Fake Notepad++ for Mac
67 points by wonk
67 points by wonk
Unauthorized "ports" of software like these- stolen branding, misleading fine-print about authorship, a significant risk of coming with malware, and tacked-on subscriptions, donation links, and ads- are truly a scourge. I fear that scams like this will continue to become more commonplace.
I've been dealing with thieves misrepresenting themselves as "official ports" of my own software, exploiting my users and sullying my personal reputation, and it is extremely draining and upsetting. You have my sincerest sympathies for having to deal with this shit, Don.
It's so annoying too because if someone got to the stage where those could be genuinely confused in practice - why not just release under a new name and list the original as inspiration / missing port. The market for it is right there apparently.
Just saw this announcement / banner on their website:
Starting with upcoming version 1.0.6, Notepad++ for Mac will be renamed to Nextpad++. The new name is a small nod to Mac history.
I stumbled across this myself recently[1]. Fortunately, I haven't (as far as I know...) had my actual identity or likeness misappropriated as blatantly as this, but it was extremely disconcerting to see my exact words from my personal website and someone / some slop bot parroting them along with my own background to promote their cloned app.
I fully expect this to get worse now that it's totally feasible to create rip-off apps, websites and social media presence with a simple prompt and an army of bots running in the background.
Don't really know what the solution is, either. We're heading to a world where nothing and no one can be believed, and a "web of trust" clearly won't scale.
[1]=My "Sloppy Copies" article which was on here a week or so ago
Shockingly generous behavior by the author here. These people are committing a crime and the notepad++ people should take their infringing domain and their infringing GitHub organization. They didn’t even point out the obvious fact that this is probably malware and should be assumed to be malicious.
Yeah, I appreciate the desire to be kind and work properly. But this is clearly intentionally confusing users. This wasn't an accident of someone being a bit too similar. They are impersonating him and the project to trick people. I would reach for some bigger hammers very quickly.
The author of Notepad++ has a point. On the other hand trademarking Notepad++ when we already had an established brand 'notepad' is funny. I mean can I trademark Windows++ ?
Also if someone would port my app to Mac, I would be happy, as long as they don't derive money out of it (I haven't checked if this was the case).
This "port" was slopped together with an LLM, trading on the reputation of a long-running, beloved application for Windows, and the project solicits donations. There is absolutely no reason to trust the slopsmith not to have embedded malware, or not to otherwise enshittify their port in the future once the SEO of their parasitic port has matured. It's a scam- pure and simple- if you bother to open your eyes.
no, this is the good and proper use of trademarks - to prevent someone else from impersonating your product! notepad++ is not pretending to be notepad, so it would be a lot less ethical to use trademarks to go after them.
It seems the website for the fake mac version has been updated:
In coordination with Don Ho, the creator of the original Notepad++, I'll be evolving the branding of the macOS version so it stands on its own while respecting its lineage. These updates, such as a new logo, a refined name, and likely a new domain will ship with version 1.0.6 in the coming days. Continuity for existing users is a priority, and I'll make the transition as seamless as I can. Thank you for your patience.
yet have to guess what "stands on its own while respecting its lineage" will mean.
also weird to claim "be patient i'm working on updating the site" while having access to the site to make that announcement and actively violating Notepad++'s trademark...
Also weird that the message is just slop, generated by claude, from two days ago. If they gave a shit about acting in good faith, they could have had their slop machine come up with a new name and logo right at that same time. Because, as we're repeatedly told, those slop machines are all about velocity.
It's almost like they're trying to slow roll it and milk that to get money from the donations button until they're truly made to stop.
I just use CotEditor. Which works fine.
I also have a vibe coded text editor. But that can only be used a a torture device