Home Inspection Software for the MAC

[George P. Wells, CMI]

[quote=dmaricic;552299]George,

I've talked to you a few times and I have a lot of respect for you. I was not misrepresenting anyone. I think you need to look over the 4600+ posts that I made on this board. 99.9% of them have nothing to do with out software. I post on here to help inspectors with computer and website questions. I do not "hawk my wares" as any member on here can tell you. I was not stating we were the only Mac program as I know other programs work with Office. I stated we were the only to run on all 3 (which you have informed me is inaccurate).

Dominic,

I wasn't thinking of you with my comment regarding vendors hawking their wares. I was venting my frustration and I can see where anyone reading the post would reasonably interpret it as being a comment directed at you and referring to you.

I apologize if you or anyone else took my comments to be a slam against you.

I was, however, thinking of several specific individuals when I made my comments.

For example, I learned the other day that an InterNACHI member sent spam e-mail to a large number of InterNACHI members hawking inspection software using descriptions that are almost identical to many of my ads.

He has also blatantly violated several (or many) of our copyrights by incorporating our copyrighted features in his software. Then he got on this message board and started giving away copies of software that is in violation of our copyrights. I have no doubt at all that we will prevail in court but the damage he has already done cannot be calculated.

Most casual MS Office users are completely unaware of what Office is. VBA, VB, VB.net, C++, C#, and VSTO collectively comprise the most powerful suite of programming languages ever.

As I said, I am not a programmer. I have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on the development of our applications. The money isn't all in programming. A large chunk is spent on research.

I do not promote the fact that stuff runs on Linux because we believe it is better for small businesses to use mainstream operating systems and platforms. Apple has enjoyed a resurgence in popularity. That's great for them and for people who like Apples. We recently started mentioning the fact that we have Mac compatible stuff because Apple is again becoming mainstream.

Microsoft had decided to remove VBA from Mac Office because the Mac user base had dwindled to almost being non-existent. Microsoft recently made the decision to continue developing VBA for Macs for the same reason we decided to again start mentioning Mac compatibility.

I am frustrated by the fact that the conversations on this board have little to anymore with actual report writing. More and more, it is about the software.

I'd like to see all vendors completely stop promoting the stuff they sell. It used to be that selling stuff on the message board was not tolerated. Now it is commonplace.

When it gets to the point where pirates and spammers are using the board to hawk their wares, I get frustrated and I'm going to speak up.

As I said Dominic, I apologize to you personally. I should have been clearer.

[George P. Wells, CMI]

Originally Posted by belliott

George I had a good opinion of you till now.
I hope you keep that opinion on the good side by redefining what I just read ,as I will assume you are just having a bad day.

You should know better than to attack one of the most respected members of this Association.

I see no place where he went after you or belittled your software system.

Bob,

I did not mean to attack Dominic. I apologized to him on this thread. I was - and am - frustrated by stuff that has been going on. I was not clear in my original message. I was trying to express my views without naming names. In trying to not name names, it came across as an attack on Dominic. That was not at all what I intended.

[Bob Elliott]

Originally Posted by gwells

Bob,

I did not mean to attack Dominic. I apologized to him on this thread. I was - and am - frustrated by stuff that has been going on. I was not clear in my original message. I was trying to express my views without naming names. In trying to not name names, it came across as an attack on Dominic. That was not at all what I intended.

No problem.

[Dominic J. Maricic]

Originally Posted by gwells

Bob,

I did not mean to attack Dominic. I apologized to him on this thread. I was - and am - frustrated by stuff that has been going on. I was not clear in my original message. I was trying to express my views without naming names. In trying to not name names, it came across as an attack on Dominic. That was not at all what I intended.

I understand. I've seen other programs being copied closed to verbatim. I'd be extremely pissed off too. I don't work 20 hours a day for someone to copy our software! Good luck with the lawsuit.

[George P. Wells, CMI]

Originally Posted by dmaricic

I understand. I've seen other programs being copied closed to verbatim. I'd be extremely pissed off too. I don't work 20 hours a day for someone to copy our software! Good luck with the lawsuit.

Dominic,

You and I know each other well enough that I'm sure you know that I don't get angry easily. In fact, it takes quite a lot to get me riled up.

Let me tell you what lead to my becoming angry. A few days ago while I was in the field, an inspector friend of mine called to tell me about an e-mail he had received. He read it to me over the phone. As he was reading it, he was commenting on how poorly written it was. He was reading my ad copy but it was altered slightly. For a few minutes I thought he was only messing with me. He assured me that this was legitimate. He told me that he never signs up for e-mail mailing lists. The only mailing list he is on legally is mine. This was either from me or from a Spammer. It wasn't from me. I had him forward the e-mail to me.

When I returned to my office, the first thing I did was check my e-mail. Sure enough, there was my ad copy, albeit badly butchered up. I went to the guys website and found a sample report with his name on it. The name looked familiar so I searched our sales records. The guy bought software from us late last year. I could see immediately that he had stolen some of our copyrighted stuff. I called to talk to him about it.

During our conversation he told me that he had expected to hear from me but, not so soon. I downloaded his software. Which, incidentally doesn't even work. Within minutes I saw major chunks that he stole verbatim!

At this point, I'm not happy but I'm still not angry.

In a bizarre coincidence, one thing he stole was something that the inspector who told me about the e-mail had contributed. Another major mistake he made was that he also didn't realize that part of what he stole verbatim was written by a lawyer that had worked with me on some stuff ten years ago. I still have original drafts on the lawyer's letterhead! That lawyer and I co-own the copyrights for his contributions.

At this point, I know I cannot let this go but I'm still not angry.

The guy then proceeds to tell me that he had consulted with Nick Gromicko and Nick agreed to give away copies of the software on this message board. We all know Nick. He tries to help anyone and everyone. This guy obviously did not tell Nick that he had stolen key ideas from me. Nick, of course did not know that the guy stole any of it, let alone stole some of it verbatim! He had set Nick up!

Not only that, he admitted to me that he had obtained a large potion of the InterNACHI mailing list without permission from someone else who was also using it illegally.

At this point, I am ANGRY!

What angered me most was the fact that the guy was so bold as to steal from me then start handing out the stolen property right in my own back yard! And - he made his e-mail and the name of the software look like it might have come from me.

Then, to further aggravate the situation, he created his malfunctioning software in MS Office thus providing ammunition to those who are constantly knocking Office as a legitimate programming platform.

I posted my comments in this thread because of my frustration with the whole question of platforms. The fact is that they are all good platforms. Whether as developers or as end users, we all choose what works best for us.

This was the first time that anyone has been bold enough to try to sell our stuff to InterNACHI members. I'm sure many here will recall a while back when someone was stealing Keith Swift's stuff and trying to promote it to InterNACHI members via Spam.

Usually we catch pirates on eBay. People mistakenly believe that they can get away with piracy on eBay. In reality, eBay is swift and decisive when dealing with copyright violations. I have long participated in eBay's Verified Rights Ownership (aka VeRO) program.

We have never made it as far as a courtroom because no intellectual property lawyer has been willing to take a case to court for anyone we have had problems with. We present our proof of ownership to the opposing lawyer and that pretty much ends it.

[Tim Spargo]

Hi George and Dominic,

For what it's worth and having spoke to both of you... You are both fantastic guys and have been helpful to me and I'm sure, countless others.

I hope that a "bump in the road" doesn't leave too bad of a taste in anyone's mouth.

Just wanted to say that the contributions by both of you and everyone else here are worth their weight in gold.

Thanks again.

[Dominic J. Maricic]

Hey Tim,

There's no problem at all. George sent me a pm explaining what he was talking about and posted it on here. He had quite a bit going on with someone ripping off his software and it just came our wrong on the forum. I understand!

[Tim Spargo]

Good to hear Dominic and thanks again for all you guys do.

Tim

[Patrick D. Wilson]

Originally Posted by ccrosland

I'm working on starting a home inspection business and am having trouble finding software compatible with my MAC. Huge fan of MAC and not willing to go to PC. Any help? By the way, I'm in Texas so I need software that uses the TREC standard inspection form REI 7A-1.

Allinspections.com

Search allinspections in the app store.

[Dominic J. Maricic]

Patrick, you might want to check the posts you're responding to, they're several YEARS old!