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61-399: Day-to-day management of the organization was balanced between the senior full-time staff: business manager Harry Critchfield, technical manager Steve Costa, and support manager Randy Simon. BMUG's finances and business operations were managed by Harry Critchfield and Alisa Schulman, better known for her role as a DJ at KALX . In 1995 Anne Wrixon replaced Harry Critchfield, and in 1997, Wrixon

122-751: A BMUG kit, before being productized by Farallon and then Macromedia . BMUG was famous for lively meetings, "We are in the business of giving away information" motto, "BMUG Awards", its great MacWorld Expo get-togethers, CD and book publishing , 400+ page biannual " newsletters " akin to the Whole Earth Catalog , and one of the largest shareware collections for Macintosh Public domain software sold to members and customers on floppy disks . These meetings are often cited by tech notables as their introduction to technology. BMUG hosted an enthusiastic weekly Thursday night meeting with questions and answers, and software demonstrations by vendors, followed at

183-412: A certain level representing the end of the trial period. Racks of games on single 5 1/4-inch and later 3.5-inch floppy disks were common in retail stores. However, computer shows and bulletin board systems (BBS) such as Software Creations BBS were the primary distributors of low-cost software. Free software from a BBS was the motivating force for consumers to purchase a computer equipped with

244-431: A column, The Public Library , about such software. Public domain is a misnomer for shareware, and Freeware was trademarked by Fluegelman and could not be used legally by others, and User-Supported Software was too cumbersome. So columnist Nelson Ford had a contest to come up with a better name. The most popular name submitted was Shareware , which was being used by Wallace. However, Wallace acknowledged that he got

305-504: A fixture in BMUG's technical services, and his son Frank continued that tradition into a second generation. BMUG maintained a Macintosh support call-center, which helped users around the world by answering questions and helping them resolve technical problems with their computers. The support operation was managed by Randy Simon, and staffed by volunteers. While much of the support operation dealt with assisting users whose computers had crashed,

366-549: A junior political science major who was the station's sports director and business manager , negotiated the agreement with team owner Charlie Finley . The situation was made possible because of the Athletics' subpar on-field performance and attendance and the uncertainty surrounding Finley's threats to move the ballclub to Denver . Baer, who would later serve as a San Francisco Giants executive beginning in December 1992,

427-456: A longer version of the game, and in other cases the later episodes would be stand-alone games. Sometimes the additional content was completely integrated with the unregistered game, such as in Ambrosia's Escape Velocity series, in which a character representing the developer's pet parrot , equipped with an undefeatable ship, would periodically harass and destroy the player after they reached

488-431: A message that paying will remove the notice, which is usually displayed either upon startup or after an interval while the application is running. These notices are designed to annoy the user into paying. Postcardware, also called just cardware, is a style of software distribution similar to shareware, distributed by the author on the condition that users send the author a postcard . A variation of cardware, emailware, uses

549-491: A modem, so as to acquire software at no cost. The success of shareware games, including id Software hits Commander Keen and Doom , depended in part on the BBS community's willingness to redistribute them from one BBS to another across North America. The reasons for redistribution included allowing modem users who could not afford long-distance calls the opportunity to view the games. The important distinguishing feature between

610-441: A premium for advanced features, functionality, or related products and services. For example, a fully functional feature-limited version may be given away for free, with advanced features disabled until a license fee is paid. The word freemium combines the two aspects of the business model: "free" and "premium". It has become a popular model especially in the antivirus industry. Adware, short for "advertising-supported software",

671-407: A reduced-functionality (freemium, nagware, or crippleware) or non-functional mode, unless the user purchases a full version. Trialware has become normalized for online Software as a Service (SaaS). WinRAR is a notable example of an unlimited trialware, i.e. a program that retains its full functionality even after the trial period has ended. The rationale behind trialware is to give potential users

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732-435: A server was hard to come by, so networks like Info-Mac were developed, consisting of non-profit mirror sites hosting large shareware libraries accessible via the web or ftp. With the advent of the commercial web hosting industry, the authors of shareware programs started their own sites where the public could learn about their programs and download the latest versions, and even pay for the software online. This erased one of

793-432: A shareware game and a game demo is that the shareware game is (at least in theory) a complete working software program albeit with reduced content compared to the full game, while a game demo omits significant functionality as well as content. Shareware games commonly offered both single player and multiplayer modes plus a significant fraction of the full game content such as the first of three episodes, while some even offered

854-735: A significant portion of it dealt with the specific "vertical market" of desktop publishing and prepress issues, which was then in its infancy and was one of the Macintosh's primary markets. Randy Simon also coordinated the production and publications of BMUG's massive biannual newsletters, sometimes totaling more than a thousand pages per year, initially with the assistance of BMUG volunteers Carolyn Sagami, Zig Zichterman, Robert Lettieri and Bill Woodcock , and later Hans Hansen. A collaboration between BMUG members, Programming SIG chair Greg Dow (now at Adobe ) and networking and prepress expert Bill Woodcock (now at Packet Clearing House ) resulted in

915-470: A small chamber sequestered off from a sizable library of albums. In the 1970s, KALX was taken off the air for a short period by the faculty oversight Radio Policy Board after the station manager and friends had abused their use of university automobiles for private use and run up large bills for long distance phone calls to their contacts in Los Angeles and elsewhere. After an investigation, the station

976-498: Is a type of proprietary software that is initially shared by the owner for trial use at little or no cost. Often the software has limited functionality or incomplete documentation until the user sends payment to the software developer. Shareware is often offered as a download from a website . Shareware differs from freeware , which is fully-featured software distributed at no cost to the user but without source code being made available; and free and open-source software , in which

1037-415: Is any software package which automatically renders advertisements in order to generate revenue for its author. Shareware is often packaged with adware to lower the shareware fees or eliminate the need to charge users a fee. The advertisements may take the form of a banner on an application window. The functions may be designed to analyze which websites the user visits and to present advertising pertinent to

1098-430: Is often removed in an update once the user has donated to (paid for) the software. Nagware (also known as begware, annoyware or a nagscreen) is a pejorative term for shareware that persistently reminds the user to purchase a license. It usually does this by popping up a message when the user starts the program, or intermittently while the user is using the application. These messages can appear as windows obscuring part of

1159-410: Is that an unlicensed freemium program has useful functionality, while crippleware demonstrates its potential but is not useful on its own. Donationware is a licensing model that supplies fully operational unrestricted software to the user and requests an optional donation be paid to the programmer or a third-party beneficiary (usually a non-profit ). The amount of the donation may also be stipulated by

1220-570: Is the Laravel package developers from Spatie, which has released over 200 open-source packages to the Laravel framework , which are postcardware licensed, and all shown at their website. In 1982, Andrew Fluegelman created a program for the IBM PC called PC-Talk , a telecommunications program, and used the term freeware ; he described it "as an experiment in economics more than altruism". About

1281-406: The call letters being derived from Berkeley's nickname "Cal") had moved from Berkeley's dormitories to Dwinelle Hall on campus, and Berkeley administrators began investigating the possibility of applying for a broadcast frequency for the station. KALX received its broadcast license and made its first FM broadcast, with 10 watts of power, in 1967. The studio in the basement of Dwinelle was modest,

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1342-440: The A's 50th anniversary celebration in 2018, Baer was invited back to do play-by-play for one inning of an A's/Giants game. KALX offers a diverse range of public affairs programming, and airs many kinds of public service announcements throughout its daily broadcast. KALX has provided a training ground for numerous individuals who have had careers in music, television, and radio. These include: Shareware Shareware

1403-603: The AppleTalk Networking Forum), the inaptly-named A/UX Users Group , and numerous other real-world periodic meet-ups. The BMUG BBS also served as a nexus for the interoperability testing of email gateways between FidoNet , UUCP , SMTP , and a number of proprietary AppleTalk , NetWare , and Internet Protocol electronic mail systems, including CE Software's QuickMail , SoftArc's FirstClass , those from Information Electronics and AppleLink Personal Edition , which went on to become America Online . When

1464-551: The BBS host system in Berkeley was damaged by the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake , Aboba set up a temporary stand-in using a solid-state industrial PLC and multi-line serial controller, which was able to keep up with the heavy call volume by answering, presenting an ASCII banner explaining the situation, and immediately disconnecting. The BBS eventually ran on hardware in Berkeley , Palo Alto , Boston , and Tokyo . In addition to

1525-510: The Internet era, books compiling reviews of available shareware were published, sometimes targeting specific niches such as small business . These books would typically come with one or more floppy disks or CD-ROMs containing software from the book. As Internet use grew, users turned to downloading shareware programs from FTP or web sites. This spelled the end of bulletin board systems and shareware disk distributors. At first, disk space on

1586-462: The Internet, programming and mathematics. Branch groups held general meetings in outlying areas, including San Francisco , Cupertino and Tokyo . Rather than publish a standard monthly newsletter, the group decided to publish a collection of articles in a bound book every six months. The resulting "newsletter" routinely exceeded 300 pages in length. The newsletter was originally edited by volunteers Carolyn Sagami and Zig Zichterman, until Randy Simon

1647-495: The Internet, revenues could not keep up and the not-for-profit corporation declared bankruptcy in 2000. However, its members continued to collaborate and meet as separate entities in the following years. KALX KALX (90.7 FM ) is an FM radio station that broadcasts from the University of California, Berkeley in Berkeley , California , United States . KALX, a community and student-run radio station licensed to

1708-489: The application is all that is required to disable the registration notices. In the early 1990s, shareware distribution was a popular method of publishing games for smaller developers, including then-fledgling companies Apogee Software (also known as 3D Realms ), Epic MegaGames (now Epic Games ), Ambrosia Software and id Software . It gave consumers the chance to play the game before investing money in it, and it gave them exposure that some products would be unable to get in

1769-406: The author, or it may be left to the discretion of the user, based on individual perceptions of the software's value. Since donationware comes fully operational (i.e. not crippleware ) with payment optional, it is a type of freeware . In some cases, there is a delay to start the program or "nag screen" reminding the user that they haven't donated to the project. This nag feature and/or delayed start

1830-544: The chief distinctions of shareware, as it was now most often downloaded from a central "official" location instead of being shared samizdat -style by its users. To ensure users would get the latest bug-fixes as well as an install untainted by viruses or other malware , some authors discouraged users from giving the software to their friends, encouraging them to send a link instead. Major download sites such as VersionTracker and CNet 's Download.com began to rank titles based on quality, feedback, and downloads. Popular software

1891-402: The developer and the pirates where the developer disables pirated codes and the pirates attempt to find or generate new ones. Some software publishers have started accepting known pirated codes, using the opportunity to educate users on the economics of the shareware model. Some shareware relies entirely on the user's honesty and requires no password. Simply checking an "I have paid" checkbox in

Berkeley Macintosh Users Group - Misplaced Pages Continue

1952-473: The end by a raffle. Notable speakers included: Steve Jobs , Guy Kawasaki , Ted Nelson , Heidi Roizen , Andy Hertzfeld , Bill Atkinson , Jean-Louis Gassée , Marc Benioff , Melinda Ann French (Gates) and Bill Gates . It also held Special Interest Groups (SIGs) on Basic Mac, Troubleshooting, ClarisWorks (integrated word processing, drawing, painting, spreadsheet, database and telecommunications), FileMakerPro relational databases, graphics, video, music,

2013-475: The first example of " database publishing ," a 1989 encyclopedia of Macintosh software, for which plates were produced directly from a FileMaker database without intervening processing. BMUG was initially located in suite 3B, 2150 Kittredge Street, in downtown Berkeley , directly adjoining the southwest corner of the UC Berkeley campus. This building also housed Farallon Computing until Farallon outgrew

2074-425: The group. Co-founder Reese Jones branched the production off as the commercial business Farallon Computing in 1986, renaming the product PhoneNet . The group invented other subsequent low-cost hardware kits as well... the 1991 introduction of the low-cost Mac LC prompted BMUG to begin offering a $ 12 VGA monitor adapter . MacRecorder , the first audio input device for the Macintosh, was also first released in 1985 as

2135-425: The installation of the software. Crippleware has vital features of the program, such as printing or the ability to save files, disabled or unwanted features like watermarks on screencasting and video editing software until the user buys the software. This allows users to take a close look at the features of a program without being able to use it to generate output. The distinction between freemium and crippleware

2196-638: The newsletter, BMUG published the occasional reference book. These included: BMUG was certainly the largest Macintosh users group, but the Boston Computer Society was the largest computer users group. BCS-Mac, the Macintosh special interest group of the Boston Computer Society, was the second largest Macintosh users group. A good-humored rivalry obtained between the two groups throughout their mutual existence, but they were ultimately supportive of each other. BMUG's first foray onto BCS-Mac's Boston home turf, at MacWorld Expo on August 11–13 of 1987

2257-513: The opportunity to try out the program to judge its usefulness before purchasing a license. According to industry research firm Softletter, 66% of online companies surveyed had free-trial-to-paying-customer conversion rates of 25% or less. SaaS providers employ a wide range of strategies to nurture leads, and convert them into paying customers. Freemium works by offering a product or service free of charge (typically digital offerings such as software, content, games, web services or other) while charging

2318-475: The retail space. With the Kroz series, Apogee introduced the "episodic" shareware model that became the most popular incentive for buying a game. While the shareware game would be a truly complete game, there would be additional "episodes" of the game that were not shareware and could only be legally obtained by paying for the shareware episode. In some cases these episodes were neatly integrated and would feel like

2379-410: The same approach but requires the user to send the author an email . Postcardware, like other novelty software distribution terms, is often not strictly enforced. Cardware is similar to beerware . The concept was first used by Aaron Giles , author of JPEGView . Another well-known piece of postcardware is the roguelike game Ancient Domains of Mystery , whose author collects postcards from around

2440-660: The same time, Jim "Button" Knopf released PC-File , a database program, calling it user-supported software . Not much later, Bob Wallace produced PC-Write , a word processor, and called it shareware . Appearing in an episode of Horizon titled Psychedelic Science originally broadcast 5 April 1998, Bob Wallace said the idea for shareware came to him "to some extent as a result of my psychedelic experience ". In 1983 Jerry Pournelle wrote of "an increasingly popular variant" of free software "that has no name, but works thus: 'If you like this, send me (the author) some money. I prefer cash. ' " In 1984, Softalk-PC magazine had

2501-408: The screen, or as message boxes that can quickly be closed. Some nagware keeps the message up for a certain time period, forcing the user to wait to continue to use the program. Unlicensed programs that support printing may superimpose a watermark on the printed output, typically stating that the output was produced by an unlicensed copy. Some titles display a dialog box with payment information and

Berkeley Macintosh Users Group - Misplaced Pages Continue

2562-745: The software and share it on disks. Commercial shareware distributors such as Educorp and Public Domain Inc printed catalogs describing thousands of public domain and shareware programs that were available for a small charge on floppy disk. These companies later made their entire catalog available on CD-ROM. One such distributor, Public Software Library (PSL), began an order-taking service for programmers who otherwise had no means of accepting credit card orders. Meanwhile major online service provider CompuServe enabled people to pay (register) for software using their CompuServe accounts. When AOL bought out CompuServe, that part of CompuServe called SWREG (Shareware Registration)

2623-413: The source code is freely available for anyone to inspect and alter. There are many types of shareware and, while they may not require an initial up-front payment, many are intended to generate revenue in one way or another. Some limit use to personal non- commercial purposes only, with purchase of a license required for use in a business enterprise. The software itself may be time-limited, or it may remind

2684-486: The space and moved five blocks south-east to Dwight Way. After six years, BMUG moved to a larger space with street frontage at 2055 Center Street, a block and a half west of campus and directly across from the downtown Berkeley BART station. BMUG's primary revenue-generating activity was the sneakernet distribution of Macintosh shareware software from its comprehensive library on 400k and 800k 3.5" floppy disks . BMUG's shareware disk duplication and distribution program

2745-480: The term from an InfoWorld magazine column by that name in the 1970s , and that he considered the name to be generic, so its use became established over freeware and user-supported software . Fluegelman, Knopf, and Wallace clearly established shareware as a viable software distribution model by becoming wealthy. Prior to the popularity of the World Wide Web and widespread Internet access, shareware

2806-420: The time, KALX only operated at 10 watts, rendering it practically unlistenable more than 10 miles from Oakland Coliseum . This led one fan to joke about the A's radio network stretching all the way to Hawaii by asking, " Honolulu ? How about here? " In 1981, the station began a successful fundraising drive to boost its power level to the present-day 500 watts, a level that was reached in 1982. As part of

2867-441: The types of goods or services featured there. The term is sometimes used to refer to software that displays unwanted advertisements, which typically are more intrusive and may appear as pop-ups , as is the case in most ad-oriented spyware . During the installation of the intended software, the user is presented with a requirement to agree to the terms of click through an end-user license agreement or similar licensing which governs

2928-443: The university, broadcasts in stereo with 500 watts of power . The station employs three full-time paid staff members, but is largely run by its nearly 300 volunteers , including Berkeley students and other members of the local community. The station's studios are located at Social Sciences Building on campus. The station originally began broadcasting in 1962, as a carrier current station. By 1966, KALX (then known as Radio KAL,

2989-402: The user that payment would be appreciated. Trialware or demoware is a program that limits the time that it can be effectively used, commonly via a built-in time limit, number of uses, or only allowing progression up to a certain point (e.g. in video games, see Game demo ). The user can try out the fully featured program until the trial period is up, and then most trialware reverts to either

3050-458: The world. Orbitron is distributed as postcardware. Exifer is a popular application among digital photographers that has been postcardware. Caledos Automatic Wallpaper Changer is a "still alive" project cardware. "Empathy" is a postcardware for password-protected executables. Dual Module Player and Linux were also postcardware for a long time. An example for emailware is the video game Jump 'n Bump . Another popular postcardware company

3111-515: Was commemorated with a new T-shirt, featuring an inscription "BMUG in Boston" which Bill Woodcock, who designed BMUG's T-shirts, intended to look like graffiti, using a rattle-can to write the original text in black paint on white paper, which was then photographed, scanned, and converted to PostScript in Adobe illustrator, before being silkscreened in red on black shirts. The red-on-black effect, however,

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3172-624: Was hired as staff, and then turned over to Hans Hansen when Randy departed. BMUG's Bulletin board system or "BBS" was managed by Bernard Aboba (then in graduate school at Stanford and UC Berkeley , subsequently at Microsoft ) with the assistance of Bill Woodcock . It was an early FidoNet node, and from 1986 through 1993, the home of the FidoNet MacNetAdmin "echo," which spawned the AppleTalk Network Managers Association (which in turn begat

3233-401: Was novel at the time. SWREG was eventually bought by Digital River, Inc. Also, services like Kagi started offering applications that authors could distribute along with their products that would present the user with an onscreen form to fill out, print, and mail along with their payment. Once telecommunications became more widespread, this service also expanded online. Toward the beginning of

3294-626: Was often the only economical way for independent software authors to get their product onto users' desktops. Those with Internet or BBS access could download software and distribute it amongst their friends or user groups, who would then be encouraged to send the registration fee to the author, usually via postal mail. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, shareware software was widely distributed over online services , bulletin board systems and on diskettes. Contrary to commercial developers who spent millions of dollars urging users " Don't Copy That Floppy ", shareware developers encouraged users to upload

3355-619: Was put back on the air in 1975 under new management, led by Andrew Reimer who had previously been manager of KUCI , the radio station at UC Irvine. The station progressed from a 10-watt part-time operation to continuous operation in 1977, to a higher transmitter site in the Berkeley Hills in 1978. KALX became the official radio station for the Oakland Athletics just days before the season opener in April 1978 . Larry Baer ,

3416-400: Was replaced by Hal Gibson, who remained until the end. One of BMUG's principal operations was collaborative Macintosh repair and maintenance. A benefit of BMUG membership was hardware repair (and often recovery of lost documents from floppy and hard disks). The technical operations were managed by Steve Costa. Electrical engineer Chuck Meyer conducted many of the trickier repairs. Herb Dang was

3477-472: Was run by Art Lau and Gerald Raddatz, supplemented by the efforts of many of the other volunteers. One of the early successes for the group was BMUGNet , a variant of Apple's LocalTalk system which used standard telephone wires to connect Macintosh computers together in a local area network . Wiring plans were initially published in the Fall 1985 BMUG Newsletter, but members could purchase adapters assembled by

3538-399: Was said by startled BCS-Mac members to more resemble dripping blood than spray-paint. By 1995, BMUG had accumulated a debt of $ 250,000, which forced a two-year period of restructuring and the layoff of some of the staff, but which was weathered successfully. With the increasing cost of printing the biannual newsletter, decreasing membership and the waning sales of software due to the rise of

3599-410: Was sold to UK businessman Stephen Lee of Atlantic Coast PLC who placed the service on to the internet and enabled over 3,000 independent software developers to use SWREG as a back office to accept various payment methods including credit, debit and charge cards, Paypal and other services in multiple currencies. This worked in realtime so that a client could pay for software and instantly download it which

3660-409: Was sorted to the top of the list, along with products whose authors paid for preferred placement. If features are disabled in the freely accessible version, paying may provide the user with a license key or code they can enter into the software to disable the notices and enable full functionality. Some pirate web sites publish license codes for popular shareware, leading to a kind of arms race between

3721-513: Was the play-by-play announcer . Sophomore mass communications major Bob Kozberg and station producer / engineer Steve Blum also worked on the broadcasts. The arrangement lasted only sixteen games. One month into the season, Finley decided to keep the Athletics in Oakland and awarded the broadcast rights to KNEW . Nonetheless, the setup made the A's a laughingstock in the Bay Area. At

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