Your views on SpyWare and AdWare
I'm sure you are all aware of the nuisence spyware and adware can cause. I'm not however talking here about malicous self installing applications which secretly watch your online activities or browser hijacking programs. I'm talking about programs which advertise themselves as such software iin advacnce. My question is, to what extent are you willing to accept a possible invasion of privicy and unwanted ads in return for useful application?
This brings me to my next question. What in your opinion do you classify as adware and spyware. Hotmail for example displays advertisments on the user interface and also appends them to e-mails, do we calssify this as adware? GMail goes a step further and uses the contene of your e-mail's to display related ad's, so do you view this as a kind of spyware?
Lastly, have you had any bad experiences with this type of software? Is it more awkward to uninstall? Can you ever gauruntee its gone forever? Do they take over other aspects of your computer use, such as locking down your browser home page.