I just went through installing some random Japanese fonts and a few of them were said to be available on Adobe's website. So I went there and started the download.

Immediately after the download started, I was presented a JavaScript box which asked me whether I wanted to take part in a survey. I thought, sure, why the heck not tell them how much I dislike them.

Well here's what happened. The following popup opened:



Needless to say, there was no survey in the Window I just came from.

It turned out that the fonts were just Adobe Reader addons anyway which I don't even have installed.

# The Brillant Paula Bean
# Author::    derula
# Copyright:: Copyright (c) 2005-2008 Paula Bean
# License::   Originally distributed under a
#             proprietary license by Paula Bean.
#             Ruby port by derula published
#             under the same terms as Ruby's.

# This module provides a method to return the
# brillance of Paula Bean. This can be achieved
# by calling the module method get_paula.
module Paula_Bean

  # This constant stores the essence of Paula
  # Bean's brillance. This is a private
  # constant, so you MAY NOT use
  # Paula_Bean::PAULA to access it! Please use
  # the get_paula method instead.
  PAULA = "Brillant"

  # Returns Paula Bean's brillance.
  def self.get_paula
    return PAULA
  end
end

Maybe Adobe already knows that everyone hates them and realized that a survey would be pointless.

 

It said to ignore the window, and here you are, posting it on TheDailyWTF.  So much for following instructions... 

derula:

Needless to say, there was no survey in the Window I just came from.

Hmm.. it sounds like maybe Adobe doesn't actually control who gets the survey but contracts it out to a 3rd party.  They have JS to ask you if you want to take part but the 3rd party must have their own criteria for deciding who gets the survey.  More than anything, it sounds like a nasty hack so Adobe didn't have to allow the 3rd party to run code on their own servers, but there would have been a more elegant way to handle it.  So kind of silly, but I see why the window basically said "ignore me" because the 3rd party decided you weren't worthy of taking their survey.

 

derula:

It turned out that the fonts were just Adobe Reader addons anyway which I don't even have installed.

Sounds like your problem, not Adobe's.  I don't really adore their products, but I don't think they are as bad as you seem to.

morbiuswilters:

So kind of silly, but I see why the window basically said "ignore me" because the 3rd party decided you weren't worthy of taking their survey.

My point is that the window doesn't seem really decisive. On the one hand, it says that it might present me with a survey, but then it requests me to ignore it. When it's like you suggested, why didn't the third party responsible for the survey let the window say "You are not allowed to take part in the survey" or, heck, why didn't Adobe use some Ajax to determine if I'm allowed or whatever.

# The Brillant Paula Bean
# Author::    derula
# Copyright:: Copyright (c) 2005-2008 Paula Bean
# License::   Originally distributed under a
#             proprietary license by Paula Bean.
#             Ruby port by derula published
#             under the same terms as Ruby's.

# This module provides a method to return the
# brillance of Paula Bean. This can be achieved
# by calling the module method get_paula.
module Paula_Bean

  # This constant stores the essence of Paula
  # Bean's brillance. This is a private
  # constant, so you MAY NOT use
  # Paula_Bean::PAULA to access it! Please use
  # the get_paula method instead.
  PAULA = "Brillant"

  # Returns Paula Bean's brillance.
  def self.get_paula
    return PAULA
  end
end

I'm not sure, but I've been on some pages that did pretty the same (but the instructions in the popup were clearer), and after leaving their site, the window would get focus and the survey would start. Maybe they meant it to be this way, but made a mistake somewhere along the way... Or they just didn't know how to explain it ;-)