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Audacity is no longer spyware :)

NoXion

NoXion

Craicy the Squirrel
I have some disappointing news for all audiophiles and other similar long-time users: The long time and much respected open-source audio editing program, Audacity, has more or less turned itself into spyware. To elaborate, a while back the development team were bought out by some company called MuseGroup. When the news originally came out, some were worried that the program wouldn't be the same. Thanks to this news, those concerns were validated: the plucky little 20 year old program that has been a long-time stalwart of open-source software that many have been using for over a decade has become what some had originally feared: A corporate product that wants to treat you as the product by sucking up your user data. In the latest version of Audacity, they've switched up their Privacy Policy to include spying on your hardware for the purposes of "Law Enforcement" and don't tell you anything much more specific than that. It also allows MuseGroup and its associates to take note of your computer build, your OS, your IP address, your country location and sell your data to the highest bidder much like what Facebook and similar apps and sites do. Oh and the best part: They're sending your data to their headquarters in fucking Russia of all places. The most secure and definitely not-at-all sketchy epicentre of shonky Internet practices in any way!



"All your personal data is stored on our servers in the European Economic Area (EEA). However, we are occasionally required to share your personal data with our main office in Russia and our external counsel in the USA."
-Audacity's new Privacy Policy, Section 7



Here's a peek at who's going to have access to your data:



OFSXGXc.png




Another interesting aside is because of this new change, the software now has to restrict itself from being used by people under the age of 13, which naturally violates its own GPL licence agreement it uses, so there's a well-earned can of worms the bastards will have to wrestle with now.



Fortunately because Audacity's software has been open-source for two decades, you can bet your arse there are some cunning programmers out there coding up some forks right now and there's already some chatter about it going on across GitHub and Reddit. There is some slight good news too: This is all regarding the NEW version of the software. If you're currently using an older version, keep it! It doesn't "talk" back to the developers and feed them your info. I personally haven't updated my version of Audacity because I haven't needed to. Now I guess I never will. I'm probably going to start looking for an alternative at some point, but there's a little bit of solace for you regarding this development.



Disappointing news all round. I've personally found this handy little program to be quite intuitive and powerful whenever I've had cause to use it. Another fine piece of software ruined by corporate greed and arrogance.
 
NoXion said:
I have some disappointing news for all audiophiles and other similar long-time users: The long time and much respected open-source audio editing program, Audacity, has more or less turned itself into spyware. To elaborate, a while back the development team were bought out by some company called MuseGroup. When the news originally came out, some were worried that the program wouldn't be the same. Thanks to this news, those concerns were validated: the plucky little 20 year old program that has been a long-time stalwart of open-source software that many have been using for over a decade has become what some had originally feared: A corporate product that wants to treat you as the product by sucking up your user data. In the latest version of Audacity, they've switched up their Privacy Policy to include spying on your hardware for the purposes of "Law Enforcement" and don't tell you anything much more specific than that. It also allows MuseGroup and its associates to take note of your computer build, your OS, your IP address, your country location and sell your data to the highest bidder much like what Facebook and similar apps and sites do. Oh and the best part: They're sending your data to their headquarters in fucking Russia of all places. The most secure and definitely not-at-all sketchy epicentre of shonky Internet practices in any way!



"All your personal data is stored on our servers in the European Economic Area (EEA). However, we are occasionally required to share your personal data with our main office in Russia and our external counsel in the USA."
-Audacity's new Privacy Policy, Section 7



Here's a peek at who's going to have access to your data:



OFSXGXc.png




Another interesting aside is because of this new change, the software now has to restrict itself from being used by people under the age of 13, which naturally violates its own GPL licence agreement it uses, so there's a well-earned can of worms the bastards will have to wrestle with now.



Fortunately because Audacity's software has been open-source for two decades, you can bet your arse there are some cunning programmers out there coding up some forks right now and there's already some chatter about it going on across GitHub and Reddit. There is some slight good news too: This is all regarding the NEW version of the software. If you're currently using an older version, keep it! It doesn't "talk" back to the developers and feed them your info. I personally haven't updated my version of Audacity because I haven't needed to. Now I guess I never will. I'm probably going to start looking for an alternative at some point, but there's a little bit of solace for you regarding this development.



Disappointing news all round. I've personally found this handy little program to be quite intuitive and powerful whenever I've had cause to use it. Another fine piece of software ruined by corporate greed and arrogance.
Click to expand...
Fuck. I've just gone to some trouble to upgrade it on 3 machines to 3.0.2 (and it's a bit of an arse doing it on Ubuntu). I shall watch out for forks...
 
Last edited:
Yes sad to see I used it loads, really easy and nice piece of software (once you'd learned how to set it up).

I saw there's talk of a fork derived from the old version but I don't know how that would do with copyrights. Perhaps people will make old version available for download?
 
two sheds said:
Yes sad to see I used it loads, really easy and nice piece of software (once you'd learned how to set it up).

I saw there's talk of a fork derived from the old version but I don't know how that would do with copyrights. Perhaps people will make old version available for download?
Click to expand...

It's open-source software, forking is allowed. Which is what makes this particular situation so fucking stupid. Of all the well-respected programs to fuck with in this manner, they chose the one which could most easily be forked without the spyware shit.
 
two sheds said:
Yes sad to see I used it loads, really easy and nice piece of software (once you'd learned how to set it up).

I saw there's talk of a fork derived from the old version but I don't know how that would do with copyrights. Perhaps people will make old version available for download?
Click to expand...

No problem with a fork.
Audacity is free software. You may use it for any personal, commercial, institutional or educational purpose, including installing it on as many different computers as you wish.

You may also copy, distribute, modify, and/or resell Audacity, under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL) as published by the Free Software Foundation – either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version. In granting you this right, the GPL requires that the source code you distribute is itself available under the GPL. If you distribute or recommend Audacity in any way, please cite our trademark by referring to Audacity as “Audacity(R)”.
Click to expand...
 
NoXion said:
It's open-source software, forking is allowed. Which is what makes this particular situation so fucking stupid. Of all the well-respected programs to fuck with in this manner, they chose the one which could most easily be forked without the spyware shit.
Click to expand...
And, of course, it won't be long at all before someone's figured out the spyware shit and written a set of firewall rules to block or spoof it...
 
existentialist said:
And, of course, it won't be long at all before someone's figured out the spyware shit and written a set of firewall rules to block or spoof it...
Click to expand...

That's what I've been wondering; none of the actually functional parts of the software rely on outside communication, so blocking it from doing so with the firewall ought to be enough to prevent it phoning home.

I have version 3.0.2, and just in case I've already created a rule to completely block audacity.exe from sending anything out. It still works fine so far as I can tell.
 
Hmm if I go through Software manager it shows version 2.3.3-1build1

perhaps they've not updated it for linux yet?
 
Fucking hell, it's Stalinesque.

Audacity User Agreement – Terms of Service

THIS TERMS OF SERVICE AGREEMENT ("AGREEMENT") IS A LEGAL AND BINDING AGREEMENT BETWEEN YOU ("YOU," "YOUR" OR "YOURSELF") AND MUSECY SM LTD. ("OUR," "US," "WE" OR "AUDACITY"), WHICH GOVERNS YOUR USE OF THE AUDACITY WEBSITE, APPS, APIs AND WIDGETS, TOGETHER WITH ALL INFORMATION, CONTENT, PRODUCTS, MAT
www.audacityteam.org www.audacityteam.org

You agree to provide true, accurate, current and complete information about yourself as prompted by the Service registration process (such information being the “Registration Data”). You further agree that, in providing such Registration Data, you will not knowingly omit or misrepresent any material facts or information and that you will promptly enter corrected or updated Registration Data via the Service, or otherwise advise us promptly in writing of any such changes or updates. You further consent and authorize us to verify your Registration Data as required for your use of and access to the Service, as applicable. If you are already registered for the Service, you shall utilize your existing user ID and password in connection with your account (collectively referred to herein as “IDs”).
Click to expand...
 
two sheds said:
Hmm if I go through Software manager it shows version 2.3.3-1build1

perhaps they've not updated it for linux yet?
Click to expand...
No, v3.x isn't available via the usual repositories - you can download it via flatpak, which is some sort of Ubuntu package manager type thing. Which is what I have done.

Trouble is, the file format changed, so migrating back from v3 to v2 might be an arse.
 
existentialist said:
Fucking hell, it's Stalinesque.

Audacity User Agreement – Terms of Service

THIS TERMS OF SERVICE AGREEMENT ("AGREEMENT") IS A LEGAL AND BINDING AGREEMENT BETWEEN YOU ("YOU," "YOUR" OR "YOURSELF") AND MUSECY SM LTD. ("OUR," "US," "WE" OR "AUDACITY"), WHICH GOVERNS YOUR USE OF THE AUDACITY WEBSITE, APPS, APIs AND WIDGETS, TOGETHER WITH ALL INFORMATION, CONTENT, PRODUCTS, MAT
www.audacityteam.org www.audacityteam.org
Click to expand...
Does anybody ever provide correct information when registering software, especially free software?
 
existentialist said:
No, v3.x isn't available via the usual repositories - you can download it via flatpak, which is some sort of Ubuntu package manager type thing. Which is what I have done.

Trouble is, the file format changed, so migrating back from v3 to v2 might be an arse.
Click to expand...
i.e. migrating back for you? Not just uninstall and install the other one?

Yes I saw the flatpack but didn't know what it was.
 
Done that :) ta peoples I ought to start ripping audio again I've got loads of r4 plays on disk I should check whether they've done any more over the last three or four years.

Will just have to remember not to press the 'update to newer version' key
 
"Tenacity" is very much the front runner, atm. And, much as I am quite attached to "Temerity", I think the former has the advantage of being similar in pronunciation to "Audacity".

And maybe the fork should start with version 10 ;)
 
existentialist said:
Fucking hell, it's Stalinesque.

Audacity User Agreement – Terms of Service

THIS TERMS OF SERVICE AGREEMENT ("AGREEMENT") IS A LEGAL AND BINDING AGREEMENT BETWEEN YOU ("YOU," "YOUR" OR "YOURSELF") AND MUSECY SM LTD. ("OUR," "US," "WE" OR "AUDACITY"), WHICH GOVERNS YOUR USE OF THE AUDACITY WEBSITE, APPS, APIs AND WIDGETS, TOGETHER WITH ALL INFORMATION, CONTENT, PRODUCTS, MAT
www.audacityteam.org www.audacityteam.org
Click to expand...

The bastard audacity of them!!

Will pull it from our corporate app store once the fork is released.
 
I don't use it as much now that Audition has much of the functionality that Audacity used to fill in for. To be honest I use it so little, I think I'll just leave it as it is. Shame that this is such a common progression now though.
 
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