Erica over at Ars has a hilarious article about the super-seedy world of software piracy. On Sunday, a warez site announced the release of Crackulous 0.9. The software takes apps that have been legitimately downloaded from the iTunes App Store and removes the DRM. The DRM-stripped apps can then be installed on a jailbroken iPhone.
Then it gets hilarious. The software was developed by pirate Salad Fork who got upset when an early build of the software was leaked and pirated without his consent.
So the guy who created the software to steal from developers got upset when his software was stolen from him. You have to wonder if this bit of irony registered in his brain. We're guessing it didn't because the cracking software was finished and released only to have it, once again, pirated and distributed by another site.
Crackulous.net is selling Salad Fork's pirating software for the special low price of $10. The price is expected to hit $20. Crackulous.net contends that the free version of Crackulous is malware that will steal your passwords and possibly send a dingo to eat your baby:
Alert: Watch out for websites that claim to have a free version of Crackulous. They claim to have Crackulous but it actually is an app that logs all your passwords and sensitive info and sends it to them. Crackulous is supported by your payments.
Hackulous.us, the site that contends, along with Salad Fork, that they created the software has posted a counter warning:
The quick and dirty: Crackulous was developed right here on our forum, on our SVN server. Anyone selling Crackulous or claiming to be the developer is trying to scam you. The official Cydia repository to get Crackulous is http://cydia.hackulo.us. Crackulous is and will always be FREE SOFTWARE. It has had NO OTHER developers but SaladFork and Angel, with contributions from Uncon.
Oh the torrid life of software pirates.
We would like to remind everyone that developers work insane hours to create some of your favorite iPhone apps. Pirating software is stealing, plain and simple.
Won't someone please think of the developers!
