The other day I downloaded a program from the Internet. It was listed as karmaware. What the heck is karmaware?

There are basically three categories of software: commercial, shareware, and freeware.

Commercial Software. This is the stuff you pay for. You buy it. You don’t own it, of course. Like music, you only own the right to use it. But it costs money. Even if it comes with a preview version that runs free for a while, it’s still something you eventually must pay for.

Shareware. The shareware concept came out in the late 1980s. Basically, the software is free. If you feel like paying for it, you’re encouraged to do so, but there are no penalties for using the software if you don’t pay.

Freeware. Free stuff. This includes public domain and copyleft software. There are, however, subtle differences between the two.

Public domain software is absolutely free. The author retains no rights. You can use the software. You can even package it and sell it as your own (if you’re so bold). Public domain means that the software is owned by everyone.

Copyleft software, also known as GNU Public License (GPL) software, is free. There is no cost, but the author retains his rights as the owner. You may be allowed to modify the code, but you must give credit to the original author. Or maybe the license allows you to use the software, but not to sell it.

There are variations on shareware as well. These include:

Crippleware. This is software that serves a limited function until you cough up the dough. Most of the good shareware is crippleware. The program works okay, but lacks advanced features or requires that you stop and restart the program to perform multiple tasks. That’s the way it works until you pay the shareware fee and unlock the program.

A variation on crippleware is software that runs just fine, but may tag the resulting files it creates with a watermark. For example, I’ve used graphic converters that plaster “Made by such-and-such” over the image when I haven’t yet paid the fee.

Nagware. This is software that bugs you about paying the fee. Sometimes you see a request displayed, asking (nagging) you to pay the fee, sometimes you have to wait a while to read a message begging you to pay the fee. When you pay the fee, however, the warning goes away.

Karmaware. This is the new one on me! It’s shareware, but probably falls into the nagware subcategory. The author wants me to pay him the shareware fee, in which case I will bring the world and myself good karma. Om!