I have been noticing an increasing trend lately where more and more users want all software for free and feel they certainly should not have to pay to block ads and detect and remove harmful software. The general comments we receive seem to be centered around the fact that the user did not "put" the harmful software on their computer and therefore should not have to pay to have it removed. Some people even accuse us of being in "bed" with the spyware/adware vendors in some sort of conspiracy to force users to purchase software to remove the software that the adware/spyware authors create! It often amazes me at how the human mind works :)

This of course is very frustrating as a professional software developer with a staff that spends literally thousands of hours (and dollars) a year developing professional software applications. Keeping up with the new spyware/adware/malware that appears daily is not a simple job. It takes skilled, trained professionals, to detect, diagnose and remove some of these applications.

We are not just doing this for "fun" - this is a full time career. I have personally spent over 24 years as a software developer and businessman - it is not something you can just do overnight. I often would like to ask these users what they do for a profession. I am quite certain that if a user is a dentist he/she would not fix everyone's teeth for free because "they did not create or want the cavities, so why should they have to pay to fix them!"

I fully understand the frustrations that a user goes through when their computer slows down, serves ads and becomes unusable because they clicked the "Fix your computer now" ad and it installed spyware. It would seem the "anger" would be better spent getting laws in place and supporting (i.e. paying) for software to be developed to prevent further infections, etc.

Free software is a dangerous lure - as free software is the reason most of the infected computers got that way in the first place :)