On Friday 15 March 2002 10:47 pm, jukola wrote:

[snipped]

> A printer is *not* a software, nor is a CPU.

Whilst that is undoubtedly true, in Windows many printers connect to 
the internet because their drivers are set up to use rpcss.exe in the 
Windows OS.  My Epson printer would not print unless it was connected 
to the internet... I am not saying this is true of all printers, but 
using it as an example; I'm sure there's a lot of spyware in printer 
drivers but because it operates at the OS level it isn't immediately 
obvious. This doesn't happen in Linux because the drivers are in the 
kernel and don't require an internet connection to function.

By the same token, software running on a PC (in the shape of drivers) 
can affect other programs, so it is a legitimate question to ask.

There is nothing underhand going on here: you are free to use Mozilla 
without the Quality Feedback Agent (Talkback) if you prefer.  If you do 
opt-in for testing, the guys at Mozilla say they will take info about 
your system should you have a crash.  You are agreeing to give them 
such information as they require when you agree to use a Talkback 
build.  That's how I understood it when I downloaded Mozilla several 
builds ago, and the wording on their notice doesn't seem to have 
changed since then.
-- 

Graham

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