FreeLists / 24hoursupport / [24hoursupport] Re: Security Decisions

["Mike" <mikebike@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Ron,
I think you are correct that the AV/Firewall programs are attempting to
become full security suites at the customers expense.

I'm holding off purchasing any new software till SP2 goes gold and the
security programs have an opportunity to produce programs which will be
compatible.

Linux is looking better all the time<G>

Mike
******* Mike's  REPLY SEPARATOR *********

On 7/23/2004 at 5:14 PM chizotz@xxxxxxxxx wrote:

Hi Mike,

There are several points that really upsets me about this situation. 

First, in my opinion it is _never_ acceptable for a company to require that
a 
competing product be removed before it will install. I understand, perhaps 
better than most, how that can put companies between a rock and a hard
place, 
but it is simply, utterly unacceptable in my opinion. The real rub is that 
Zone Alarm charges a fee for their upgrade/update program, and that this 
requirement was _not_ a part of the deal when I purchased the product. They 
made a unilateral decision to include functionality that a competing
product 
interferes with, and, rather than offer an option for a version of their 
product without that problem or any of the other possibilities open to
them, 
they are forcing all of their customers to either comply or do without the 
upgrade they have paid for. In this case, complying with the requirement
Zone 
Alarm is imposing will cost me the licensing fee I've paid to their 
competitor, Trend Micro, which they do not propose to compensate me for -- 
much less tell me what I'm supposed to do about an Anti-Virus solution to 
replace Trend Micro that is as good or better than Trend Micro.

In my opinion, Zone Alarm has no business integrating any Anti-Virus 
functionality into their firewall product that might interfere with
competing 
Anti-Virus packages. Likewise, Trend Micro has no business integrating 
firewall functionality into their Anti-Virus product that might interfere
with 
competing firewall pakages. If either or both of these companies want to 
produce software that competes with the other, that's great! But they
should 
not be allowed to bundle these products together, forcing their customers
to 
have to make a choice between them. Each product should be able to compete 
directly with the other; let the user decide if they want the Zone Alarm 
firewall and the Trend Micro AV, or the Zone Alarm firewall and Norton AV,
or 
the Trend Micro firewall and McAfee AV, or _whatever_ combination the user 
chooses.

This bundling of different software in one package has gotten way, way out
of 
hand. It introduces all sorts of problems, such as filesize and resource 
requirement bloat when the user really only wants and needs a particular
piece 
of a software package; the consumer buys a particular piece of software as
the 
best solution to a particular problem, but is forced to take a lot of
other, 
perhaps useless (to that consumer), junk along with it. Now we're seeing 
competing products actually requiring that their competetor's product be 
uninstalled to function which simply can _not_ be good for competition nor
for 
the consumers who are affected.

I'm a consumer. I don't want Trend Micro's firewall, I want Zone Alarm
which I 
believe to be the best firewall solution. I don't want Zone Labs
Anti-Virus, I 
want Trend Micro which I believe to be the best AV solution. That's why I
paid 
money to both companies, and that's why I'm the loser, no matter which way
you 
look at it or which way I go, when these companies bundle their products 
together and force the consumer to take it or leave it.

OK, rant over... for the moment.

Ron




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