An ad plugin was stealing revenue for a year and I didn't even notice
1–10 of 195 posts
Re: An ad plugin was stealing revenue for a year and I didn't even notice
#2At least the plugin guy was reasonable-ish. That does sounds like a really odd experience. It does pay to always check all of the dependencies you are using and their terms. When I was younger I got hit by limits when using a free tier of a service, but they just throttled us which lost us users.
Re: An ad plugin was stealing revenue for a year and I didn't even notice
#3At least the plugin guy was reasonable-ish. That does sounds like a really odd experience. It does pay to always check all of the dependencies you are using and their terms. When I was younger I got hit by limits when using a free tier of a service, but they just throttled us which lost us users.
The plugin guy can afford to be reasonable-ish. It reduces the likelihood of the scam being publicly disclosed, and I'd wager that 99% of people never notice the plugin is doing this.
Re: An ad plugin was stealing revenue for a year and I didn't even notice
#4So he used code straight off GitHub, didn’t read the license terms, and then has the gall to call it “stealing” when the program does exactly as it says it would.
Either learn to read licenses, or have a list of approved licenses (MIT, GPL, etc.) and only use software thus licensed.
EDIT: What I mean above is the 2% which is specified in the “Licence Agreement” page – the article author is clearly considering this, too, to be “stealing”. Regarding the increase from 2% to 30%, that is way more questionable, and I do not defend it.
Re: An ad plugin was stealing revenue for a year and I didn't even notice
#5AdMob indeed. It does what it says on the tin.
Re: An ad plugin was stealing revenue for a year and I didn't even notice
#6So he used code straight off GitHub, didn’t read the license terms, and then has the gall to call it “stealing” when the program does exactly as it says it would. Either learn to read licenses, or have a list of approved licenses (MIT, GPL, etc.) and only use software thus licensed. EDIT: What I mean above is the 2% which is specified in the “Licence Agreement” page – the article author is clearly considering this, t…
The GitHub page said it would take 2% but actually took 30%. How is that "exactly as it says it would"?
Re: An ad plugin was stealing revenue for a year and I didn't even notice
#7At least the plugin guy was reasonable-ish. That does sounds like a really odd experience. It does pay to always check all of the dependencies you are using and their terms. When I was younger I got hit by limits when using a free tier of a service, but they just throttled us which lost us users.
The plugin guy can afford to be reasonable-ish. It reduces the likelihood of the scam being publicly disclosed, and I'd wager that 99% of people never notice the plugin is doing this.
How is it a “scam” if the terms are clearly posted?
EDIT: The percentage increase from 2% to 30% was not posted; I withdraw my opinion on that.
Re: An ad plugin was stealing revenue for a year and I didn't even notice
#8So he used code straight off GitHub, didn’t read the license terms, and then has the gall to call it “stealing” when the program does exactly as it says it would. Either learn to read licenses, or have a list of approved licenses (MIT, GPL, etc.) and only use software thus licensed. EDIT: What I mean above is the 2% which is specified in the “Licence Agreement” page – the article author is clearly considering this, t…
That's incorrect. The license stated he would share 2% of the ad traffic, but it looks like the plugin was taking 100%.
Re: An ad plugin was stealing revenue for a year and I didn't even notice
#9I'm of two minds about this. "Stealing" does seem to be a little too harsh given the plugin did say it would take a percentage if you make more than $1K and didn't buy a license. The 30% seems underhand (only because it's not spelled out in the repo) but I do understand the plugin author's position. Open source work, especially something like Ionic/Cordova/Capacitor plugins, are hard to make any money on and I've seen the GH issues for many cordova plugins, it's /rough/. Also there are so many things you need to support and edge cases that I can't even imagine the patience of someone maintaining one of those plugins.
I think it's clear the plugin author was/is happy to let the 2-30% stipulation fly under the radar and sit back and collect which doesn't sit great with me but also I kind of get it. I mean if you are going to take OS work and use it for your own gain (something I'm plenty guilty of myself I'll admit) then don't be surprised if not reading the license bites you in the butt.
In a perfect world OS devs wouldn't need to these methods to make it worth their time but we don't live in a such a world, people rarely donate to OS projects and expect issues/features to be added quickly and for free. People need money to exist and they don't owe you anything. Honestly if this plugin author had called out the 30% in their license I would say this blog author has no leg to stand on. As-is I'm glad the app developer got their money back and the plugin author should either stop charging more than 2% or update their license accordingly. But "stealing"? Too harsh, especially since you got your money back.
Re: An ad plugin was stealing revenue for a year and I didn't even notice
#10Stealing seems an almost libellous term for using a software with a revenue model the author did not bother checking out.