I sincerely hope that the principals of Avast never lose sight of the fact that trust in their type of software (meaning AV & AS) is the most important thing of all. Any anti-virus, anti-spyware or anti-malware company crawling in bed with scare-ware, ad-ware and any other sleazy marketing firm gimmick will, IMO, lose far more than they’ll make in any incremental income.
Shame on Avira. I hope they suffer what they deserve from these business arrangements. I will do what ever I can to make sure anyone and everyone I run into knows how they can no longer be trusted!
There is absolutely no reason to believe that avast! would ever “partner” in the way Avira seems to have done. But if you’ve not done so already, may I suggest that the best strategy for making sure that no-one at avast! ever gets as far as even thinking about suggesting such a partnership, is for each of us who appreciate that all we have to put up with in avast! Free is the Google Chrome option, an “Upgrade” button and an ad for AIS in the GUI, to take whatever discount we can get (still 55% at Wilders AFAIK) and become an avast! “partner” yourself.
I can’t believe I just wrote that. Do I sound like a fanboy? :-[
We have changed the licensing type on our Avira AntiVir Personal listing from "Freeware" to "Ad-supported" as a result of this incident. Avira gave us assurances in the past that it won't display third-party ads through the product citing company ethos.
Since those policies have clearly changed and we want our users to be well informed about what they install, we have updated our listing accordingly. A similar change will be enforced for paid versions of Avira AntiVir if the product’s Service Pack 2 (SP2) ships with the rebranded Ask toolbar included.