Source: https://youtu.be/RMWNvwLiXIQ
Well worth watching his other videos too, even if you don’t use musical notation software. Funny and insightful commentary on software usability in general.
I’m now in charge of Audacity [video] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26995610 - April 2021 (59 comments)
His twitter (https://twitter.com/Tantacrul) and youtube (https://www.youtube.com/user/martinthekearykid) are full of interesting tidbits, an you can tell he's passionate about things.
Even if you don't do music/notation his video on Sibelius, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKx1wnXClcI , is ridiculously funny, but also on point.
True, Blender really exploded when they re-designed the interface. I hope someday GIMP team understand that. The software is solid, but the interface isn't great. Some very simple workflow changes made Blender easier to use.
The thing is (unmentioned in Tantacrul's Audacity video) is that Audacity's UI has always - from day one - been a terrible copy of the much beloved SoundEdit16, afaict. I just want something as easy to use as SoundEdit was, if Tantacrul is reading.
I think a lot more OSS projects should reach out for contributions in improving usability — it's almost always what separates OSS projects from paid alternatives.
After looking at MuseScore and UltimateGuitar, however, it looks like they are also free and have a similar aesthetic to Audacity. Maybe this will work out after all.
It seems these days they support CC (finally...), but not any ad-hoc or third party licenses. So most of the music I'm interested in, which is legal to distribute sheet music of for free but not commercially (but under a non-CC license), is still paywalled in violation of its copyright.
MuseScore the software is fine, but the MuseScore.com fiasco has left a really bad taste in my mouth. I hope none of that nonsense bleeds over into the development teams of the actual OSS software, but absent any kind of apology or change of direction MuseScore.com, I'm scared.
> Otherwise, I will have to transfer information about you to lawyers who will cooperate with github.com and Chinese government to physically find you and stop the illegal use of licensed content.
This is by far the worst takedown request I've ever seen in Github. The physically find you is especially concerning, since the owner of the repository seems to be a Chinese national.
Apparently by the time the takedown was written, the API was public but the documentation was taken down. The next replies don't make it better, and it seems they don't have a leg to stand on to send a proper DMCA.
I also had no idea they belonged to Ultimate Guitar. Honestly I lost some of the respect I had for MuseScore and Audacity teams after seeing this.
This is IMO worse than the youtube-dl debacle.
EDIT: The same developer who wrote the email seems to be making threats involving the police in another repository: https://github.com/Xmader/musescore-downloader/issues/42#iss...
Seems to boil down to "music publishing mafia didn't like it", which is understandable.
Plus musescore.com has numerous shenanigans with payment, ending subscriptions, etc [0]
It leads me to wonder, what is the other side of this deal? Will muscore.com repeat what they did with the free musescore software and utilize it to ensnare a large number of community resources? What kind of deal are the Audacity devs getting offered? I hope tantacrul doesn't become the face of a dumpsterfire.
>We are genuinely committed to open source and do want to make as much as possible as free as possible. The fact that I am sitting here and writing in these discussions at all should be evidence of our commitment to open source and engagement vs. simply passing the issue on to lawyers to deal with.
And then this next (and final) comment ended with this:
> I will not be commenting further on this topic.
If the copyright holders are absent then not much is going to be done about this -- that's one of the major reasons why artists join these large copyright holding organizations, to handle this stuff for them!
The UI is garbage. The plugin architecture is rough. It's difficult to workflow -- no automation is really available. Audacity produces good results, at the cost of an insanely high requirement for patience and experience. What you are actually in love with is the creative process of editing and creating audio.
As a project, audacity has languished for a long time. It has the potential to be great -- but it's not there, now.
It's fast, out of the box, multiplatform... and I haven't used it in years, but that's mostly because Reaper it's too great, the only thing I miss it's audacity loading times.
Now I think Audacity has only a few bottlenecks, the main workflow it's not that broken.
If what they say it's accomplished and they prioritize VTS non-destructive effects, improve the Timeline management and other UX details. I could see Audacity present in the majority of home studios and the software behind a lot of professional works (not big studios, but enough for self publish). I now a couple of local bands that recorded their demo with audacity, a cheap interface and a sm57 mic.
...and if I can ask maybe add support for ASIO (something hard to happen becauses licences, but I can dream).
It survives only because of platform effects.
I'm not holding out much hope for Audacity.
If anybody has insight into the plans, I'd love to hear them.
Wow, non destructive stackable VST effects https://youtu.be/RMWNvwLiXIQ?t=773
The levity and the pragmatic focus make a great combination.
- go to github
- download all source code
- download last installation version ...
- say farewell to audacity ...
