Hello, Joe.

Sunday February 20 2011 at 20:18, you wrote to me:

 JM> As a final note, if my statements offended you or anyone else, please
 JM> accept my appologies and know they were not intended to do so.  They
 JM> were simply asked to better understand the current state of affairs.

No offense taken (I don't think any was meant in the first place).

A less acerbic response to your original question:

If you want to keep supporting a very dead BBS software package that its
"developer" won't even fix properly to keep it running these
days, that's your perogative.  But, such is the way, it seems, that BBS
authors treat the BBS community after they find money, like Tim Strike, the
author of Telegard BBS. He was a nice guy but once he started making money,
he turned into a grade-A prick and if you try to contact him, he runs away
and hides.  That's the same with Benjamin Schollnick, the author of
QuickBBS.  He turned out to be a real douchebag too.  If you ask them about
a problem with their software, they will come up with any excuse they can
to wiggle out of responsibility.

I've dealt with the Santos clan once and that was enough for me.  I can see
why Hector and Andrea left Fidonet-they weren't liked very much since all
they cared about, and according to fellow sysops who still deal with the
couple and their products, and still only care about is money, money,
money, and to hell with the people who buy their products.  I bought a copy
of OLX from them quite some time ago and dealing with them was like dealing
with a chained pit bull with a bad tooth.

However, the "prick of the year" award goes to
Dan-whatthehellishispolishname, the guy behind DCT Productions.  I emailed
him to ask if he would simply recompile his doors to fix errors in them, I
got "No." in response.  So, I fixed his goddamn doors myself.

If it seems I'm a little vitriolic about things, I've had the pleasure and
displeasure of dealing with a lot of software authors since 1996.  I've run
over 40 BBS packages and have seen the good but mostly bad side of people
in this hobby.  However, as the assholes and ne'er-do-wells left Fidonet
for the wastelands of the WWW and the Internet, I've noticed that those who
have stuck around seem to be decent people who are just trying to make
their hobby a bit better.  I've seen this more in my own FTN network than
in Fidonet per se, but in general, it's better now that money has gotten
out of the picture and the people that are left are those who truly are in
the hobby for their enjoyment and not to make a buck.

As for supporting what you've written, if you're in it for the money with
your software, forget it.  If you're in it for the enjoyment of it, sure. 
But if you don't know why you want to maintain the software you wrote, then
perhaps you should just leave the past in the past and simply support the
software as-is.

As the author of the Cheepware line, I write my BBS doors and utilities for
myself, primarily.  I release them as freeware to the BBS scene in the
hopes someone will find my programs as useful as I have.

On a side note, I've been under a lot of stress in my personal life
recently and sometimes, no matter how hard I try, it slips into my online
life including here.  For that, I'm sorry if I was overly critical but I do
think if you ask the sysops who are using the BBS software you support, you
might get a much better answer than simply asking a general audience.

Later,
Sean

... Real knowledge is to know the extent of one's ignorance.
--- GoldED/2 3.0.1