D-Squared Can Resume Pop-Ups, For Now

linuxwrangler writes "According to this SF Gate article, U.S. District Judge Andre Davis said there was insufficient evidence for him to grant a preliminary injunction preventing D-Squared from using Microsoft's messenger service to send pop-up ads to Windows users. D-Squared used the Windows messenger service to pop-up ads as often as every 10 minutes. The ads promoted its product -- software to stop 'these unwanted and illegal pop-up messages forever with the click of a button' - a practice the FTC called 'high-tech extortion.'"

Comments

Re:Is the Judge saying....

[SpaceLifeForm]

This was a serious question. The judge was more or less saying that he couldn't assign enough blame *to* D-Squared to issue the injunction. Well, if it is not that clear to the judge at this point, does the judge believe that a different party might share some of the blame?

Why do people put up with it?

[zeugma-amp]

D-Squared used the Windows messenger service to pop-up ads as often as every 10 minutes. The ads promoted its product -- software to stop 'these unwanted and illegal pop-up messages forever with the click of a button'

That's the funniest thing I've seen in a while.

Perhaps I don't get out enough.

Sometimes it amazes me what windows users will put up with to stay on the microsoft plantation. Messenger pop-ups ... Web popups ... Spyware ... Gator ... Browsers that you can't trust to accurately represent a URL ... Programs that crash at random (or even regular) intervals...

I'm sure there are lots of other everyday annoyances, since I don't have to deal with them anymore, they just don't come to mind.

I was speaking with a fellow at work today and he was complaing about having to reload his windows box yet again because of stability issues. Why do people continue to just suck it up and deal with this crap? I guess I just don't understand why even people who know about the alternatives and are completely capable of dealing with the change continue to be so willing to submit. My wife is one of those. I've told her flat out that google and her own wits are the only tech support she has anymore. Fortunately for her, she knows enough to be able to figure things out on her own and can navigate DOS better than most, but I just plain refuse to be an enabler with this annoying pile of warm cow patties that is windows.

Re:Why do people put up with it?

[Texas Rose on Lava L]

Sometimes it amazes me what automobile users will put up with to stay on the road. Traffic jams... high gas prices... exorbitant insurance premiums... speeding tickets... parking tickets... sleazy used car dealers... sleazy new car dealers... global warming... accidents... dirty air... smog checks... lines at the dmv... toll roads... noise... road rage... wars in the middle east... smelly oil refineries... corrupt oil companies... lemons... shady repair shops... red light cameras... registration fees... finding parking at the mall...

If something is ubiquitous, and the alternatives are not well known or percieved to be inadequate/hard to use, or if people are required by their employers to use it, they'll put up with a lot of shit.

That said, if the downsides are particularly bad in a given situation, the alternatives can become quite popular. This is why public transportation is so popular in Manhattan, even though most of the USA drives everywhere. It's also why so many web servers run Apache, even though most people's desktops run windows.

A morsel for the troll

[FreeUser]

Don't get me wrong, I think Linux has a very bright future and has a good chance of dominating over Windows someday. But the fact is, Windows is the still the most usable OS out there for the time being.

• Not according to my mother, who switched from Windoze and now runs linux.
  
• Not according to my girlfriend, who switched from Windoze and now runs Apple OS X.
  
• Not according to my nieces and nefews (ages 2-14), who all run (at home) and prefer Linux over the windows systems they use at school, and who prefer open office over microsoft office.

Indeed, not according to a lot of people who are not particularly computer literate, are not at all idealogical with respect to software and digital freedom, and who still, once exposed to alternatives to Microsoft, never go back despite Microsoft's best efforts at lockin and petty harrassment via IE specific web pages, broken MS-only java implimentations, and the like.

Microsoft may be the most usable system for you. This may reflect your personal preferences, or it may reflect an idealogical, financial, or personal stake you have in Windows vs. other alternatives. Or it may be a function of unfamiliarity with the alternatives and a mind closed to them. Quite possibly the latter, as describing the crash prone, virus prone, digital-rights-mangled heap of buggy code that is Windows as more usable than Apple OS X, a system which even most Windows, Linux and FreeBSD enthusiasts will happilly admit is the easiest for non-clueful users to learn, certainly flies in the face of objective facts.

Indeed, emperical evidence suggests Windows is no longer easier to use than Linux (just more familiar), indeed, its propensity for worm and virus infestation, its continueing instability make it quite the opposite for those non-techie computer users I've exposed its alternatives to. (Even windows 2k dies for no good reason from time to time...not the daily reboots we once knew, but monthly reboots remain, something my OS X and Linux boxes do not suffer from).

Now quit being the jerk you are and go help your wife with her computer problems.

He is, by weaning her away from the source of those problems (shoddy Microsoft software), and using tough love where it is appropriate.