Info-Mac is an
online community,
news aggregator and
shareware
Shareware is a type of proprietary software that is initially shared by the owner for trial use at little or no cost. Often the software has limited functionality or incomplete documentation until the user sends payment to the software developer ...
file hosting service
A file-hosting service, cloud-storage service, online file-storage provider, or cyberlocker is an internet hosting service specifically designed to host user files. It allows users to upload files that could be accessed over the internet afte ...
covering
Apple Inc. products, including the
iPhone,
iPod
The iPod is a discontinued series of portable media players and multi-purpose mobile devices designed and marketed by Apple Inc. The first version was released on October 23, 2001, about months after the Macintosh version of iTunes ...
and especially the
Macintosh. Established in 1984 as an
electronic mailing list
A mailing list is a collection of names and addresses used by an individual or an organization to send material to multiple recipients. The term is often extended to include the people subscribed to such a list, so the group of subscribers is re ...
, Info-Mac is notable as being the first online community for Apple's then-new Macintosh computer. Info-Mac was the dominant
Internet resource for
Mac OS software
The following is a list of Macintosh Software – notable computer applications for current macOS operating systems.
Video
For software designed for the classic Mac OS, see List of old Macintosh software.
Anti-malware software
The software ...
and community-based support throughout the 1980s and early 1990s.
Original format
Info-Mac consisted of two distinct services: the ''Info-Mac Archive'', a user-submitted collection of nearly all contemporary
freeware and
shareware
Shareware is a type of proprietary software that is initially shared by the owner for trial use at little or no cost. Often the software has limited functionality or incomplete documentation until the user sends payment to the software developer ...
available for the Macintosh, and the ''Info-Mac Digest'', an electronic mailing list open to public participation. Both the Info-Mac Archive and Info-Mac Digest were operated by volunteers.
Info-Mac Digest
The Info-Mac Digest was published daily via
Stanford University
Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...
servers, and was itself archived on the Info-Mac Archive. At its height, the Info-Mac Digest was read daily by several thousand people, and was mirrored in the
Usenet group comp.sys.mac.digest.
The Info-Mac Digest was published in "volumes" that covered the period of one calendar year, with some exceptions.
Info-Mac Archive
The Info-Mac Archive was the centralized collection of Macintosh software with over 100
mirror sites located around the world. At the time, disk space on a server was cost-prohibitive and hard to come by. Free public archives such as Info-Mac were often the only means for shareware authors to deliver their product over the Internet. Some early commercial software download sites, like
CNET's Shareware.com, were originally mirrors of the Info-Mac Archive.
Due to the low-bandwidth connections accessible by early Internet users, which made downloading large files an onerous task, Info-Mac partnered with Pacific HiTech to periodically publish
CD-ROM
A CD-ROM (, compact disc read-only memory) is a type of read-only memory consisting of a pre-pressed optical compact disc that contains data. Computers can read—but not write or erase—CD-ROMs. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold both comput ...
s containing selected shareware and freeware from the archive. These CDs were sold through Mac-related magazines and publications. Licensing issues required software authors to specifically allow their contributions to be included on the CD-ROM through a statement in the file's abstract. The CDs allowed wider distribution to users who did not have network access or could not spare the long download times associated with software applications. As the software was encoded in
BinHex or
MacBinary format it could be stored on non-Mac file systems such as a
BBS or
FTP server. Starting with the Info-Mac VI CD-ROM, the discs included the utility "Spelunker" which allowed users to search the archive in a user-friendly manner. Starting with the Info-Mac VIII CD-ROM, the package included two discs to offer twice the shareware and freeware.
Decline and 2007 relaunch
The popularity of Info-Mac services in their original format waned in the late 1990s. As the growing popularity of the
World Wide Web and
web hosting services allowed software authors to distribute their own software, and for users to communicate on online
message boards, demand for Info-Mac's services grew beyond the capability of an all-volunteer staff to provide and maintain it at an acceptable level. Unable to maintain relevance on the rapidly evolving Internet, the Info-Mac Digest was discontinued in November 2002, while the Info-Mac Archive stopped accepting new file submissions in December 2005.
In December 2007, Info-Mac was redesigned and relaunched with a
Web 2.0 interface, combining previous Info-Mac Digest and Info-Mac Archive content with a modernized forum-based community and news aggregator.
Info-Mac Reloaded
/ref> Today, Info-Mac has expanded to cover all Apple product lines. A new, opt in Info-Mac Digest automatically generated from forum content is published daily. Info-Mac also distributes an iOS app called iForum on the App Store.
References
External links
*
Info-Mac Archive
Info-Mac Digest
{{Authority control
File hosting
Internet properties established in 1984
Internet forums
Macintosh websites
Macintosh operating systems