RealPlayer

I HATE REALPLAYER!!! Something I never understood is why Realplayer is as successful as it is, and why it isn't living in a cardboard box in the gutters of Software city. I dread whenever I download a .rm and .ram file..which requires me to open this horrid program. The other day, I decided to go and download RealPlayer8. When I went to install it, The following message popped up: Your current volume has 0 kb available. You need 9874 kb. Wow. My hard drive has 0 kb and it's still running. Now THAT'S an accomplishment. So anyways, What I do next is decide to download Realplayer 7. Who cares if the version is one less? Well then it can't create a folder in the preferences. It doesn't say WHY it can't create this particular folder, just says that it can't. After all, why should you, the user, know exactly why the installer is incompetent of doing a simple task? So then I go to the Real support forums. I type up the problems I had with installing RealPlayer 8 and 7 and then submit it to the support forums. What an interesting place that is. When I check back the next day, there is no response, but one of the Real Player employees fixed some errors I made in the post. Thanks, Real, thanks. Another thing that's interesting is the actual posts on the support forums. It seems I'm not the only one who is having problems with this program:

Help me PLEASE

ERROR MESSAGE: UNABLE TO CREATE %INSTALL% CACHE - GRRRRRr

Please HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Can't play CDs offline now that Real Player is installed.

Why can't real player see that I have a blank CD in my CD-R drive?

i can't play dvds anymore....why me lord? why me?

An error message appears when i try to play a cd

Can not play files

So when I finally find out what's wrong, something that has not bothered any other program I have ever installed but bothers RealPlayer in particular...and then I run the program. Ouch. The program is completely and totally covered with digital feces. On the right I have "channels" for things I will never use. I have the filename path, bars underneath and overtop, all over the place. Little useless buttons. The interface is so expensive to your computer that it sometimes laggs terribly while playing video, which is its PRIMARY FUNCTION. Of course, that is just me and my obsolete computer talking, but still. What is it that makes RealPlayer popular in the first place? Well...the answer is .rm. I am astounded at how well the .rm codec is compressed and yet it still retains its quality. This is probably why RealPlayer has been able to survive all these years. However, with the introduction of DivX, XviD, 3ivX, and other codecs whose names prove the unoriginality of computer programmers, RealPlayer's time may be almost up. Keep in mind this whole blog is all about RealPlayer 8, which is 5 years old. I haven't (fortunately) had to use the new RealPlayers yet, but I have a feeling they're going further in this direction just by looking at real.com.