Linux, Where Crapware Goes to Die

“Remember this cute little purple ape? If you’re a Linux
user, you might not, so let me enlighten you a bit. This little guy
is the “Bonzi Buddy” ape. He was one of the earliest
malware/spyware/crapware programs for the Microsoft Windows
platform. Arguably the cutest of his breed, BonziBuddy became a
widespread problem for Windows users for years.

“One of the biggest problems for end users is that BonziBuddy
almost did something useful. It sorta supplied some value to users
(heck, just seeing his little ad dance around was entertaining),
but it also did nefarious things in the background. His evil
backdoor santa activities, however, were not what made people hate
the “product.” The dumb monkey was insidious about popping up when
you didn’t want to see him, and was impossible to delete! He
was sorta like “Clippy Extreme” when it came to annoyance.

“So why were Linux users left out in the cold during the heyday
of BonziBuddy? Well, there’s a few reasons. Some are obvious,
some aren’t.”

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