[Updated on 22th of June 2015 : Though the two-day offers test completed May 27th, we took further action on our project mirroring program on June 18th. See the update at http://sourceforge.net/ blog/project-mirroring- policies-will-be-revisited- with-our-community-panel- existing-mirrors-removed/]

There has recently been some report that the GIMP-Win project on SourceForge has been hijacked; this project was actually abandoned over 18 months ago, and SourceForge has stepped-in to keep this project current. For more details, read on…

The GIMP-Win project was registered on SourceForge in October of 2004. In 2013, the GIMP-Win author discontinued use of SourceForge for download delivery.

Based on our prior outreach to the GIMP-Win author, we understand that they had concerns about the presence of misleading third-party ads on SourceForge. They were not alone in those concerns — we were also concerned — leading us to establish a program to enable users and developers to help us remove misleading and confusing ads.

In cases where a project is no longer actively being maintained, SourceForge has in some cases established a mirror of releases that are hosted elsewhere. This was done for GIMP-Win.

When we establish a mirror, we change the status on the project to clearly delineate it as a mirror, and change administrative control of the project to clearly delineate that it is editorially curated by SourceForge.

Mirrored projects help enable end-users to stay current with the latest releases, particularly where SourceForge continues to house historical releases for community benefit.

Mirrored projects are sometimes used to deliver easy-to-decline third-party offers, and the original downloads are always available.

Since our change to mirror GIMP-Win, we have received no requests by the original author to resume use of this project. We welcome further discussion about how SourceForge can best serve the GIMP-Win author.

[updated on 28-5-2015] Since yesterday, SourceForge Gimp-Win mirror downloads only the original software without any offers. We also invite the Gimp-Win developer to take back control of the project if that is his desire, while respectfully asking that he maintain any project updates or allow us to do so.