Anti-Features

I like the term a lot. However, popup blocking is actually a real feature since sometimes you want to block popups and sometimes you don't. Designing a system that makes sorting out allowed vs. disallowed in a user friendly way is non-trivial and is in fact a feature of a browser. It's especially a feature if enabling means, as it did for the Internet Explorer team, going back and changing old functionality to allow for blocking.

It's well thought out article. One key insight that Benjamin Hill offers is that anti-features are often driven by business model requirements. If a competitor "un-implements them" (enabling the feature) it's hard for the original firm to follow without changing business model. This applies beyond open source vs. proprietary competition.

That is a great term. I've been searching for years to sum up that concept so elegantly. Probably since first time I encountered copy-protection on a video game (X-Wing on a 486, I think it was)

<i>It does not cost free software developers anything to avoid anti-features</i><p>Damn well better not cost them anything since their remuneration is zero.