Today started innocently enough, went to REI, cleaned my room, begun packing, and (Drumrollll) cleaned up my computer some. So naturally as part of cleaning my computer I go around changing my passwords and whatnot. As you know, for some reason beyond me, we still pay for AOL, and I still have an AOL email account that has been broken into twice and they have accused me of being the nation's worst spammer/Satan (take your pick). So anywho, I haven't myself changed my AOL password in years (though they did for me after the incidents). You cannot change your AOL password online, you have to do it through the actual AOL software, so here we go. I go to aol.com and figure, what the hell, I'm going to wipe down this computer sometime in the near future anyway, I'll install AOL 9.0, see what all the rave is about, change my password, and be more educated on the technological world around me. The misery begins. First, you download the program to download AOL (cause they couldn't just make it an executable). Once the REAL download begins it takes about 2 hours because its 60 megs (WTF MATE!). Okay, so after pissing off everyone in your neighborhood for sucking down the communal bandwidth you begin the install process. Apparently they didn't compress anything, this should go smooth, especially with all the money that AOL has to pay their programmers so shit works, right? WRONG! As you sit their you wonder, is AOL being installed on my computer or is a weasel that is high on methamphetamine chiseling away at my hard drive with his crack pipe? HOLY SHIT, IT WAS INSTALLING! So now here we go, time to start it up and log on, but in reality this is like watching molasses drip down the wall. So you are finally on, and low and behold you are accosted by about every welcome page you can think of (and you can't get rid of this shit), for example, the AOL Entertainment Welcome Page, the Black Interest Welcome page, the Latino Interest Welcome page, and the Small Business Welcome page. At this point I am thinking about going and playing in traffic, but alas, I set out on a mission to change my password, and I've come this far, so that's what I did. After closing the program (as much as you can, because there is still a little AOL thing on the toolbar that you CANNOT, I mean CANNOT, close), I begin the uninstall process. Holy shit. First, there is no uninstall under the AOL menu it puts in your programs, so you go to the control panel and what do you find, a list of 8, count them 8 programs it installed on your computer, and no good way to get all the shit off. After going through the most painful and messy uninstall of my life (ex you are uninstalling AOL, would you like to still keep the AOL update bar?) I sat down so disgruntled with the state of technology the only thing I could do was write this letter to you. I know you will feel my pain.