mcgrew's Journal: An Open Letter to Google

I was already in a bad mood when I got to work. My arthritis was hurting badly and McDonalds got my order wrong, I was almost late from taking it back, and the office was freezing. I logged in to the network, and opened IE because the Outlook email client stupidly has no way to change your password. Adobe informed me Flash needed upgrading so I clicked OK. It asked if I wanted to install a Chrome frame for IE and I unchecked the box and clicked OK.

The damned thing installed a Google toolbar in IE, installed Chrome, and made it the default browser!

I uninstalled them and reset IE as the default browser; it isn't my computer, it belongs to my employer and I'm supposed to use their approved software. I hate my work computer. When I uninstalled Chrome, IE opened by itself to a firewall "Forbidden!" page, listing it as "shareware, freeware".

It was really cold, my arthritis was killing me and I went home. I won't be upgrading Flash on any of my own computers, because trojans are evil, even when they're written by Adobe, Google, Sony, or anybody else. I'll probably uninstall all Adobe products from my own machines except one; sometimes channel 49 won't come in so I need it for the Big Bang Theory.

Google, your motto is a God damned lie. I've been a faithful Google user since you first put the search engine on the internet; it was heads and shoulders better than any of the others and still is. I cheered when you used the Linux kernel in Android. I was an early G+ user when you had to know somebody to get an account. I have a gMail address (I seldom check its mail, though).

But these stealth installs are bullshit. That behavior is not acceptable and I won't tolerate it. I won't be back on G+ or gMail and I may bight the bullet and start using that shitty Bing.

When I see or hear that you've changed your ways I'll be back. Hurry, though, because I'm thinking of buying a new phone and I really don't want Apple or Microsoft.

I will repeat myself here -- it is never acceptable to install anything at all on anyone else's computer without their permission, ever, for any reason. No exceptions.

Slashdotters, please inform your non-nerd friends of this rule, just the other night a guy I know was steaming because his daughter in law had "messed up my computer."

Google, I'm really, really disappointed in you.