Ordinary Gweilo

It’s November, so it must be time for my annual anti-Symantec rant.

I needed to renew my subscription for Norton Internet Security, so (after finding my way through their badly-designed website) I discovered that for a few dollars more I could upgrade to Norton Internet Security 2006. 

Well, why not?  It seemed like a bargain.

One reason is that when I placed my order I couldn’t download the product.  Should be so straightforward – the email said that I could download the software from "my order page", and (like an idiot) I kept trying to find the download icon, assuming that maybe I’d done something wrong.  No, I hadn’t – they had.

I complained, and a few days later they informed that there was a "problem", and my credit card had not been debited (hmmm…) and suggesting that I could order again.  I did, and (amazingly) this time it worked. 

I have discovered one ‘gotcha’ already.  When you install the software, it changes your homepage, and then the software refuses to let you change it back because it might be a hacker doing this.  Amazingly, the way it does this is to create a warning window that it doesn’t actually display.  Brilliant.