A Pain in the Whatchamacallit
By Tiny Ruisch
Earlier this month, when I was adding the “differences” to the Commodore 64 picture, I started to realize what a loyal consumer I am. Until they went bankrupt, all except one of the computers I owned were manufactured by Commodore. The lone exception was a Heathkit Zenith computer kit that I built.
Back in the early 1980’s the VIC 20 was a great first computer. Later, it was a real joy to own the Commodore 64. I think anyone that ever owned one will tell you how much they loved it. The Commodore 128 was a great upgrade. After all, it had a 64 mode which made it the best of both worlds. For some reason, the Amiga didn’t impress me all that much. It was a Commodore though.
I think most people are like me. I’ve always had good luck with Netgear products, so I tend to buy their stuff when it is a viable choice. Same way with computers. Four of the five machines in my house were manufactured by HP. Brand loyalty is a big thing to most companies. That’s why they sue all trademark infringements.
Brand loyalty also works in reverse. Years ago, I was a fan of Sony products (even the Betamax). I owned the Sony Walkman, a Sony TV, and of course a Sony Discman. Do you remember the Sony Trinitron microwave? I think you could say that I was a loyal Sony customer.
That all changed for me when Sony did evil. In 2005, they put root kits on their music CDs. It was supposed to be a copyright scheme. It later turned out that they illegally violated the license agreement for the LAME codec and the VLC Media Player. That made me so mad that I refused to spend any of my money on Sony products again. Over the years, it seems that I made a good decision. Sony has often been in the news since then for various nefarious reasons.
Another company that I refuse to enrich is Electronic Arts. I dislike them so much that since October of 2000, I’ve slammed them on my personal web site. Once again, my instincts were proven to be good. Over the years, Electronic Arts has spent a lot of time in court defending themselves against various lawsuits.
Then there is another of my favorite companies to dislike: Symantec. Way back in the 1980’s, a great utility named PC Tools was created by Central Point Software. I was a faithful customer until they were acquired by Symantec for a whole bunch of money. Like many others, I shifted to the Norton suite because PC Tools was incorporated in it. Unfortunately, it was never the same program again. Norton turned out to be bloated software that actually slowed down your computer. The company received so many complaints ranging from poor customer service to fraudulently putting charges on customer’s credit cards. They only got away with charging me one time. They have supposedly gotten better since then, but I’ve never purchased any of their products again.
I guess I’ve done enough ranting and raving for this month. Please feel free to join me in not supporting Sony, Electronic Arts and Symantec. When it comes to the computing picture, I can tell you that there aren’t any “differences” in them.
Thanks for reading.