Interactive NYC Blog: August 2006 Archives

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August 29, 2006

Yahoo Music Engine - Problem

I work at a large interactive agency in New York City. I am a Senior Flash Developer, part of the overall Technology team. This is my first big gig as an employee of a major company, and this is the first time I haven't had administrator access to my own computer. Technically, I suppose it's *their* computer... but I work on it every day.

I had to pull strings with our IT department to get them to install Yahoo Music Engine on my computer. They routinely install iTunes on request, but they don't support other software that hasn't been approved. Today, I am disappointed to find a forced upgrade to Yahoo Music Engine. This means for me, that I need to request IT support to install the "FORCED" upgrade, which is likely to put YAHOO MUSIC ENGINE on our IT departments BLACK LIST! They don't have time to come around to everybody who pays for and uses Yahoo technology, and support their fiendish legal music habits.

A tip: I can install software on my computer that doesn't touch my REGISTRY. I believe this is the problem I'm having with YME's upgrade. Please correct me if I'm wrong about this. I have been able to install Java programs, no problem. Trillian installed just fine. Various other downloadable apps work with no problem.

Yahoo - can you please not force users to upgrade to new versions? There are reasons users like old versions, and not having to download an extra 20MB all of a sudden when you just want to listen to a new record you discovered through the NPR Music podcast. Forced upgrades are invasive, PARTICULARLY when they're NOT TRANSPARENT. Windows gets away with this, downloading in the background, and is on our IT department's approved list. There is no other software I'm aware of that gets away with this behavior without losing customers as a result.

Please fix this problem. Screenshots below.