Re: [Win2k] Stopping sw from phoning home

From: Wolf Kirchmeir (wolfekir_at_sympatico.ca)
Date: 09/12/05 

Date: Sun, 11 Sep 2005 18:31:43 -0400

Paul Adare wrote:
> In article <YGJUe.30333$vN.975121@news20.bellglobal.com>, in the
> microsoft.public.win2000.security news group, Wolf Kirchmeir
> <wolfekir@sympatico.ca> says...
>
>
>>Or just don't use this kind of software. Why use software that
>>misbehaves? Just because it's made by MS doesn't mean it's good for you.
>>MS software is made to benefit MS, not you. Be suspicious of _anything_
>>made by MS, and find a substitute ASAP.
>>
>
>
> Your anti-Microsoft bias is showing. You might want to adjust your
> glasses and re-read the original post. Last time I checked MusicMatch
> Jukebox was not a Microsoft product.
>

Sorry, the OP wording seemed to me to imply it was an MS product. My
error, it seems.

Regardless, I do _not_ like programs that "phone home" without good
reason, I don't care who makes them. MS seems to build this into much of
their product as a matter of course. I don't mind Automatic Updater
"phoning home" to check for security patches etc, but that's a necessary
part of that particular service. In most other software I have that
checks for updates, I've turned off that feature, and initiate the check
myself. I'm rather paranoid... :-)

Do I have a bias against MS? No more than against any company that tries
to manipulate the market. I'm a radical free marketeer in economic
philosophy, and MS does not play by free market rules. I think the
government's role is ensure the market is as free as possible, which
paradoxically means enforcing the rules of the free market, as in
anti-trust legislation, etc. It just hasn't gone far enough, and under
recent administrations, the US's free market regulation, which was IMO
the best in the world, has been pretty thoroughly gutted, and/or the
Justice Department has been muzzled. Pity. The EU appears to have
overtaken the USA in enforcement of free market principles.

But that's just one side of the free market equation. A free market also
requires knowledgable customers, and that takes work. IMO, very few
people have grasped that the customer also has a responsibility to keep
the market free, by learning as much as possible about the products
(s)he is contemplating buying. I've seen ads that extol and encourage
the customer's _ignorance_ - you know, the ones that tell the
prospective buyer that they don't need to know all that geeky stuff,
just know of what's cool, and they won't go wrong. Good grief!

But enough of ranting.

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