
    wide spread as StuffIt is now, and I think Aladdin knows it too.

(2) StuffIt Deluxe can decode and *encode* files in the StuffIt Classic
    format, which is already public domain.  Thus, anyone buying StuffIt
    Deluxe will still be able to uncompress and compress files in the
    old format to be uploaded to archives.

(3) Aladdin isn't abandoning the old StuffIt in favor of the new.
    It is still being supported (as much as shareware ever is), and is still
    used as the dominant compression technique in most archives.

(4) People seem to be overlooking the fact that StuffIt Deluxe also comes
    with a freely distributable product called "UnStuffIt Deluxe" which
    can (obviously) unstuff the new files.  (The only thing I think I would
    like to see Alladin do is distribute this on the net - they've already
    authorized free distribution by people that have purchased StuffIt
    Deluxe).

(5) Finally, I think that Aladdin has created and distributed StuffIt Deluxe
    more with the idea that it will be used as a personal archiving/backup/
    file protection tool rather than become the "new standard" for public
    archival purposes.

Disclaimer:  I am in no way associated with Aladdin Systems, Inc. or any
of it's associates.
--
       Dane Spearing        |  Dept of Geology      |    (415) 723-4092
<---------------------------|  Stanford University  |------------------------>
  dane@pangea.stanford.edu  |  Stanford, CA  94305  |  #include <disclaim.h>