Ummm, this is -old- news.
M$ purchased the leading anti-spyware company
"Giant Company" back in November. I had been evaluating Giant's AntiSpyware tool on two separate computers, and was about ready to add it to my list of recommended applications and register it, when M$ purchased it.
At that point, M$ basically shut it all down. You couldn't get to the web site for anything except one page which notified the browser that the company was purchased by M$. No more registrations would be accepted. Only currently registered people could get updates, and once those registrations ran out, you were just plain out of luck.
Almost a month later, they've re-enabled much of the website, but the apps and service are still crippled.
A later
posting on Slashdot indicates M$ has removed some functionality from the original product. I also speculate they will tie it into IE for updating, which will only open it up to more vulnerabilities.
To me, this is just another M$ hostile takeover:
- Find company that is popular with consumers.
- Buy it.
- Make noise that M$ is going to make it better, stronger and more "innovative"
- Remove some functionality.
- Re-label it with M$ logos, etc.
- Release it late
- Watch consumers cry as they now have to keep buying upgrades from M$ in order to get functionality back, that was in the original product, only to find it all buggered by M$ hack coders.
Makes me mad really.
Oh, and yea, if they'd just fix the damn OS, they wouldn't need to buy up other companies tools to 'BAND-AID" their damn OS.
M$ is like Maaco, they can paint -anything- and make it look good, but it's still shit underneath.
Luckily, the anti-spyware product was co-developed with
Sunbelt Software which focuses more on business level IT tools. However, they -do- have a consumer (read that personal) grade anti-spyware product, called
CounterSpy.
I have been evaluating CounterSpy now for about two days, and so far, it's working very nicely. The fact is, Sunbelt had to work out some contractual obligations with GIANT, now with M$. M$ and Sunbelt will be sharing data files, but from what I've read, Sunbelt will continue independent development of the spyware tool.
At least this story had a more happy ending.