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Investigating corrupt Winamp skins

jordaneldredge.com

71–80 of 158 posts

Re: Investigating corrupt Winamp skins

#71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's probably property of AOL. But REAPER isn't open source either. Justin Frankel has released other open source stuff though.

I think AOL sold it to a random company at least a decade ago, and then they announced they will modernize it and have a big surprise and shit, then nothing happened for years, and then maybe two years ago they actually released a new update to winamp 5. Also while it's not open source, the source also leaked years ago, and there are unofficial updates to the old AOL winamp too. No idea if they kept going once the re…

No legit project could ever make use of the leaked source code even if it was from just before the end of the pre-sale AOL era so the person who did that never actually helped anyone & imho just hindered things.

I can't use it for WACUP & I don't see how any of the other players out there (clone / compatibles / just looking to hack in some features from it) could ever use it either.

There's also the whole "source available" thing they announced earlier this year still likely means it's never going to be proper open source against how media / others at the time took it to mean. Not like things couldn't be done via plug-ins but for whatever reason so many seem to forget about that & only see source code as the only way to modify things which imho is just going to make things messier if / when something does happen.

-dro

Re: Investigating corrupt Winamp skins

#74
post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a home grown hacker from before the time of internet, I increasingly understand why people despise computers. I was always telling people, that you can make computers do your bidding, make them part of your life, frictionless. But I never needed IT help, I knew that whatever frustrations I might have are because of something I can work and fix with some digging around. But having things like Windows auto updates,…

Windows auto update could always be disabled. A person must be extremely tech incompetent if they couldn't do the simplest of windows tasks.

Tell me you haven't used Windows 10 without telling me you haven't used Windows 10.

Re: Investigating corrupt Winamp skins

#75
post #52
post #36

I've always love WinAmp due to the simple reason that it is keyboard friendly. For example, the 5 buttons for Previous, Play, Pause, Stop, Next map to zxcvb. Simple and fun. Operations like searching for and queuing up files to play are lightning fast compared to Spotify, YT Music, et al. Also, I absolutely detest how YT Music keeps A/B testing ALL THE TIME, changing the location of things around. Ultimately, a websi…

As a home grown hacker from before the time of internet, I increasingly understand why people despise computers. I was always telling people, that you can make computers do your bidding, make them part of your life, frictionless. But I never needed IT help, I knew that whatever frustrations I might have are because of something I can work and fix with some digging around. But having things like Windows auto updates,…

It's no longer a wrench, it's a wireless corporate-run ad-powered e-wrench which needs printer ink for bolt-screwning.

Perfect.

Re: Investigating corrupt Winamp skins

#76
post #36

I've always love WinAmp due to the simple reason that it is keyboard friendly. For example, the 5 buttons for Previous, Play, Pause, Stop, Next map to zxcvb. Simple and fun. Operations like searching for and queuing up files to play are lightning fast compared to Spotify, YT Music, et al. Also, I absolutely detest how YT Music keeps A/B testing ALL THE TIME, changing the location of things around. Ultimately, a websi…

[deleted]

Re: Investigating corrupt Winamp skins

#78
post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a home grown hacker from before the time of internet, I increasingly understand why people despise computers. I was always telling people, that you can make computers do your bidding, make them part of your life, frictionless. But I never needed IT help, I knew that whatever frustrations I might have are because of something I can work and fix with some digging around. But having things like Windows auto updates,…

Windows auto update could always be disabled. A person must be extremely tech incompetent if they couldn't do the simplest of windows tasks.

I just love how I am in a constant funnel trying to move me to a Microsoft account, and get to find new ad-funnel content on my task bar and get to figure out how to turn it off and hope it sticks more than a couple of days over and over again. And preventing playing this game requires disabling security updates and getting pwned.

Decades of experience and deep knowledge doesn’t keep me out of wrestling with the machine like this. What is it like for someone who devotes a lot less of their attention span and learning to computers?

Re: Investigating corrupt Winamp skins

#79
post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a beautiful way to see it, thank you for leading me to it. Guess I'll have to consider myself a bryophite of the information age from now on.

I think that this analogy is really fitting. The old internet was way less organized, which means that it was less useful, but it also gave this fantastic sense of exploring something new. It was highly personal, the lack of common standards meant that everyone had to reinvent the wheel in their own way. Its dangers were more direct and "in your face". Yes, you could stumble upon a pedofile on an open forum and order…

There is also the effect of sharply concentrated power in a few hands. Antitrust shouldn’t let individual tech powers get too strong.

To keep the analogy going, mankind introduced a few invasive species to the island.

Re: Investigating corrupt Winamp skins

#80
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You were young and not working. The world was full of new frontiers and possibilities. Young people today are on Minecraft, Roblox, VRchat, Discord, and YouTube. That's their frontier internet, and they probably feel the same way about it as you do. A Geocities website, phpBB or EZBoard, webring, Xanga, and AIM/IRC has a similar analogues today. The pieces just have different names and shapes.

That’s not the point. Modern crap doesn’t hold a candle to what we had back then. And no, this is not the rambling of getting-older-man. Rampant corporate control, completely sanitized internet by default, “social” networks that literally give kids https://cwi.pressbooks.pub/urj/chapter/2022-first-place-inst... mental disorders, political agenda pushed from every hole, disinformation campaigns, bots to the point wher…

I think there is great stuff on Discord and people do the same things they did then and enjoy similar tomfoolery.. they just don’t own it and are monetized, and don’t have viable alternatives (none of which was true back then).

I think the big reason why social media is toxic is because going online is no longer a choice and it follows you around. Some decisions by social media providers aren’t helping, but mobile is more guilty than social itself.

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