Catherine: Who are you guys - really?

Both: We're the Bloatbusters™.

Catherine: How long have you been in existence?

Fidel: We've always been in existence, and we always will be. Bloat is cosmic, and so is the fight against it. We're confident that it's not eternal, but of course the vigilance against it must be.

Catherine (troubled laugh): Are you guys saying you're immortal?

Both: No comment.

Catherine: Uh, ok - maybe we'd better move on.

Both (chuckling): Yes, maybe we'd better.

Catherine: Ok. Is it true that you abduct bloatware offenders and try to turn them?

Both: No comment.

Catherine: I'm not exactly off to a good start here!

Catherine: Do bloatware offenders - bloataholics - ever come to you and ask for treatment?

Both: All the time.

Catherine: Is it true that you use brutal methods to extract confessions from bloatware offenders?

Beelzebub: Brutal and brutal. Bloatware itself takes no prisoners, so why should we? But we're trying to help people, not hurt them, and even the worst bloatware offender is "people", or used to be. It's our job to restore the "people" in them.

(Blofeld steps in.)

Catherine: How do you find the bloatware apps you attack in the Hall of Bloat?

Blofeld: They come to us. Or rather, their victims do. Then, if we think the matter is serious enough, we send out a Bloatbusters™ S.W.A.T. team.

Catherine: What is the difference between bloatware and hellware?

Fidel: It's degrees. Hellware is just so horrible in every possible way, including bloat, that there is no better way of describing it.

Catherine: Have you ever gotten into trouble for one of your reviews?

Fidel: No. But there's always a first time. But we're not worried. The bloataholics are the ones that should be worried. Some of them get death threats after people read our reviews.

(Blofeld steps out.)

Catherine: How do you feel about that?

Both: How do we feel about what?

Catherine: About the death threats? Against bloataholics.

Beelzebub: Well, not good, but maybe it will shake them up a bit. And not many people who threaten them really mean it, even in the heat of the moment. All we do is expose the truth. People who find out the truth have a right to be upset. But we're not advocating physical violence of any sort. Violence is not the answer.

Catherine: Will you tell that to your readers? There are several ISVs who have received these calls and they're worried.

Beelzebub: Sure. We just did. But if ISVs are worried, then begging us for forgiveness or asking us to take the pressure off is not the answer. Tell them to stop selling bloatware.

Catherine: Why don't you tell them?

Both (laughing): We just did!

Catherine (laughing): Ok. Here's a question I'm personally interested in getting an answer to - do you see a connection between lean and mean software and a vegetarian diet?

Beelzebub: Of course. Don't you?

Catherine: Do you think the condition of commercial software is likely to improve?

Fidel: Everything points in that direction right now. The DOJ has inadvertently sideswiped the planned obsolescence in use in the commercial software industry without even knowing it. Without Microsoft there to bully ISVs around, the likelihood that the industry can relax a bit and concentrate on quality again is good.

(Blofeld steps in.)

Catherine: What are your working hours like as members of the Bloatbusters™ team?

Blofeld: Working hours? This is our life. Or put it this way: we have no leisure time. We have to protect people, we can't worry about selfish things like our own leisure time.

Catherine: Do people ever ask you for autographs?

(Blofeld steps out.)

Catherine: What are you guys doing later tonight? I don't have any plans myself.

Both: We're working in the VoV. The Bloatbusters™ are never off duty. Actually we're in a bit of a hurry now.

Catherine: What a shame! How about a raincheck?

Both: Call us!

(End of interview.)

  Bloat Jokes