Real Player Can Kiss My Ass

I haven't written anything yet today, so I figured I had better, or feel the wrath of not blogging.
Today's rant is about Real player. Real actually have a very good piece of software. Their player is not bad, and overall, it's very enjoyable to use. However, Real networks seem to be begging you to hate them.

1. 
   
2. They marginalize their free player on their site. By marginalize, I mean that you really need to poke around before you can find it, and even on the page where it is listed, it still tries to force you to buy the player. I wonder how many people have bought it in sheer frustration.
   
3. Buying the player isn't enough. They want you to subscribe too. So you have a player, but you need to pay extra to view stuff on it. (hmm, stealth taxes...).
   
4. Setting up the player is pretty standard, however if you don't go with the custom version, then you will end up with a whole load of icons that you don't want or need.
   
5. After install, you *still* get to tell them that you don't want to pay them money.
   
6. message boxes pop up when you don't want them too. (it's somewhat annoying)
   
7. ad nauseum, ad nauseum.

REAL! why must you make life so difficult?