The Download Blog

While the rest of you are off gallivanting about in the summer sun, I've been chained to my desk under the San Francisco fog to parse through the worst downloads of the summer. This time around, the range varies from programs that sound useful but aren't, to programs that sound horrible and are, and include one that just defies common decency--and not in a good way.

Be sure to check out CNET TV editor Tom Merritt's video on these five train wrecks and just what I get out of all this. Oh, and a quick disclaimer, just so we're all on the same page: none of these programs are malicious software of any kind, and all meet CNET Download.com's software hosting policies. You're safe in downloading them and trying them out. Consider yourself warned, though: they suck, and maybe even worse than the batch from this spring.

Coming in at No. 5 is Google Maps Downloader. Designed for that rare Venn diagram intersection of cartographers and unnecessarily challenging work flows, this program requires knowing the exact latitude and longitude to save a map. And it's not just one set of coordinates, either. It's way too much effort for something that can be done just as easily with a screen capture. Sometimes it's cool to have professional-level software, but this isn't one of those times.

For No. 4, I present to you yet another entry in the long list of Gnutella clients that already exist for spreading mislabeled malicious software and porn. This one's called TurboWire, and promises even faster download speeds for getting your system-infecting copies of Windows 7 RTM or "Harry Potter".

At to No. 3, the Seanau Icon Collection promises a difficult pronunciation along with a rip-off of a deal. See, the program gives you six generic icons in different sizes, and you can then pay $70 to get the other 2,794 just-as-generic icons. You pay $70, and you get lameness. As Tom pointed out, what's the icon for rip-off?

Windows Movie Maker has its fans, but then, nobody's perfect. This Microsoft program is far, far from perfection, with its buggy behavior, frequent crashes, and lack of modern features. With all the overhauls that Microsoft has been focusing on of late, from Windows 7 to Office to Windows Media Player, one hopes that Redmond will soon focus their attention on this backward little fella. Either that, or kill it outright.

The worst download of the summer has to be the Michael Joseph Jackson Screen Saver. Before you fire off that flame mail, hear me out. It's not the content of the screen saver--if you're a MJ fan, you're going to want to remember him in some way, and there are worse things you could do besides a screen saver that shows you a new version of Jackson's face every 10 seconds--kind of like the man himself. No, the real problem with this, no matter your relationship to Jacko, is that it's a craven attempt to capitalize on his passing. Tragically hilarious? Amusingly offensive? Both, at the same time? Either way, it's awful, so give this No. 1 a big, big pass.

Be sure to check out Tom Merritt's video for a chance to win an extremely special prize.

The end of the aughts is nigh, and the first few months of 2009 have brought us new corporate bailouts, new unemployment figures, and a new batch of download disasters. I don't know about you, but I can't wait to get to 2020. Until then, here are five of the worst downloads from the beginning of '09--maybe we can just laugh ourselves into the future.

Be sure to check out CNET TV Editor Tom Merritt's hilarious video (on the left) on these five gems and just what happened to Peter Butler, my "Worst Downloads" predecessor. Oh, and a quick disclaimer, just so we're all on the same page: none of these programs are malware of any kind, and all meet CNET Download.com's software hosting policies. You're safe in downloading them and trying them out. Consider yourself warned, though: they suck.

5) Internet Speed Up, Bandwidth Saver & Offline Proxy is the name of number five on our list. I'm always wary of programs with names that sound like sentences, and this one's no different. It promises to "speed-Up browsing Internet," which right there makes us want to slap the developer--with a monitor. CRT, preferably. Folks, any time anybody tells you that they've got a way to speed up your Internet browsing and it'll just cost a mere pittance, walk away. It's all smoke and mirrors.

There are settings you can adjust in your browser and other programs that regularly access the Internet to give priority to one application over another. This one claims to make things go faster, and save bandwidth, and work as an offline proxy, and--yes, there's more!--block Trojans.

This wouldn't be so bad were it free, but the eight dollars that this costs would be better spent if you just set them on fire. And where there's smoke, you just don't need to go.

4) Next up is a program that can help you improve the largest organ in the human body. That's right, the Skin Analyzer asks you a series of leading questions followed by leading answers. It starts off somewhat benignly, like a tiny blackhead. The first question asks, "Why do you want to improve your skin," followed by two possible answers: "Mainly for beauty reasons" and "Mainly for health reasons". So far, not so bad.

By the third question, The Skin Analyzer turns into a raging zit of anxiety: if you have "wrinkled and aged skin," for example, you're offered skin care links with paid options such as the Peter Thomas Roth Age Defense kit at the top. To its credit, it do offer a few links to information, like a Web MD article on skin health, but the only real defense against snake oil hucksterism like this is not downloading it in the first place.

Come on, there's nothing here that a quick Google search for "skin care" can't do.

3) Sometimes, the problem with a download is that it's snarzzle-whamaringtone-plockit. I mean, it's a goblin Transpolyporter 6000 that's been spotted in Gnomeregan, and they're struggling with the Trogg scourge and there's a lost Razzle Sprysprocket. Whack A Gnome may have a simple name, but the description defies belief, dictionary, and possibly several international laws on linguistics. It may also be the greatest game in the world, but who can tell when the publisher needs to learn that to get people to download their fozzie-binglot, they need to stop drinking thunderbrew and smoking cannelopy and make a just a wee bit more zertif-qualeebers, right?

2) Lotto Sorcerer is the program I've been waiting for my entire life, and is your instant ticket to unending riches.

Just kidding. There's always one or two special cases, and is there really anything more special than a lottery number predictor that claims to use a neural network? It can bend spoons with it's mind, too. The publisher's description of this geek- and greed-speak mashup says, "Lotto Sorcerer employs neural network (artificial intelligence) techniques to look for non-random and weighted influences in prior lottery drawings, then advises optimum playing strategy."

The "privilege" of owning a program that uses real, honest-to-goodness artificial intelligence to determine how you will fail to win the next lottery you enter will set you back $34.95.

1) The Ultimate Virus is the ultimate way to get your friends to shove you into oncoming traffic. I thought that the neural network was hard to take, but get this: The Ultimate Virus isn't a virus--it's a practical joke.

It's a program that runs a progress bar informing the user that a virus is being loaded, and then follows it by hiding the taskbar and desktop icons. I imagine the effect on a friend is much like hiding their antipsychosis medication. We're all for having fun, and everybody likes a good prank, but this is the computer equivalent of telling a friend you've siphoned all the gas out of their car when you haven't.

If you just can't resist trying some of these out, even that last one, check out Revo Uninstaller to obliterate all traces of these programs once you're done and friendless.

In the wake of the Conficker worm, we dug into our research vault, known as the Web, and ferreted out the five deadliest computer viruses/worms of all time. Turns out all we needed to do was read the London Times. And all they needed to do was ask a security company.

It goes without saying that you should watch the video to see what the Top 5 are. But you have another incentive: for this week we are giving away a size-large throwback CNET fleece, as modeled in the video by Intern Chris Knox and Producer Sarah Harbin.

Watch the video, then come back here and answer the trivia question. If you are one of the first 10 people to get it right, you have a chance to win the fleece. Best of luck!

P.S. If these five PC viruses give you the chills, check out our favorite freeware antivirus and other security picks in CNET Download.com's Security Starter Kit.

The are good programs and bad programs, and then there are the horror shows. Every three months or so, we take a playful look at some of the least impressive software programs to come down the pike.

From Canadian Rock Radio to telepathic communication with aliens, there's a lot not to like about this oddball crew. Just in time for Halloween, CNET TV's Tom Merritt counts down the five scariest downloads of fall 2008.

Every few months, we like to playfully poke fun at some of the less successful software on the site. While there are countless great products created (and covered in this blog, hopefully) every week, these five software applications are not included in that group. These programs are the other sort of download software--the head-scratching variety.

We love you, software publishers, we really do. Some of your products...are another story.

Watch CNET TV's Tom Merritt count down this summer's list of the worst software on Download.com, and see if you don't find yourself wondering, "What were they thinking?"

2008 is nearly halfway over, which means that poor CNET Download.com senior content manager Peter Butler has reached deeply into the trash heap to pluck out, shake off, and crown with glory the most useless downloads published this year. He's handed the best of the worst over to CNET Executive Editor Tom Merritt for show and tell. Hey, even truly horrendous software deserves its moment of shame fame.

To every sweet there is a sour; to every storm cloud, there is a silver lining. We took care of the sour storm clouds first with a demonstration of the worst downloads of 2007 on CNET Download.com. I reiterate editor Peter Butler's disclaimer that the absolute worst downloads, stuffed with spyware or adware, never make it near our site.

The amusing mudslinging for misdirected software aside, may we now present Tom Merritt's ever-humorous take on the five most awesome downloads to break out in 2007. These applications that will save you time, and possibly a whole lot of cash.

If you missed it the first time, here's another look at those useless or embarrassing applications that went belly-up.

Now that Mac OS X Leopard has arrived, and Microsoft's Windows Vista slowly gains more acceptance, it's time for another battle of the heavyweight operating systems. Tom Merritt counts down the five biggest differences between Mac and Windows in another edition of CNET TV Top 5.

You've heard of summer movie flops, but sometimes software can fall just as flat. With the thousands of software programs we see every month on CNET Download.com, there are bound to be a few duds. CNET's Tom Merritt runs through the five worst downloads of summer 2007.