bicurious wrote: Can anyone find any worthwhile source saying that it's a good idea to make security updates harder for people to install?
Because I can't.
I can.
If user is a professional, then he should subscribe to comfortUpdate to keep his installation safe. It's a very small fee, absolutely acceptable for a professional. By the way, he's supporting the developement of LimeSurvey, the tool he's using to earn money. When you know that few years ago the project was about to be abandoned because of the lack of donations...
If user is not a professional, like a student, and he does not have enough money to pay the comfortUpdate, then he should take the time to learn how to perform a manual update. Open source is free, it's often a bit harder, but it's also a excellent way to learn. Free software means "free" like in freedom, not like in "not paying". And the real freedom OpenSource brings to user is knowledge. When you know how to install and update manually LimeSurvey, you are more free.