I know I have complained about this before, but tell me this isn’t somewhat predatory:

All I have installed on this PC is quicktime.

I got a software update saying there was a new version of Quicktime, I unchecked Safari and Itunes because I don’t want them on my work machine.

I updated Quicktime and the dialog box came back with Safari and Itunes checked again.

I chose quit. This time I opened the dialog for this blog and guess what, Safari and iTunes are checked again.

Does little Stevie really thing Safari has a chance of gaining marketshare?

Does Mr. Jobs thing that it’s his Apple given right to have iTunes on every machine on earth?

Will our heroes escape the trap that the evil Dr. Jobs has set…wait, that’s Batman, nevermind. I don’t want these apps on every PC I own. I do want it at home, to be honest I don’t REALLY even want Quicktime….. Just leave me alone!

I have to first thank my buddie’s girl for letting me onto this little jewel. I found it on her blog following a trackback from a comment she had left on mind and I am blown away. The tool is called Inquisitor 3 and it’s basically spotlight for Safari.

This is the results that appeared typing philoking on my mac. Of course it autocompletes as you type and shows you relevant results as well as quicklinks to searches with your default search engine.

According to their site:

Inquisitor… it’s like Spotlight for the web.

Start typing and websites pop up immediately, along with ideas to refine your search.

It’ll autocomplete your words (is it reading your mind?) and you can add more search engines to Safari with customized keyboard shortcuts.

Oh, and it’s free.

Give it a look and I think you will find it difficult to not be impressed by it’s elegant interface and simplicity. Search on!

Download Inquisitor 3

I do not, I repeat, I DO NOT WANT SAFARI FOR WINDOWS!

I am so tired of closing update notifications on all my PCs! Just because I use iTunes everywhere I have to pay the Safari tax? No thanks…

I know I posted this before, but I was leaving a comment on an article today and I feel compelled to blog my comment…

@MasterofOpera.. you WANT Quicktime? Wow…. I blogged about this awhile back, now admittedly, I work for Microsoft, so I will probably get smacked for being totally uncredible, but I do carry a Macbook Pro (even into MS meetings hehe) and I think that gives me a little credibility towards being unbiased.

I think the thing is, it’s not that Safari is a bad product, even though I won’t use it even on the mac….. it’s that it is a subversive way to try and install it. I had installed Safari for Windows on my main XP machine at home, and when I saw the update thing I wasn’t surprised. Then I went to use my wife’s computer for something and the update box was up with Safari, I thought maybe she had installed it and didn’t think about it again until the 64 bit Vista machine I had just built from a clean install asked me to install it after installing iTunes. I was blown away. Stop taking the Apple fanboy side and ask yourself this.

What would happen to us (Microsoft) today if we tried to install IE8 with the Zune software for example. Me thinks we wouldn’t get away with that one too well. So as far as I know, standards of computer etiquette are not unique to the company.

Anyone that pretends that MOST users don’t just click next on those things is fooling themselves. My mom, sister, aunt, uncle, cousin, friend next door….all those guys probably would just go, “oh, it’s an update…ok” Then they see a new icon on their desktop and go “What’s that?” They click it, and another box comes up saying “Make this your default browser?” and they go, hmmm, ok, and click that.

I am not saying these are the brightest users on the planet, but it’s a COMMON USER. Apple making this the default behavior, based on knowing research that this is a common user pattern, makes this NO different than the Browser Hijacking crap that went on 5 years ago. Seriously.

If you need an analogy to make it stick, Apple no more expects people to pay attention to that dialog as Best Buy expects you to mail in your rebates. That’s just the facts ma’am.

From this article….

On my main machine I had installed Safari for Windows for testing purposes. Knowing that, I was not surprised when Apple’s update software alerted me that 3.1 was available for download. I updated and all was right with the world.

I saw update pop up on my wife’s machine this week and noticed Safari in the list of updates, no biggie I thought, perhaps she had installed it also.

It was when I saw the software alert on my 64-bit machine that alarms went off. Apple was telling me there was an update for Safari to be installed when Safari had never been installed previously.

Now I may be splitting hairs here, but adding new software under the guise of an update seems to be pretty shady to me. Someone that isn’t paying much attention might bet getting all sorts of software that he or she never intended.

If I remember correctly, that was the straw that broke the camel’s back with Limewire and labeled it as Mal-ware. I am not saying that Safari is dangerous, but given the state of browsers and the constant attacks the receive, they very may well be, but since when does “update” mean, install whatever you want.