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Comment by smacktoward | Hacker News Reader

> The Store release of Paint.NET is not distributed free-of-charge. This allows many things to converge and solves a lot of problems, while still providing value for new and existing users (err, customers?).

So let me see if I've got this straight. I can go to the Windows Store to get Paint.NET, in which case I will have to pay USD$8.99 for it. Or I can go to getpaint.net to get Paint.NET for free, in which case I will expose myself to a barrage of misleading ads designed to get me to download malware (see https://jasonlefkowitz.net/2013/03/google-and-paint-net-need... -- I wrote that four years ago, but the ads are as bad today as they were then).

"Now you can pay us money to skip past the part where we try our hardest to screw up your computer!" is a real innovation in software marketing.

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Google said they were going to go after those ads on AdSense with misleading "download" and "install" buttons.

https://consumerist.com/2016/02/05/google-hates-those-fake-d...

But right now, the misleading ad showing on getpaint.net is an ad for a Google product. Lol.

https://imgur.com/a/OdgpG

I don't think the Duo ad is confusing - it clearly shows that the install button will take you to somewhere to install Duo.

The misleading buttons are ads on download sites that just say "Install" and make the user think it's the button to download the item the user is looking at (in this case, Paint.NET).

I don't think that's clear at all; there's no border around the ad, so you've got quotes about how great Paint.NET is, some info about Google Duo, and then a big INSTALL button. It's not at all obvious that Duo and Paint.NET are unrelated, if you don't know what Duo is.

I have those ads blocked in the HOSTS file; that explains why I didn't see them. Nonetheless, when looking for where to download it, my eyes first went to the "Download" link at the top of the page.

From many years of browsing, I've learned that huge flashy "download" and "install" buttons are almost always to be ignored...

I'm of two minds. On the one hand I hate the practices that software companies engage in order to create income from software that is not sold to users. On the other hand, I hate the idea that $8.99 has become an outrageous price for a software company to charge.

And to be clear, there's no free lunch. Small open source projects often burn out developers when the software is not built as part of their job and big open source projects funded by corporation and built to serve that corporation's interests such as React or Kubernetes and aren't useful to ordinary users in the way that Paint.NET is.

Or I can go to getpaint.net to get Paint.NET for free, in which case I will expose myself to a barrage of misleading ads designed to get me to download malware

Maybe I was already "primed" by your post or just from previous experience, but I visited that site and the first thing I saw was the "Download" link in the header, leading me to https://www.getpaint.net/download.html , and then https://www.dotpdn.com/downloads/pdn.html and finally to https://www.dotpdn.com/files/paint.net.4.0.18.install.zip which I believe is the actual file (didn't open nor run it.)

I didn't see any other ads, probably because I have an adblocker and JS off by default. I've seen far worse sites with this configuration, and even then I managed to get what I was looking for.

Note: as absurd as this may sound, I have never used Paint.NET but only heard of it, so this is the first time. So... how did I do? Did I find the right link, or was that the malware?

Try again with your adblocker off. Then consider whether you would advise your <insert non-techsavvy relative here> to attempt the same.

Without ads being blocked, you have to avoid two giant "Start Download" buttons: https://i.imgur.com/o4MXM4Z.png

Perhaps trivial for a "savvy" user to avoid, but people do end up clicking on them (e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cAfPWgiE7E)

It's too bad you're downvoted. Paint.NET's developer has been willing to infect people's computers with malware for years, and now he wants people to pay him. There are so many better options for image editing, like GIMP, Krita and so on. Why support these scummy practices?

Think of it as an opportunity to support the project, not as some sort of devious trick.

>I wrote that four years ago, but the ads are as bad today as they were then

But to be fair (and mind you I am not particularly appreciative of Paint.Net nor of this new "procurement model", as the two things I have an allergy for are .Net and the Windows Store ;) ) a large part of the Internet has similar download pages (with deceiving ads), which is not an "excuse" or a "good thing" but surely it is something with which any internet user has by now learned to avoid or workaround.

I would put the blame also (and mainly) on those that allow such deceiving ads to be served to these (or similar) download pages (aka Google).

However I would instead underline how in this blog post there is no mention of/link to www.getpaint.net, while there is (as an example) a clear one in the first line of the blog post for the previous release:

https://blog.getpaint.net/2017/07/20/paint-net-4-0-17-is-now...

So - understandably - the Author attempts to push a little bit the "Windows Store" source, maybe - indirectly or at a subliminal level - hinting that "experts" can have it for free (because they can actually find the download page and link) while "n00bs" will better be paying the "entry ticket" and go to the Windows Store ...

Why would you hate. Net ? It's an awesome environment

>Why would you hate. Net ? It's an awesome environment

I don't hate it, I have a form of allergy to it, it is not the same thing.

I personally like small, portable, self-contained programs capable of running "everywhere" both in "installed" OSes and in reduced environments, such as a PE or RE, and .Net based programs are none of them (this is not specific to paint.net, that is an actual practical example of how "awesome" the environment is).

.net core apps are portable and can be self-contained, not sure if they match your definition of small though(what's PE/RE?)

> what's PE/RE?

Preinstallation Environment [1] and Recovery Environment [2], basically stripped-down "live" versions of Windows for deployment and repair purposes. They're frequently customized by PC vendors and corporate IT departments.

[1] https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/manufactur...

[2] https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/manufactur...

Maybe I can better explain myself.

A program like paint.net is a program that normally would be "installed" on a "fully installed" OS.

The fact that it uses the .Net subsystem is mostly "transparent" (to be picky it is transparent on recent OS's where the .Net subssystem is installed anyway, not so much on older systems where .Net is not installed or is installed by default in an earlier version that may not be compatible with the program at hand and needs an update).

For it and for any number of programs that only make sense on a full system this is not an issue at all.

The allergy I declared revolves about small tools that would be useful both in a fully installed system and in a reduced environment, such as a PE or RE (Pre-installation Environment or Recovery Environment) typically used in recovery or repairing scenarios, typically booting from removable media such as a USB stick or CD/DVD .

In these cases it is more complex (and anyway adds several tens of megabytes to the build, which implies also often slower booting) to have a working .Net environment suitable to run the given program/tool.

Because of tribalism. Your tribe won't accept you any longer if you stray too far. Some people also really enjoy feeling superior to others, so they do whatever they have to in order to appear as such.

These superior tribalists are usually the people who go around saying things like "I personally like small, portable, self-contained programs capable of running everywhere..." instead of things like "I like using the best tools for the given job so that I can better serve my users."

Or, you know, he or she has an allergy to it - didn't you hear that part?

Sure, I would be immediately kicked out of the tribe of do-more-with-less-bytes, had I not declared the superiority of small, self-contained tools.

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