The Frustrating Truth About Subscriptions: A Cautionary Tale from My Grandfather’s Computer

During a recent visit to my late grandfather’s home, I found myself on an unexpected mission: sorting through his belongings and tending to his old computer. As I began the task of ensuring nothing important was overlooked, I was met with an experience that left me both shocked and disheartened.

As I powered up the computer, I anticipated a nostalgic journey through my grandfather’s digital life. Instead, I was greeted by an agonizingly slow system. After checking the Task Manager, it became painfully clear that AVG—an antivirus software—was monopolizing the computer’s resources while offering little to no beneficial output. Certain processes were impossible to disable, and others stubbornly persisted in starting up each time the computer was turned on. It was evident that AVG had entrenched itself firmly, contributing to the sluggish performance.

As I sifted through emails, a particularly disconcerting trend emerged. AVG had sent numerous messages, warning that the computer was operating at diminished capacity and encouraging a subscription to AVG TuneUp for £45 GBP annually, essentially promising to “optimize” performance. What I saw, however, was a veiled attempt to coerce users into paying to alleviate the very issues that AVG had created in the first place.

To my dismay, my grandfather was subscribed to several AVG services, including AVG Security, AVG TuneUp, and AVG’s VPN—a service I highly doubted he ever used. Furthermore, the revelation that driver updates were yet another paid add-on came as a real shocker; is this the norm now? What kind of system requires users to fork out more money for something as essential as driver updates?

The situation grew even more absurd when I discovered that AVG Secure Browser was the default on his computer. The resource-intensive application left little room for other browsers like Chrome and Edge. Even when I attempted to access those platforms, AVG intervened, redirecting me to safety warnings that insisted on the superiority of its own browser.

This entire ordeal left me seething. My grandfather, not incredibly tech-savvy yet eager to enjoy simple pleasures like watching sports and exploring military history, had unwittingly fallen prey to a web of unnecessary subscriptions costing him roughly £120 GBP (about $150 USD). If a stranger had knocked on his door and taken that amount, we would have called the authorities, yet here we are, grappling with a system that enables