From: "Matthias Paul" Organization: Rechenzentrum RWTH Aachen To: opendos AT delorie DOT com Date: Fri, 15 Dec 2000 18:33:36 +0100 Subject: Re: Decompression licensing X-mailer: Pegasus Mail v3.22 Message-ID: Reply-To: opendos AT delorie DOT com On Wed, 13 Dec 2000 Joe Da Silva wrote: > Also, the PKWARE site seems to imply that their > shareware is now adware/nagware - YUK!!! At least the Windows "Shareware" version is. If you install it, it will also install an ad-robot, that downloads advertisments when you re online to show them even when you re offline. AFAIK, PKWARE at least tells about this (there are other companies, who don t tell you, they are using such techniques). But even if you decide to deinstall the product, the robot still remains active and continues its work. Some months ago, the German computer magazine c t published an article how to get rid of this beast again, but since I almost never use Windows, I didn t paid enough intention to it to reproduce it here... Sorry. After all, Windows is more and more becoming a "playground" for such bad habits, such as sending user profiles back into the net (RealAudio RealPlayer, as well as some Microsoft software), giving control to dangerous organizations like Scientology to more or less vital parts of the system (the DiskKeeper derivative in Windows 2000 Professional), this annoying ad-ware, and other great ideas... Privacy, what s that? What? Oh yes, sorry, I forgot, we are not humans, we are consumers... Orwell s 1984 is long ago and forgotted, I guess... Orwell? Who s that? We even have Big Brother shows in commercial TV now (so I have been told)... 1984? 1933? Pah, we are living in the 21st century! In Germany we say "Wehret den Anfaengen!" (Very loose translation: "(Stand together and) put it down as long as it is still possible to respond!") I guess we have a new form of environmental pollution now, it once started with "information pollution", but now it can almost be characterized as "mental pollution" or "mind pollution", and if we don t pay serious attention to it, I predict, it will sooner or later start to *control* us. Microsoft calls Windows an "entertainment" platform, but I must have a very different idea of "entertainment" then... I am already seeing Windows as advertising/merchandising platform for all this e-commerce stuff, similar to ads in TV or radio. How boring... Well, maybe it is meant to be entertaining, trying to get rid of the "channel guides" or "MSN" or other things that once you cut them off they come back again somewhere else just like a Hydra... Adventure Windows ;-> I don t understand why the majority of users still tolerates it... Matthias