TurboTax (on CD) is BAD NEWS! (1 Viewer)

[Ryan Wright]

All PC users with any sense should run away from vendors who use this type of copy protection. You're their customer, but they're convinced you're their enemy. Prove them right.

I agree 100%.

First off, my copy of Turbotax wouldn't even run on my Win2k box. After installing, it gave a cryptic error and died every time I tried to run it. Wonder if it had anything to do with my firewall preventing outgoing connections??

So I installed it on a Win98 box, and saw the registration BS. Packaged it up and returned it to the store. I ended up using their online version this year. I should have abandoned them completely.

Next year, I'm buying a different product.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Well, I'm just trying to warn HTFers of the potential for getting a whole lot more than anyone bargained for when installing a Tax return preparation software, and mucking up their PC setup. Just be careful!

 

[Danny R]

No problem Patrick. Warnings are always helpful, and Intuit's decision is just bad business. But I have a feeling some folks are using this as an opportunity to slam the software more than it deserves (see below).

there were several comments on Amazon from people with computers where the CD-burner stopped working

FYI, no problems on either of the computers I've installed the software on, both with pretty standard equipment. If this spyware software was designed to disable burning illegal copies, its very poorly written if it doesn't effect me (and I burn things constantly).

I'm not a trader in either tax company, but I believe a lot of the negative comments on Amazon and other forums are being placed there by stock shorters, and thus have to be taken with care.

 

[MickeS]

I'm not saying it was deisgned to disable burning of illegal copies, just that several people said they couldn't burn anything after installing it. Why bother taking the chance if there's another equivalent product out there.

 

[Philip Hamm]

I'm not a trader in either tax company, but I believe a lot of the negative comments on Amazon and other forums are being placed there by stock shorters, and thus have to be taken with care.

Wow, now that is some seriously far fetched fantasy there IMO! You seriously think that the average Turbo Tax customers go to these places?

 

[Ryan Wright]

You seriously think that the average Turbo Tax customers go to these places?

That's not the idea. The idea is to make a public stink about it. If the stink is big enough it will make it to the media, sales will be lower than expected, and as soon as the company announces their quartly earnings the stock will drop. Thus earning some people a lot of money.

They don't have to stop everyone from buying Turbotax. They just have to stop a small percentage.

But I think the people behind Turbotax are doing that job for themselves. They really don't need any help in shooting their own foot.

 

[Danny R]

Actually a stock shorter doesn't even have to effect sales... they just have to give enough of an impression that the product is no good in order to influence other stock owners to sell, thereby causing the stock as a whole to lose value.

INTU's PE is already pretty high (82) making it a prime target for shorting anyway. Its lost about 20% of its value since the beginning of the year, a bit more than the market as a whole.

 

[Andrew W]

As a software engineer, I despise software that doesn't play within the rules of the filesystem and operating system. This is way outside those boundaries. I don't understand how Microsoft would certify the SW as Windows compatible when it doesn't do a clean uninstall and remove EVERYTHING that was installed except data.