I recently upgraded two pieces of software. One was Norton the other iTunes. In both cases I got bit in the ass for it. In the case of Norton I forgot rule #1. Never, ever buy software the first year it comes out. The reason is because it takes at least a year to work out all the bugs.
I had this sweet set up with Norton Utils, Antivirus and Firewall where I had my shit so tight I was pooping diamonds! Seriously my computer never needed a reboot, never got a virus, never needed me to do anything! I had it set up to run the big scans monthly, otherwise only scan incoming files, run Utils and updates once a month to defrag and keep stuff running smoothly and do it all in the wee hours of the morning while I slept. Then I had to screw things up.
My subscriptions expired and in a moment of weakness I chose an “upgrade” To renew the subscriptions was 49.95 and for only 5 dollars more I could get this new super awesome Norton 360! It sucks. The stupid software removed my password manager, so now I can’t remember how to log in to anything. (which was the whole point of the password manager in the first place). It also scans continuously. Despite my telling it to run once a month. The stress on the CPU keeps my condo warm. Seriously I don’t turn on the heat in the winter and I live in Toronto! It is a dismal state of affairs and it’s going to be a year before I can try to roll things back to what they were. I could just return the product and try to roll back now but good luck getting a hold of someone at Symantec. “Worst customer service ever” – Comic book guy.
The other upgrade mistake was iTunes. I have my 30G iPod synced to my computer at home and loaded on a library of some 5700+ songs. My Itunes here at work asked if I wanted to upgrade and I selected “no” and checked the “do not ask me again”. Unfortunately it kept asking me over and over. Why? Did it not understand “no”? HEY STEVE ARE YOU LISTENING? Of course you’re not. You too busy pulling “just one more thing” out of your ass. Well I finally relented to get the stupid thing to stop asking me. The result was it erased my iPod. I am not very happy at the moment, as you might guess.
Software manufacturer have to keep messing with their products if they want to keep selling copies. The lesson learned is don’t update.