iTunes (and all other Apple software) have been banished from my network and desktops 5 years ago.
I was like you once. But, for the record... While iTunes performs like crap, and crashes a lot (especially on Windows, but it isn't fantastic on OSX either)... There's really nothing particularly evil about the QuickTime installer
anymore.
The iTunes installer does install a system service or two (for detection of and administration of their handheld devices), but they are well behaved and it only takes a second to head over to the Services management panel in Windows to stop that from auto-loading, if you like.
QuickTime doesn't really do much of anything bad in current versions, so long as you are careful not to let it take over your file associations (which is obnoxious in pretty much every media player installer out there, so that's nothing Apple-specific).
Really the only thing I find even a little annoying is the Apple Software Updater utility. And they've fixed it so it doesn't try to auto-install Safari anymore (that only lasted like two months before they fixed it), and it is easy to avoid installing it at all by simply clicking "No" when they ask you in the iTunes or QuickTime install process.
iTunes itself is still a piece of fail though. And installing an update seems to ALWAYS require a reboot, which makes me angry.