Today it is relatively easy to market your software (through a web site), distribute the software (via Internet downloads) and collect payment (using an online payment provider). It wasn’t so easy before the Internet existed. “Shareware” appeared in the 1980s as a way for small commercial developers to reach a large market.
Shareware was one of the surprises of the early personal computer industry. Who would have thought that you could make a living from software paid for on the honor system? Make it publicly available, invite people to make copies of it and give them to their friends, and base your income prospects on a little notice asking people to send you a few dollars if they found the program useful.
Michael Swaine, Dr Dobbs, January 2000
Early shareware pioneers including Andrew Fluegelman, Jim Knopf (Button), Bob Wallace and Marshall Magee proved the commercial viability of the shareware concept, reportedly making millions. Read more…
Andy Brice Announcements, Articles, Interviews, News ASP, News, shareware, software, try before you buy
Happy new year everyone! “Lets hope the year of the Tiger treats us better than the year of the Cow did!” 
, to quote Bill from Webmaster World.
I hope this year the ASP will become even more popular (this is also the main 2010 goal of Jim Coutu, the new Chairman of the Board of Directors of the ASP) and will welcome more software authors.
A few changes have happened inside the ASP board: it has a new Chairman and 3 new members have joined the Board for a two year term. Jim Coutu from GatorData Inc is the new Chairman of the Board of Directors for this year. The three new members who have been elected for the board, that I wish to welcome wholeheartedly, are:
A big thank you on behalf of everyone at ASP goes to the 3 members whose term ended in the Board of Directors, for all the enthusiastic work done in ASP: Henk Devos, Greg Weir and Dave Gjessing. Read more…
Adriana Iordan Announcements ASP, association, association of shareware professionals, shareware, software
The ASP funded the development of a software certification service called Safer Downloads (SD) through the trial stage.
It now wants to divest itself of this property and is soliciting bids to transfer ownership.
Up for sale, as a package, are the:
- saferdownloads.com (.net & .org) and safeshareware.com domain names (4 total)
- USPTO trademark registration of the seals
- ownership of the proprietary software and content used to power the site
- activity and test records, as they exist on site
All funds offered by initial prospective customers (less than 10) have been returned. Most bank balances have been recovered by the ASP. An existing CD (time deposit) will be recovered soon and so there are no financial assets transferring to buyer under this sale. Read more…
Dennis Reinhardt Announcements ASP, safer downloads, software
