Trademark violation: Fake Notepad++ for Mac

206 points79 comments2 hours ago
FinnKuhn

Using the trademark is one thing. The authors brazen reaction another: https://github.com/notepad-plus-plus/notepad-plus-plus/issue...

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KORraN

Original announcement and discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47916964

x187463

Just needs to update the site to make it clear it's an independent port of the project. Then, modify the name to MacPad++ or something. Good to go.

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HelloUsername

Related discussions:

"Notepad++ for Mac – Independent community port" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47916964 27-apr-2026 85 comments

"Notepad++ Code Editor Comes to Mac After 20-Year Wait" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47947740 29-apr-2026 36 comments

Bender

A similar thing happened for OTR recently. [1] Is the AI naming the vibe coded projects? Many of these are getting submitted to /newest

[1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47997919

i_think_so

Plenty of very thoughtful comments so far about copyright, community, developers who might not speak English as a first language, .... Very few people mentioning the obvious:

MALICIOUS BINARY!

Did we learn nothing from the xz malware fiasco? One update quietly pushed out at night while nobody's paying attention and boom.

albertzeyer

Why not just getting the changes/extensions upstream, welcome the Mac dev on the team, and make it an official port?

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krzyzanowskim

becase there is only one Notepad.exe https://notepadexe.com on the mac

f3408fh

FFS. I installed it after seeing it here on HN and on MacRumors. Terrible failure on my part but MacRumors should offer an apology for endorsing this fake release.

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omblivion

It is astonishing how blatant people can be. How do they imagine they won't be immediately called out?

Hopefully the domain and the app on the app store gets taken down soon.

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RedShift1

Is notepad++ a registered trademark?

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karel-3d

The app seems to be entirely vibe-coded. ("multi-agent AI development workflows are what make a one-person project at this scale practical")

However the author says he will "move from the branding".

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ares623

(posting my comment from the other thread) Hilarious. How long does it take to vibecode the requests to change the logo and name. Vibecoding a port from scratch is super fast as long as you don't need permission huh. Then when the adults ask you to not infringe on copyright, it's all "please be patient guys. I am boy. Give me one week pls."

andai

Not to be confused with

https://notepadexe.com/

gverrilla

It's the Trump pattern: break all rules to benefit yourself until someone or something stops you. USA has not yet reached this clarity.