The word is pretty decisively dead [+]. Lots of companies make money by selling software over the Internet on a free trial model. As was routinely observed in

The word is pretty decisively dead [+]. Lots of companies make money by selling software over the Internet on a free trial model. As was routinely observed in the shareware community as we tired of the name, "How can we differentiate 'shareware' from the rest of the industry when Microsoft Freaking Office is sold on a free trial model these days?" After the widespread rise of the web "You can give the installer executable to other people. Please do!" was no longer a really compelling advantage, and it always confused a lot of civilians. ("You mean I don't have to pay for it, right?" "No, that is not what shareware means." "You greedy bastard!") I just sold my business which did this back in April -- it supported me above my previous day job salary for a while back in the day, before the rest of my business eclipsed it. I was, ahem, very much not the most successful HNer with the model, but many of the others like to keep things under their hat. At least one received a check written on purple paper with an exclamation point on it, as if the dollar amount wasn't an exclamation enough. (He's occasionally active on HN and can tell you the story if he wants to, but it isn't mine to tell.) [+] I used to be a card-carrying member of the Association of Shareware Professionals, which is now the Association of Software Professionals, because the membership expressed its opinion that the shareware branding communicated "crappy software which will give your Googles a virus but is otherwise free."