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As an IT professional I advise my clients that any piece of software that obeys the commands of someone other than the computer owner qualifies as malware.
Foxitreader has been an excellent, even superior, alternative to Adobe's bloated PDF reader but the Mephistophelean pact with the hustlers at Ask.com has now crossed the line. The latest automatic update silently installs the Ask.com malware without permission, and the uninstaller is non-functional, asking to close Internet Explorer windows even when there are no Internet Explorer processes present, requiring manual removal of the toolbar malware from the registry.
It's obvious that Foxit is now addicted to the revenue stream that comes from the Crack Dealers and sleazy hookers at Ask.com, and now the Crack Dealers and hookers are in charge. So Foxit, it's time for an intervention.
Foisting malware on your users is unacceptable, Foxit, and you know it very well.
You might blame it on your developers, but if they are thumb-fingered as to put out an unrequested piece of malware that will not uninstall itself on request, then the problem isn't development, it's leadership. If management made a decision to do this on purpose in response to more aggressive requests by the Crack Dealers at Ask.com, then Foxit has become a tool of their avarice that sees customers and users as a commodity: prey to be devoured rather than customers to be served.
You know this, Foxit. At some level you know you've lost your way. Remember who and what you are - you started out as the good guys, the shining, positive alternative to the bloated, buggy, insecure mess of Adobe Reader. But you've forgotten who you were, and allowed yourself to be led down a path to your own destruction by the likes of Ask.com. They don't care about you, Foxit, or about your users. All they care about is using you and us as tools to push their unwanted crap on people to squeeze revenue out of them by serving up ads no one wants. They have made you into their image, and you're better than them. Remember who you were.
Foxit needs a 12-step program to recover from the addictions that have caused this unfortunate turn of events.
Step 1: Admit you have become addicted to the revenues of unscrupulous partners like Ask.com and that your practices have become uncontrollable.
Step 2: Come to believe that a higher power (your community of users, if you will listen) can restore you to sanity.
Step 3: Make a commitment to turn your will and your life over to the care and guidance of your users (we are your customers, not Ask.com!)
Step 4: Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of your actions.
Step 5: Admit to your users and yourselves the exact nature of your wrongs.
Step 6: Become ready to have your users help you remove your defects of character.
Step 7: Humbly ask users help to remove your shortcomings.
Step 8: Make a list of the persons you have harmed, and become willing to make amends to them all.
Step 9: Make direct amends by apologizing and righting the wrongs (roll out an auto-update that removes the malware you distributed and provide support to those who need help in removing your malware).
Step 10: Continue to regularly take a moral inventory, and when you see yourself taking another step on the slippery slope toward being another evil, avaricious corporation, promptly admit it.
Step 11: Seek through reflection to improve conscious contact with your users, asking only how you can meet their needs and add revenue streams only with their express consent.
Step 12: Having experienced an awakening of organizational culture as a result of these steps, try to carry this message of recovery to other organizations, and to practice these principles in all your affairs.
The alternative is clear, Foxit: You're addicted to the revenue streams offered to you by Ask.com. They are the bad guys, they've led you down the wrong path. Get into recovery now, otherwise you'll end up rejected by the users you once served. We are your true friends. The guys at Ask.com are your crack dealer - they got you hooked, and now they are using you to control your user base and getting you to compromise the principles you once espoused. Foxit is better than this, or was at one time. You can be again, but you have to get help and get into recovery.
Ask.com isn't just like a crack dealer - they're like a hooker who gave you a freebie and has given you a bad case of the crabs, and now you have infected us. We're willing to forgive but only if you dump the parasite infested hooker you've been sleeping with.
The choice is pretty clear: recovery from your addictions, or the downhill slide to skid row to join the other crack dealers and hookers, able to hawk your infected wares only to those who are too ignorant to avoid your contagion, there to remain until Foxit Software dies, a victim of its addictions. The choice is pretty clear, Foxit. Choose the business model you want to identify with: The drug-dealing, STD-spreading crack dealer/hooker, or the helpful, clean, fast, secure, superior alternative to Adobe Reader that values users and gets revenue by being good enough to out-compete the more expensive, less efficient bloatware that dominates the market.
This is the part of the intervention where those who care about the addict detach with love. We love you, but we didn't cause you to make your bad choices, we can't cure you and we can't change you. Recovery is now up to you. No threats - just a reminder that you need to remember who you once were.
Foxitreader has been an excellent, even superior, alternative to Adobe's bloated PDF reader but the Mephistophelean pact with the hustlers at Ask.com has now crossed the line. The latest automatic update silently installs the Ask.com malware without permission, and the uninstaller is non-functional, asking to close Internet Explorer windows even when there are no Internet Explorer processes present, requiring manual removal of the toolbar malware from the registry.
It's obvious that Foxit is now addicted to the revenue stream that comes from the Crack Dealers and sleazy hookers at Ask.com, and now the Crack Dealers and hookers are in charge. So Foxit, it's time for an intervention.
Foisting malware on your users is unacceptable, Foxit, and you know it very well.
You might blame it on your developers, but if they are thumb-fingered as to put out an unrequested piece of malware that will not uninstall itself on request, then the problem isn't development, it's leadership. If management made a decision to do this on purpose in response to more aggressive requests by the Crack Dealers at Ask.com, then Foxit has become a tool of their avarice that sees customers and users as a commodity: prey to be devoured rather than customers to be served.
You know this, Foxit. At some level you know you've lost your way. Remember who and what you are - you started out as the good guys, the shining, positive alternative to the bloated, buggy, insecure mess of Adobe Reader. But you've forgotten who you were, and allowed yourself to be led down a path to your own destruction by the likes of Ask.com. They don't care about you, Foxit, or about your users. All they care about is using you and us as tools to push their unwanted crap on people to squeeze revenue out of them by serving up ads no one wants. They have made you into their image, and you're better than them. Remember who you were.
Foxit needs a 12-step program to recover from the addictions that have caused this unfortunate turn of events.
Step 1: Admit you have become addicted to the revenues of unscrupulous partners like Ask.com and that your practices have become uncontrollable.
Step 2: Come to believe that a higher power (your community of users, if you will listen) can restore you to sanity.
Step 3: Make a commitment to turn your will and your life over to the care and guidance of your users (we are your customers, not Ask.com!)
Step 4: Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of your actions.
Step 5: Admit to your users and yourselves the exact nature of your wrongs.
Step 6: Become ready to have your users help you remove your defects of character.
Step 7: Humbly ask users help to remove your shortcomings.
Step 8: Make a list of the persons you have harmed, and become willing to make amends to them all.
Step 9: Make direct amends by apologizing and righting the wrongs (roll out an auto-update that removes the malware you distributed and provide support to those who need help in removing your malware).
Step 10: Continue to regularly take a moral inventory, and when you see yourself taking another step on the slippery slope toward being another evil, avaricious corporation, promptly admit it.
Step 11: Seek through reflection to improve conscious contact with your users, asking only how you can meet their needs and add revenue streams only with their express consent.
Step 12: Having experienced an awakening of organizational culture as a result of these steps, try to carry this message of recovery to other organizations, and to practice these principles in all your affairs.
The alternative is clear, Foxit: You're addicted to the revenue streams offered to you by Ask.com. They are the bad guys, they've led you down the wrong path. Get into recovery now, otherwise you'll end up rejected by the users you once served. We are your true friends. The guys at Ask.com are your crack dealer - they got you hooked, and now they are using you to control your user base and getting you to compromise the principles you once espoused. Foxit is better than this, or was at one time. You can be again, but you have to get help and get into recovery.
Ask.com isn't just like a crack dealer - they're like a hooker who gave you a freebie and has given you a bad case of the crabs, and now you have infected us. We're willing to forgive but only if you dump the parasite infested hooker you've been sleeping with.
The choice is pretty clear: recovery from your addictions, or the downhill slide to skid row to join the other crack dealers and hookers, able to hawk your infected wares only to those who are too ignorant to avoid your contagion, there to remain until Foxit Software dies, a victim of its addictions. The choice is pretty clear, Foxit. Choose the business model you want to identify with: The drug-dealing, STD-spreading crack dealer/hooker, or the helpful, clean, fast, secure, superior alternative to Adobe Reader that values users and gets revenue by being good enough to out-compete the more expensive, less efficient bloatware that dominates the market.
This is the part of the intervention where those who care about the addict detach with love. We love you, but we didn't cause you to make your bad choices, we can't cure you and we can't change you. Recovery is now up to you. No threats - just a reminder that you need to remember who you once were.
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