Have those concerned never considered the availablity and use of free imaging programs like Macrium Reflect
http://www.macrium.com/reflectfree.asp or others. Make an image, try the program, if you are unhappy just recover the image. Standard technique used for upgrading very complex new programs to allow for individual issues to be surfaced without unduly complicating the lives of updaters. And still allows for helping the developers with problem reporting and solutions. A little less hysteria and a little more continuing to work with avast! on the issues would be warranted. Individuals with serious problems should not be ignored, but these are generally problems that did not get sorted out in beta testing for various reasons. In general the beta testers (and Alwil) believe the program was ready to release because of diminishing returns in the beta program and the perceived solution of most of the common problems. You see a lot more comments here about "all is well" than "woe is me", and there hasn't been a lot of enthusiasm for petitions, stand downs, lumping all the XP3 users into a class, ... Time for Alwil to respond, of course, since it has been nearly a week, but in the meantime it is easy to protect yourself.
BTW, imaging should also be a key part of your security protection, since no matter how good it is, there is some chance of something getting through and doing serious damage.
