[wp-forums] Thoughts on the share-and-follow plugin support system

[Francisco de Azevedo]

@Otto: Cool! I think it is really useful to know that because there are a
couple of threads in the forums where people are wondering about this:
http://wordpress.org/support/topic/share-and-follow-deleted
http://wordpress.org/support/topic/share-and-follow-plugin-where-is-it

@Mika: Thanks for sharing your opinion. This situation seemed a little in
the gray area to me, so I wanted to see if I was maybe making a big deal
out of this. I think in my case I just can't abide by this practice since I
find it rather sketchy, so I don't think I'll keep using the plugin or
recommending it for that matter.
Do you think WP users should be informed of this? Because the plugin author
seems to only have informed about this change in his "support strategy" on
his site. Suddenly, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" series comes to
mind. I wonder why... ;-)


On Mon, May 14, 2012 at 2:31 PM, Mika A Epstein <ipstenu at ipstenu.org> wrote:

> I wouldn't recommend it, but not for that. It's currently not available in
> the repo (not since April), which is always a sign of something.
>
> FWIW, there's nothing against the rules about what they're doing. While
> its kind of a di** maneuver to have a plugin and then, without documenting
> it, offer no support, it is what it is. Plugin devs should be able to make
> a living too.
>
> (Generally I just tell people to go pay for help in those cases.)
>
> On May 14, 2012, at 12:18 PM, Francisco de Azevedo <
> frandeazevedo at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Hello everybody!
> > I recently recommended this plugin to an user on the forums since we have
> > been using it on one of our sites and it works really well.
> > However, this was before I realized the plugin seems to have been removed
> > from the repository. While researching why that may have happened, I
> landed
> > here:
> > http://share-and-follow.com/support/
> > This seems a little border-line to me since the user seems to be offering
> > the plugin free of charge as a backdoor to sell premium support to its
> > users, and just let us volunteers take care of the rest of the plugin
> > users. Also, if you look at his profile, it seems it's been a couple of
> > months since he participated in the forums, which tends to confirm my
> fears.
> > Could that be the reason why the plugin is no longer available? If it's
> > not, what are your thoughts on this?
> > Cheers!
> >
> >
> >
> > On Mon, May 14, 2012 at 10:33 AM, Otto <otto at ottodestruct.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On Mon, May 14, 2012 at 7:48 AM, esmi at quirm dot net <esmi at quirm.net>
> >> wrote:
> >>> on 14/05/2012 13:42 Daniel Fenn said the following:
> >>>
> >>>> How can it be a security issue? As long as suPHP is installed and the
> >>>> configuration is right no one should be able to touch other users
> >>>> files. Other configuration would need to be check but there is no
> >>>> reason to disable it for security reasons.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> I said that they are a well-established hosting company. I didn't say
> >> that
> >>> they were sensible. :-)
> >>>
> >>> The same company blocks xmlrpc.php and then suggests you can get around
> >> it
> >>> by renaming the file!
> >>
> >> A better way to get around it is by changing what company you do
> >> business with for hosting.
> >>
> >> Just sayin'.
> >>
> >> -Otto
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> wp-forums mailing list
> >> wp-forums at lists.automattic.com
> >> http://lists.automattic.com/mailman/listinfo/wp-forums
> >>
> > _______________________________________________
> > wp-forums mailing list
> > wp-forums at lists.automattic.com
> > http://lists.automattic.com/mailman/listinfo/wp-forums
> _______________________________________________
> wp-forums mailing list
> wp-forums at lists.automattic.com
> http://lists.automattic.com/mailman/listinfo/wp-forums
>