Morgwen,

Fair enough- I am in the industry and I have intimate knowledge about what 90% of the "spyware" apps REALLY do.

Gator has in the past been the worst offender- but they don't send any info you dont give them, know what i mean? (they don't send your CC info over the net, they store it locally)

after Gator got away from grabbing ppl's email addresses, everyone's cleaned up their act. I challenge you to show me one
"buggy" mainstream spyware app that is taking down ppl's OSes today. By that I mean the WhenU SaveNows, the Gator/GAINs, the eZula TopTexts, New.net, etc...

Anyways, I may not be one to agree with spyware, but I'm willing to actually objectively look at what it does, why it does it, and what affect that has on me. And as for the why, it's usually to display contextual advertising, not steal your personal info (face it Morg. who the hell wants your personal info??)