Lots of shareware did and does that. It's normal. It's just an update check. It doesn't self-update. It doesn't transmit any information. No logs are collected. It just displays a "update is available" message if it finds that an update is available, with a link to the website to download the new version.
> Today authors instead try to perform telemetry and control the use of the software after download through "automatic updates". They seek to gain from users' laziness to change defaults. They want to collect information about users and their usage habits. "Involuntary feedback."
Ripcord doesn't send any information about the client when it checks for updates. No information is logged on the server. It just fetches from this URL: https://cancel.fm/ripcord/updates/v1
Ripcord does not have any kind of telemetry or analysis system in it. It doesn't even report which OS you're using to the static file HTTP server — the update info URL returns the information for every OS at once.
> How about starting the program while offline, i.e., network interface down.
It works fine if you do that.
> "How do I prevent Ripcord from checking for updates before I'm able to open the preferences window to disable it?
This is provided as a way for users who extra paranoid to turn it off outside of using the normal preferences in Ripcord, since that requires launching Ripcord at least once. It's not the only way to do it. (It'a also useful for package managers on Linux who don't want "update is available" notifications to show up for their users.)
The normal preferences window in Ripcord has a clearly labeled checkbox on the first page for turning update checking off or on. I don't know what alternative there is. If it was off by default, most users would ask why it was off by default and why are they being tricked into being left to use outdated versions. I don't know any software that does this.