Most evil software company

[Mercutio]

Subject says it all. Reason for the poll? The people I work for are convinced that I just hate software. But seriously, if these are the things you had to work with every day, wouldn't you be a little bitter?

AOL gives us AOL, a bunch of different IM clients, Netscape/Mozilla and Winamp, and is widely credited with bringing stupidity to the internet.

Microsoft: Well, this IS the company that invented the talking paper clip, and also gave us product activation, 30,000 different versions of the MDB format, "Start" to shut down, ActiveX and a couple of mail clients that run code about like Debbie "does Dallas".

Symantec: Symantec buys a piece of software, and its next release goes from useful to brown and stinky. Ghost will be a lot less cool when it doesn't fit on a floppy disk. We won't even talk about NAV.

CA: A lot like Symantec, except they don't constrain themselves to screwing up PC software, having moved into the realms of enterprise and mainframe-level sucking.

Stupid Talking Monkey: Spyware in general, I suppose, but I think the screechy little monkey deserves top prize in the "annoying" category.

Intuit makes Quicken and Quickbooks, which basically own the personal and small business accounting markets. Many small businesses LOVE quickbooks... at least until they have their first mandatory, feature-breaking upgrade... followed swiftly by the realization that they're stuck because all their accounting data is is weirdo quickbooks format and now Intuit wants $100 for another upgrade. Better fork it over.

 

[CougTek]

I think I started a trend with those polls...

Is it because Microsoft is so evil that you had to put it twice among the choices?

I chose Microsoft. I'm very annoyed by their constant attempts to limit/violate users' privacy. I want to own my computer, not feel I'm just borowing it and everything I do on it might be monitored. AOL doesn't give me much headaches because I avoid it and I'm almost always able to convince my customers to avoid it as well, so it's not a real issue for me.

I'm also far from being in love for Symantec, mainly because of SystemNotWorks.

 

[jtr1962]

It's MS by a close margin for me. Although as of late their operating systems has become reasonably stable, I am thoroughly annoyed with their stupid PA. one license per machine, and pending adoption of DRM. PA and DRM are highly intrusive schemes that I personally wouldn't tolerate on any machine I use. Hence, Win98(or possibly Win2000 if I get hold of it) will be the last MS operating system I'll ever use unless there is a sea change in attitude in Redmond, which I doubt.

AOL is a pretty close second for their incessant, idiotic TV commercials, and the fact that they made it possible for millions of near-illiterates to use the Internet. I don't see this a a good thing. Anytime you bring easily misled morons on board, you immediately start with incessant advertising, which is ruining the Internet. I never experienced the Internet pre-AOL because I didn't have a PC until late 1998, but reading about others' experiences it sounds much better than the current scheme of ads and pop-ups everywhere, plus that evil Flash. Speaking of which, why wasn't Macromedia among the choices? They certainly have earned it.

 

[Vlad The Impaler]

I dunno. I started on the Net on 1994. I found the experience a little difficult to get into at first. There was a certain 'lack of a point' back then. Despite moronic spammers, which can actually have quite a charm of their own under some circumstances, I prefer the Net (or information superhighway!) experience of today to that of 1994. Then again, that may also be related to the Windows NT 3.51 computer and Netscape browser I was using at the time!

 

[Mercutio]

1993 (the first year I had a real internet connection, and also the year AOL came and screwed everything up) had gopher and USENET as primary means of internet communication. Netnews was particularly great back then, since most service providers had TOS that included prohibitions against ALL commercial speech. USENET brought about a sense of internet-wide culture that cannot be replicated today, except in small sub-sets.

 

[mubs]

M$. In addition to the points jtr1962 made, M$ has ruined many small, innovative companies by acting in bad faith. Eg., "we'll license/collaborate with you, show us your stuff under non-disclosure", and then in a few years, M$ is releasing the same thing incorporated into their own product.

While Symantec is guilty of lousy products, there are alternatives you can use. Likewise, I know people who started with AOL and then have moved on to better things.

Intuit, on the other hand, is M$'s little brother, reasons already given by Merc.

Real complains about M$, but IMHO is pretty bad, and given a chance (market position of M$) will probably be worse.

Macromedia: they seed their software in the market and force you to register to download their crap. I'm sure their databse is filled with John Does. Adobe used to do this (Acrobat), but don't force registration these days.

I hate companies that force registration of any kind, especially to download patches, etc. (Roxio is one).

 

[honold]

sun

 

[CityK]

Where's the nagware champions, the fine folks from flashland?

 

[Mercutio]

Please to explain, Mr. honold.

As a software company, Sun's only offense is not giving java over to a standards organization. Well, that and admirably winning lawsuits against winning-vote-getter Microsoft.

 

[blakerwry]

I think misfitsoft trying to modify java to their liking was a bunch of shit.

Sun owns Java... There is 1 clear standard of java, it's free for me to program with it, it's free for people to use my program... it works on any platform that has a JRE (also free)... what more can you want?


unlike microsoft's intended use of java (now called C#) which was to make it windows only... requires .Net..... misfitsoft probably charges for an IDE/complier.... bunch of crap

 

[cas]

While I recognize the wording of the poll is something of a rhetorical device, the very implication is absurd. Even if we set aside the moral overtones, each of the listed companies (even AOL), has made significant contributions to the industry.

When I started using PCs, there was essentially no third party software market. If you wanted your computer to do something useful, you had to write the software yourself. As the commercial software market developed, the PC progressed from curiosity to yuppie furniture, to effective tool. The breadth and depth of what can be done with a PC has never been greater.

At the same time, software has gotten cheaper. WordStar, my first ‘real’ word processor cost something like $650 with SpellCheck and MailMerge in early eighties dollars. WordPro, WordPerfect and Microsoft Word all offer greater functionality and reliability, at lower cost.

Like many of the posters, there are things that I might do differently if at the helm of some of the listed companies. Even so, their value proposition is attractive enough that I have used software from all of the listed companies except AOL.

Sure, I would like to see a few changes, but I can’t have Falstaff, and have him thin too.

 

[Mercutio]

The fact that most of the participants in this poll are willing to ascribe a moral value to an otherwise immoral entity speaks for itself.

 

[blakerwry]

I put "the people who make the stupid monkey" because it offers no contribution.. it is a piece of spyware.. it is purposely designed to not be properly uninstalled.... to me, that is just wrong.

While I may not like MS's licensing... and it is debatable whether they are involved in unfair business tactics, their OS's have made a great contribution.

Additionally, i think AOL made a good contribution.. when it was 1st made it was an easy way to get online for people who had no other way of getting there. It made it easy and offered alot more content than the other providers.

I dont have opinions on the other companies one way or another so i will jsut keep my mouth shut

 

[Mercutio]

In the positive balance for AOL: Continuing to support Mozilla. Making the passably-good AOLServer internet server available for free (you'd have to have a long memory for that one), owning WAIS (again, an accidental acquisition, but WAIS powers a lot of site-search features all over the internet), offering the alternative to WMP that is WinAmp, mailing me a free floppy every two weeks for three years or so.

Bad things about AOL: Lowering the bar for internet use. Much like lowering the bar for say, driving, drinking or voting, I don't think that's a good thing. Broken primary client software - many sites have special instructions for AOL users, and of course I remember the "me-too" nightmare of USENET in 1993, not to mention the lock-in of AOL's mail format. Standards-ignoring client software. Destroying compuserve, which was at one time a place where techies congregated. Now it's just another version of AOL. Charging per-minute connection rates LONG after everyone else stopped. Having the usual terms of service that prevent swearing in chat-rooms, but not investigating private rooms with names like "Daddys4bipreteens". Causing a general confusion between itself and the internet. Not allowing general internet traffic over its backbone, or allowing internet access to its special content. Hindering development of a standard IM client, or even an IM client compatible with those that it uses. Owning netscape, but not doing anything with it until it became utterly valueless. Destroying the value of Time-Warner. Having tech support with intelligence on par with that offered by my cats. Clogging my mailbox with useless CDs. Increasing the proliferation of commercialism on the internet. Continuing to plague the surface of the earth.

I can probably keep going, but I'm kinda sleepy now.

 

[time]

While I may not like MS's licensing... and it is debatable whether they are involved in unfair business tactics, their OS's have made a great contribution.

It's not debatable - how many courts have to say this before M$ apologists quit?

It's true their OS efforts have made a great contribution - to their coffers. Until WinNT 3.51 they were just a horrible joke (CAS may plump for a much earlier version), and ignoring platform incompatibility, they weren't clearly superior on the desktop until Win2k (NT4 still didn't support USB etc etc).

Even so, this assumes that IBM could never have improved OS2 to a comparable level, BEOS would never have had enough hardware support, and so on. You don't need a $150 billion company to write an OS.

 

[time]

Hmmm, I didn't mean to imply that Blake (or anyone else here) is an apologist for the richest corporation on Earth. I'm just in a bad mood. :evil:

Sorry.

 

[Fushigi]

Merc, you're insulting your cats. :lol:

 

[Tea]

Yes, Merc. But apart from that, you think AOL is a pretty good company?

 

[Tannin]

My stupid litte simian friend didn't even read the list. She just scanned down from top to middle, looking for "Microsoft" and immediately ticked it. In other words, she didn't even see the "and why do we even need to ask" category.

But, as luck would have it, I think she got it right. There are a lot of evil software companies out there. Just to please our Shakespearian friend, I'll take AOL as my example: now there is a company so keen on the "soft" part of "software" - soft in the head, I mean - that if the CEO lies down at night, his brains leak out onto his pillow.

PT Barnum once observed that "no-one ever went broke by overestimating human stupidity". Well, so far that rule has been proved true a million times over. You can't go broke doing that. But it's it's a pretty good way to lose $US98.7 billion in a hurry.

Excuse me, I'm wandering off the point. Must be Tea's influence.

What I wanted to say is yes, of course it's Microsoft, it can't possibly be anyone else, but that you should always ask the question anyway.

It depends, I guess, on how you define "evil". By intention? Or by results? If we are to go by intention, then we can be fairly safe in assuming that, somewhere in the world, there is indeed a more evil company than Microsoft - in fact, there are quite possibly two or three on Fushigi's list. I'd be pretty confident that the talking monkey idiots, AOL and probably Symantec intend more evil than Microsoft - who, like every vast monopoly ever known to history, have some good points too - but if we are to go by mere intention than we would also have to agree that your average city jail is full of murderers far more evil than Hitler ever was. OK, they only killed one or two people, most of them, but that wasn't because they were lacking in evil intent, it was just that they weren't very good at doing evil.

Hitler, on the other hand, was (in my reading of history) a man who genuinely believed in trying to do good in the world, and gave his life to that aim. And yet Hitler was responsible for somewhere around 30 million deaths, perhaps 40 million. He was (in my view) unquestionably more evil than Benny the Hood could even dream about.

And once we clarify our thinking in this way, once we accept that evil is as evil does, then the elevation of Microsoft to #1 in evil becomes an unquestionable and obvious necessity. Indeed, all things considered, I'm hard pressed to think of a single company which has done more harm since King Leopold's Association Internationale du Congo.

 

[zx]

You forgot Apple!

They'd take top prize in the 'worst maketing' category. Also, quick time for windows is one of the worst piece of software I ever came across.

Microsoft have annoying licencing policies. However, because of the MSDNAA program, I get some of their software for free .

Symantec are famous for finding ways to make a system unstable or unusable. However, Speed disk is very good and NAV corporate is also a good product.

 

[zx]

But all things considered, my vote goes to the monkey.

 

[Groltz]

I'm rather surprised that Doug did not make mention of Intuit, since he and I discussed their recent disgusting changes in tax software at length a couple days ago.

For your reading enjoyment:

Item One

Item Two

Item Three

Item Three.5

.

 

[Tea]

Thankyou, ZX. May I count on your entirely voluntary campaign donation being in the mail? Oh, and about that knighthood: yez, of course. It'z yours as soon az I am elected.

 

[Handruin]

I'm rather surprised that Doug did not make mention of Intuit, since he and I discussed their recent disgusting changes in tax software at length a couple days ago.

For your reading enjoyment:

Item One

Item Two

Item Three

Item Three.5

.

I almost did, but Real was higher on my list. You also made a valid point that a majority of the folks here are not in the US. I don't even know if Intuit makes TurboTax for other countries.

 

[Tannin]

My experience with Intuit is entirely positive. My eight-year-old copy of Quicken 7 for DOS works perfectly, and has accounted flawlessly for quite a few millions of dollars over the years. (Unfortunately, I seem to have spent the majority of them. Can't blame Intuit for that, though - it's entirely Tea's fault.)

 

[Groltz]

My experience with Intuit is entirely positive. My eight-year-old copy of Quicken 7 for DOS works perfectly, and has accounted flawlessly for quite a few millions of dollars over the years. (Unfortunately, I seem to have spent the majority of them. Can't blame Intuit for that, though - it's entirely Tea's fault.)

All my past years of using TurboTax have been completely satisfactory. It is the 2002 TurboTax products that are rotten.

Caveat Emptor

 

[blakerwry]

haha.. i had quicken on an 8088 (or maybe 8086)... I think that was DOS 3.x or something... pretty bad....

 

[Adcadet]

I went to MS, perhaps only because they have such ability to be so evil. Sure, the talking monkey may be evil, but he doesn't come pre-installed on >95% of PCs.l

 

[Adcadet]

I hate companies that force registration of any kind, especially to download patches, etc. (Roxio is one).

I hate Roxio. I suffered with their 3.5/4.0 (I think) releases that worked if heavily patched/but didn't really work in WinXP. I was pretty pissed at them until I discovered Nero. Now I'm all better, and Roxio free.

 

[Groltz]

I suffered with their 3.5/4.0 (I think).

Easy CD Creator became a Roxio product starting with v5.00

 

[timwhit]

I went to MS, perhaps only because they have such ability to be so evil. Sure, the talking monkey may be evil, but he doesn't come pre-installed on >95% of PCs.l

Ya, but the talking monkey installs itself without the user knowing in some cases, which is even more evil.

 

[Groltz]

Stupid Talking Monkey: Spyware in general, I suppose, but I think the screechy little monkey deserves top prize in the "annoying" category.

I've read through the thread and have to ask: What software is this? I'm drawing a blank.

 

[timwhit]

It's called Bonzi Buddy. It is an evil purple monkey that sits on your desktop and won't leave. Lots of sites try to force Bonzi Buddy down your throat. Whatever you do, don't install it!

 

[Adcadet]

I went to MS, perhaps only because they have such ability to be so evil. Sure, the talking monkey may be evil, but he doesn't come pre-installed on >95% of PCs.l

Ya, but the talking monkey installs itself without the user knowing in some cases, which is even more evil.

Using the patented Adcadet Evil Scale (AES; where the evilness of the act (evil points)*frequency=AES value), I figure that automatically installing a monopolist's product (50 evil points) onto 95% of PCs is worth 47.5 AES's. The monkey's secret install is really evil (99 evil points), but it only happens on a fraction of machines, say 5% to get an AES of nearly 5.

 

[Adcadet]

It's called Bonzi Buddy. It is an evil purple monkey that sits on your desktop and won't leave. Lots of sites try to force Bonzi Buddy down your throat. Whatever you do, don't install it!

Aside from spreading evil, what do the marketing people claim it does? What does it really do (other than annoying people)?

 

[SteveC]

It's called Bonzi Buddy. It is an evil purple monkey that sits on your desktop and won't leave. Lots of sites try to force Bonzi Buddy down your throat. Whatever you do, don't install it!

Does this only pop up when using IE? Is that why I haven't come across this?

 

[Groltz]

Thanks Tim. No worries, I try to keep my shields up against crap like that.

The only one that ever got in was "Comet Cursor" when I was using IE because I had the "Download Signed Active X Controls" set to "Enable". At least that one wasn't too hard to get rid of.

 

[timwhit]

It's called Bonzi Buddy. It is an evil purple monkey that sits on your desktop and won't leave. Lots of sites try to force Bonzi Buddy down your throat. Whatever you do, don't install it!

Aside from spreading evil, what do the marketing people claim it does? What does it really do (other than annoying people)?

http://www.dooyoo.co.uk/review/377787.html - this page explains everything

 

[timwhit]

This is the gist of what it is supposed to do:

I'm almost loathe to tell you what it actually does, because it does sound quite good - very good in fact for a freebie download. The 'Buddy' in the Bonzi Buddy download is a cute purple 3D gorilla(or a parrot in the old version) called Joe who is animated using MS Agent technology which enables it to speak to you and move about your desktop. Joe becomes your friend online, helping you browse, manage your downloads, alerting you when you have email, finding better prices while shopping, telling jokes, singing songs, remembering special dates and a whole lot more. You can also buy upgrade plug-ins for the software which have various functions such as making Joe voice activated, adding more information to his knowledge base(more games, songs, jokes etc.) and allowing him to read your email aloud to you. Joe is cute and friendly and actually provides some very useful functions all bult in to one software package although nothing you can't find elsewhere...

 

[Groltz]

Using the patented Adcadet Evil Scale (AES; where the evilness of the act (evil points)*frequency=AES value), I figure that automatically installing a monopolist's product (50 evil points) onto 95% of PCs is worth 47.5 AES's. The monkey's secret install is really evil (99 evil points), but it only happens on a fraction of machines, say 5% to get an AES of nearly 5.

Andy, did you see this post?

How does that rate on your scale?