I realized that I hadn't installed (and then gotten angry about) a new web browser in a while. So, since I was at work on a windows machine, I thought I'd go ahead and try installing the latest version of Internet Explorer (v7). I think the last time I installed a version of IE on something is when I worked at CUNY Graduate Center, in 2002. So presumably it's come a long way since then. Here's what happened.

Install goes very well. I download it, I run it, everything is happy. Except I have to reboot my computer. Since it's towards the end of the day, I have no interest in rebooting my computer. It can wait until tommorrow morning.

The next morning: I get into the office, still having not rebooted. I sit down, log in, and try to look at my Outlook calendar. Outlook doesn't run, with some relatively esoteric error messages about not being able to open some file or another. I get annoyed, and reboot my computer.

5 minutes pass, and I'm at the login screen. I login.

Another 5 minutes pass, and the computer has finally stopped grinding so much that everything is unusable. This is just general windows annoyance, and I can't really say that it's anything having to do with the browser. I work for a little while, and remember that "Hey! I have a new web browser installed!" Which I then bring up.

Since it's the first time I run it, it goes to a setup web page. One of the first options is selecting my default search engine. And it says "Hit the Apply Settings button below to choose an engine" or somesuch." OK. Just as I'm hitting the button, I notice that there's a little arrow on the side, which says 1 / 4 right under it. So by hitting the arrow prematurely (which it very clearly tricked me into doing), I am now stuck with 3 pages of Windows default browser settings. I don't know what's in there, but I suspect that it made IE my default browser, uninstalled Firefox, corrupted my Opera install, and sent a message to an MS intern to come around to my desk and stick a shoe in my butt.

But that's alright. It's almost my fault. Then I start to get a bunch of balloon popups. Do I know that their anti-phishing software isn't set up? Do I want to set it up? Under "No, please do not setup this anti-phishing software" it says "If you select this, the web pages you visit will not be sent to Microsoft to determine their safety" or somesuch.

Really, guys? That was an option? Sending you a complete record of all the webpages I visit? And you're tying that into a portion of the application which purports to increase the safety of my web browsing? At least when the TSA violates me, they are doing it for something which has no dollar value. How much are you guys getting out of the absurd amount of personal information you are collecting from this "Anti-Phishing" tool built into to your browser? And when is that guy with the shoe getting here - I don't want to be away from my desk.

Also what I learned is that I have to get plugins to support inline find and mouse gestures. This was the last ten minutes. I'll keep you updated if I can keep myself from beating unconscious myself with my keyboard.

Update:
I also think I just learned that installing it screwed up a bunch of my Outlook defaults. Nice.

Update II
And I just saw the first Netflix popup that I've seen in almost 5 years. Holy crap.