Posted on 09/29/2008 11:27:06 PM PDT by Swordmaker
I'm making a habit of seeing things I'm not supposed to. I once went to South Korea and Samsung's marketing guys accidentally told me they were considering quitting the laptop market. Another time, an Asus rep told me the company had built a prototype tablet PC for Apple.
This trend continued last week when I sat down with Rowan Trollope, senior vice president of consumer products at Symantec. He spoke very eloquently about the merits of Norton AntiVirus 2009 and how Symantec was trying desperately to change the negative image of Norton as a resource-hogging, user-bothering nuisance.
I've tried his new software, and -- for the most part -- I agree it's pretty good. But during our meeting, I couldn't ignore the fact he was using an Apple MacBook Pro. For all his hyperbole about how incredibly safe Norton keeps Windows PCs, it appeared Trollope was ducking the virus threat completely -- by using a Mac.
You've got to wonder why. Is it because he doesn't trust Norton enough to keep a Windows PC safe? Or is he so tired of anti-virus applications intruding on his daily computing activities that he's switched to a platform where he doesn't need AV software? What's wrong with a Dell?
Trollope politely explained that he'd chosen a Mac because he prefers the platform's "ease of use" and "elegance". I'm assuming he's referring to OS X's spangly graphical user interface, and not the Mac's innate ability to dodge malware.
It does make you wonder -- if the guy responsible for pimping AV software prefers Macs, maybe we should too.
I know, I keep hearing from the anti-Macs that that is just not possible :-)
Norton makes and sells AV and anti-malware software for Macs, so the whole article is sort of a non-starter.
Mark
Norton makes and sells AV and anti-malware software for Macs, so the whole article is sort of a non-starter.
One thing to make AV/anti-malware software for Macs, it is another thing to make money selling it.
Try clicking on the right side of the mouse and see what happens.I DON’T HAVE A RIGHT CLICKER MOUSE.
I had the same experience that, straight out of the box, the mouse doesn't seem to have multiple buttons. It has them, all right, but Steve Jobs just doesn't like the appearance of having multiple buttons.If it doesn't work go to Systems Preference, click on Keyboard & Mouse and check to make sure the preferences are set correctly.
You will probably find that on both the left and the right sides of the mouse image it shows "Primary Button." Have faith - just change the selection on the right to "Secondary Button" and try it - you'll like it. You do have a right button, it's just that it's invisible.There is a side button, also. I forget whether it is off by default or not, but I have mine set to "Expose - all windows."
Also be aware of the note/checkbox below the "Key Repeat Rate" slider on the Keyboard part of system preferences. If you don't want to have to hold down the "fn" key in order to use the F10 key to mute, you have to uncheck that box. I find I like it checked - but that just means you have to remember the "fn" key when changing volume or brightness.
I’ve used several generations of Norton products. Based on those experiences, I wouldn’t exactly consider their endorsement a positive.
On an interesting and somewhat related note, I’ve had no antivirus or firewall software whatsoever installed on my main PC for the past three months, including the built-in XP firewall. I removed the ones I was using for a specific reason, but just never got around to reinstalling them, so I figured I’d see what happened. No problems whatsoever. I used to be the biggest pro-security guy around, but now I’m inclined to believe that for the average user malware isn’t the threat it once was.
why do most retail gas stations NOT have diesel? most cars are not diesel in the USA.
[ctrl][click] = right-click
It was 148 something a week or so ago. I’m sure the drop had more to do with the general drop in the market than Apple, Inc itself.
Depends on the region you live in.....
Where I live...about every station has diesel.
Unfortunately, not even the Norton removal tools work properly. I tried it, and found all sorts of leftover Symantec crap that the removal tool couldn't deal with.
I will never use another Norton product.
You, and millions of other people.
Hi kitkat. It’s likely program specific rather than Mac specific. In Firefox for example you can right-click on the picture (or control-click if you don’t have a two button mouse) and you’ll get several options. One is “Copy Image Location”.
I don’t think I’d brag about the head guy of the most annoying, crash inducing, all around junky piece of software in the world uses the same thing I do. Norton AV is the reason most games say to turn off virus scanners when you play. That’s like saying the head designer of the Edsel drives the same car. It’s like saying Scott Linehan used plays you recommend. Not really a positive thing.
He’s got one because he CAN AFFORD ONE!
Symantec makes a lot of stuff other than Norton branded, or at least they used to. He's probably in charge of the anti virus or all the "Norton" stuff.
It's too bad what's happened to the Norton brand. Back in the DOS days, I wouldn't be without Norton Utilities. I STILL use a shareware clone of Norton Commander DOS as my file manager in Windows instead of the dorky and dysfunctional destroyer. I mean, a DOS program must have been pretty good if it's still inspiring shareware versions 15 years later to use instead of the standard Windows solution.
Dual pane file manager along the concept of Xtree (but better) but when Norton "upgraded" it for Win95, it just looked like explorer. It still retained a two pane mode which was....two instances side by side tiled to fit the screen (which were no more aware of each other than they were of any other running program on the system)! Doh!
And then they do stuff like the horrible Norton AV, and they wonder why people don't buy their crap. Idiots. I hope Pete got a big pile of money, cause it's got to hurt to see what they've done to what he built.
I've been a very happy AVG AV user for 8 years or so but they really shot themselves in the foot with v8.0. It refuses to update a lot of the time, tells me I need to reboot to complete the update (this in itself is a step down from 7.x) when no number of reboots will cause it to finish, etc. Plus, now there's a lot of annoying advertisement to get you to upgrade to the paid version, and when the update is successful, you have to click four or five windows closed to get back to work, several of which are all telling you the same thing. With 7.x it was one window, and if you didn't click it within 30 seconds, it closed itself. So now I'm trying out Comodo AV on a couple machines as something to standardize on, and so far, I like it.
i don’t see what the big deal is. IIRC, Norton makes anti-virus for Mac.
A solution in search of a problem.
Horsefeathers.
Those who write viruses write them for the OS that is the easiest to exploit.
The problem is often corporate or university IT. They know only Windows so they often have zero-thinking IT policies.
"Thou shalt have anti-virus software installed on thy computer if thou have connected it to our holy network."
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