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Winamp Purchased By Radionomy
Major Blud writes "TechCrunch is reporting that Radionomy has purchased both Winamp and Shoutcast from AOL for $5-10 million and a 12% stake in the company. Radionomy CEO Alexandre Saboundjian said, 'We want to rebuild the story for Winamp. We think the future can be great because the strategy is not just desktop but mobile and cars and so much more.'"
Here's hoping they start by PROPERLY supporting FLAC, including 24/192 media.
The plugins currently available flat out do not work. And I hate using VLC for music.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Does the 12% include the Llama Ass?
Some OCD people will care since their music has to sound just right
99.9999% will just listen with their iPhone or galaxy phone
I hang out with the old nullsoft guys in IRC. General consensus for most of them is "We've moved on" The other concensus is, "There are so many good media players these days"
There was a time when Winamp mattered. There was no decent media players (in some regards, it was a new concept) Winamp brought skinning, plugins, visualizations and a whole slew of things that most folks never even knew they wanted or needed.
Funny that they mention Songbird today. One Nullsofter went there after the AOL buyout. He's now at google.
As far as Frankel, he started working on a DAW called Reaper. It's a swiss army knife for audio.
Anyone know anything about Radionomy? I still use win-amp at work, despite the bloat. I like the small 'strip' interface I can put up at the top of my window and I really haven't found a replacement, so I'd like to know if I can expect things to get better.. or worse.
It's funny that you mention those. In a way, we've come full circle. I get the feeling that most people don't really care about whether or not they can skin their music player anymore (the more out of the way it is, the better.. it's something for the background, not to show off to friends), nevermind visualizations (I don't see much demand for visualizations for Pandora on any of the platforms that have a Pandora app). Maybe that still sees some use with some (self-proclaimed) DJs, but I can't say I've seen it used in a very long time. Plugins are similarly dying a slow death. Think of video players.. how many have plugins to support some manner of format? Most of them either read them out of the box (think VLC) or rely on a 'codec pack' (with FFDShow or LAV) being installed to read everything.. and let practically any other media player read them as well.
"There was a time when Winamp mattered. There was no decent media players (in some regards, it was a new concept) Winamp brought skinning, plugins, visualizations and a whole slew of things that most folks never even knew they wanted or needed."
That's not quite true. Amiga and Atari at least had media players that worked quite well, and supported plugins etc, before WinAMP even existed. What made WinAMP hit its stride was the fact that Win95 came out, sound cards had become standard on PC's, and MP3 hit the scene in the same timeframe. And for Windows, WinAMP was the first player that supported MP3 to gain attention.
In many ways, WinAMP took a lot of inspiration from the Amiga players, such as HippoPlayer.
As far as I'm concerned, Winamp is still the best music player on Windows. With the Moon Glade skin, mine lives as an always-on-top bar at the top-center of my screen and expands into a playlist when I hover over it. The plugin system decodes every music file I know of and - this is huge for me - it can apply VST filters to the audio output. This is important to me because I play my music through Bose 901 (v6) speakers, which are designed to require a custom Bose equalizer to sound decent. Because I'm running audio into my receiver digitally, I can't use this analog equalizer, so I rely on a chain of VST plugins to mimic (and actually improve on) its functionality. I don't know of another media player that can use VST plugins for sound shaping. Then again, I haven't been looking, because I'm pretty satisfied with Winamp. If anyone knows other media players with VST functionality I would appreciate the info.
Different users have different needs. If one person wants obscure format A, and another person wants obscure format B, and a third person wants obscure format C, then the most efficient way to handle the different needs is to make a player with an input plug-in architecture. Or are you claiming that "most people would have no need for a player supporting" any obscure format?
Plugins are similarly dying a slow death. Think of video players.. how many have plugins to support some manner of format? Most of them either read them out of the box (think VLC) or rely on a 'codec pack' (with FFDShow or LAV) being installed
What do you think the "codec pack" is? As I understand it, a codec pack is just a curated set of input plug-ins.
There was a time when Winamp mattered. There was no decent media players
And now there are dozens, with some that focus on audio, some that focus on video, some that handle both: Foobar2000, Songbird, VLC, Media Player Classic, XBMC, Windows Media Center, etc... You even have image viewers like XnView turning into video players. The lines have completely blurred as viewers and players have turned into multimedia centers.
The question is, which niche would Winamp try to fill? How could they differentiate themselves? The interface? Cataloging? Container support? Codec support? Streaming support? Subtitle support? Time shifting? Post processing? Song recognition? Speed? Size? Cross-platform support?
Audio player software included on mobile devices requires audio to first be transcoded to MP3, MP4, or (in the case of Android) Vorbis. That sort of hurts if you have a big collection of files in sequenced formats, such as NSF, MIDI, or MOD. Transcode an NSF to MP3, for instance, and you've ballooned the file size by a factor of 100. Winamp solved this problem through an input plug-in architecture, but mobile device manufacturers seem to require the transcoding in order to get users to buy devices with larger flash memories at inflated prices.
Anyone working at a dog food or glue factory knows you can still make money on a dead horse. http://static5.businessinsider.com/image/4fd903b8ecad04a60a000014-960/chart-of-the-day-aol-vs-the-rest-june-2012.jpg
3A 4E 22 05 C1 83 0B 7A
It's random, but my posting it here is probably considered illegal to someone.
I too use VLC to watch video, but I use Winamp when playing or converting obscure audio formats. Until this purchase, it appeared that the capability to do the latter was about to disappear. So as of the article, I admit that my complaint is no longer quite as much of a complaint.
Anyway, if someone is about to lock himself into a particular tool, then he should choose a tool with room to grow. For example, if someone wants to play one obscure codec, he's likely to want to play other obscure codecs, which means a player with a means to add input plug-ins. Likewise, in computing, choosing an iPad or Surface tablet as your only computing device locks you into the applications that the tablet's maker approves of, making it more expensive once your needs grow to encompass something for which there is no iPad or Windows RT app.
http://mp3blaster.sourceforge.net/
I don't understand all of this talk about the Winamp developers stating that there are plenty of good audio players out there now... There really isn't! There's iTunes and a majority of people use that because they don't realise that their computers can have non Apple software installed on them too :O.
I've recently been trying out many of the top rated audio players, e.g. foobar2000, MusicBee, iTunes.. none of them come even close to being as good as Winamp.
Some of Winamp's features that I'm yet to see in other players are,
- Excellent Media Library, with the ability to play straight from the library...
- Toast Notifications of playing tracks
- Great plugin integration
- Modular and modern design
If anyone knows of any players that can really compare, please let me know. I'd love to see them.
Sonique had very nifty scaling skins, I don't know why it did so poorly
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
I loved that player, too. In fact, you sparked a moment of nostalgia. If you have one as well, download here: http://www.glop.org/sonique/
It still works, even on Windows 8 x64. Now I will say that it doesn't work WELL...and by that, I mean that you have to run the installer in compatibility mode for Win95, and batch-adding songs into a playlist is an excercise in patience. Also, the default visualization plug-ins don't look so hot on modern displays since they don't scale much past 640x480 I don't think...but they get stupid fast framerates. All of that said, I'm pleasantly surprised that a program designed to work on Windows 95 was coded sufficiently well to still work on Windows 8; there are relatively few that do.
As for why it did poorly (answering one of the other responses), I think that my nostalgia trip answers that, too: The program was originally designed in an era where a 200MHz processor and 32MB of RAM was a generous complement of hardware. The program, on a 3.2GHz Core i7 with 12GB of RAM *still* took nearly ten seconds to start. You don't win people's hearts when a music player takes as much time to load as Photoshop, especially when Winamp was able to be up and running in 3 seconds or less on similar hardware.
I was, however, a huge fan of Lightmagick and a few other plug-ins, and the skin gallery was most definitely the DeviantArt of its day, much more so than Winamp, whose skin library during the 2.x days was much more formulaic.
The question is, which niche would Winamp try to fill? How could they differentiate themselves? The interface? Cataloging? Container support? Codec support? Streaming support? Subtitle support? Time shifting? Post processing? Song recognition? Speed? Size? Cross-platform support?
Even more lamely ad-ridden with ride-along crapware in the installer than it was when AOL owned it?
Just guessing.
Yet Google sold a lot of chromebooks 2013 Holiday Season!
Probably because they figured if there is a chance of them selling the brand/company and they were really serious about it, they would rather not shoot themselves in the foot by killing Winamp before a potential deal goes through.
I hear you, whenever I think about Sonique I always go on a nostalgia trip. Wow, impressive that it on 8, however, I did run it on XP for a long time without having to run it in compatibility mode. I suspect it worked on 7 too, but I can't remember if I attempted to use it on 7.
I think a nice new re-make of the skin would look great, I always liked how it just looked different, almost like a funny little console on your screen (keeping in mind I was pretty young at that time).
Yes it was astronomically slow, it made up for this with great playlist management and good looks and it never demanded to "import a library". I largely got around it by never re-starting my computer and leaving it in standby, that way I never had to open again. On the other hand, for me Winamp wasn't exactly the epitome of speed
The monster that was Sonique 2 probably killed it off though.
No they make for free the things that people know aren't worth any money.
It seems like AOL did let it die. I am glad someone is picking this up, too much history to go the way of the dodo
I used Sonique briefly when it first came out. This was in the ICQ chat service days too IIRC.
I switched back to winamp fairly quickly usually. I didn't stop using winamp until i got a mac & ipod.
Thank you Dave Raggett
well I would want to 'move on' too if I had done what these guys did back when they did it...same goes for the guy who made napster Shawn Fanning.
remember when releasing software like this could get you sued for millions?
Thank you Dave Raggett
I love WinAmp, and it's a Windows application. I hate seeing the world "mobile" and "much more" in the buyers sentence. Sound like they will turn this of adware or bloated service application.
Dunno about any alternatives, but Winamp does what I need it to - mainly having a comprehensive media library, that I can keep open along side the playlist so I can select/drag and drop between them extremely quickly and easily, based on artist/album or individual tracks etc..
fascinating news... I had no idea AOL was still in business. I worked at spinner.com (which streamed music and was not a blog) when AOL bought us and Winamp... I left almost immediately, somewhat as a result.
-pyrrho
That works exactly because they have an army of properly paid engineers developing Chrome OS.
If you read carefully, what I wrote was not that WinAMP was the first. But the first to catch attention.
I use winamp for two things, mod music and shoutcast
mod music cause open MPT is a decent editor, but I sometimes just want a player, shoutcast cause their web player is junk and crashes all the time
both cause I like the graphic EQ
anyone who cared about the winamp name no longer does. recognition is not going to set them apart from all the other media players anymore.
i think the only reason I downloaded it was because they said I couldn't. brilliant.
Winamp brought skinning, plugins, visualizations and a whole slew of things that most folks never even knew they wanted or needed.
Well exactly. They didn't want them and they didn't need them.
Skinning is a novelty of zero use. No, I do not need to rearrange the UI of my application every month so I can't find anything. No, having my music application look like a tie-in with the latest Batman movie is not a plus.
Plugins are of more use. But really, just provide me with the stuff I need in the application and I won't need these and won't have to spend ages getting them to work together.
Visualisations are fun at first, but I am not a club DJ or a stoner. They are therefore just CPU hogs.
Winamp had it all in its day and I'll remember it fondly. But over time it just became a confused mess.
The story is their current line of business of basically just buying out blogs and operating them is panning out.
I thought their current line of business was taking monthly fees from gullible old people who still think that AOL is "the internet" and that they need to pay them in addition to their cable or DSL bill.
Having been very close to WinAmp and the AmpDev team in general in its infancy (circa 1996-1999) it's good to see that someone else is taking an interest. When AOL/Time Warner bought it for $100 Million in 1999 we all knew the direction it was going: large, corporate, and stupid. Let's face it, AOL bought WinAmp for the community that came with it. It should be no surprise that they did nothing memorable with it. And I can't fault Justin for taking the money and running.
I remember well the Stupid Factor being turned up to 11 when AOL ditched FreeBSD for SunOS/Solaris when they moved the hardware off of its "home" network. They practically ended up doubling the hardware to accommodate a (much) less functional OS. I could see the downward spiral start months before that happened. So they bought it for $100 Million and they're selling it for $5-10 Million. Good job, guys. Way to build shareholder value. Go, Team! ...Still, you beat Microsoft to the punch.
The TAP/WinAmp Memorial Hot Tub still lives and I use it every day. And I still use WinAmp every day, just not a CURRENT version. ( I still keep the pre-brain-damaged versions around despite some known security issues.)
That little pieces of it survive here and there is a nice reminder of what was, and what could have been, and what still might be. We'll see what Radionomy does with it. I, for one, will be happy to give them a chance to become relevant again.
Good luck, guys! Whip that llama's ass!
Storage is cheap
Only if your listening device has a USB mass storage port or microSD card slot. Many don't. Instead, several manufacturers of mobile listening devices, such as dedicated digital audio players and smartphones, sell one model with tiny storage at cost and put an excessive mark-up on the models with more storage.
I've been using REAPER for about 5 years now, professionally. It's cheap, works great, and there's no DRM beyond a registration code. I'd argue it's much more than a Swiss Army Knife, it's easily about 85% of ProTools is for my uses, and I can fake the other 15% without a sweat.
Good. Cheap. Fast. Pick Two.
if someone is using a certain video player for their videos and it also plays their sound files - why not use that?
Because audio and video use cases have different playlist expectations.
Video is more often a foreground application, requiring the viewer's primary attention, compared to audio that's more often used as background noise. And audio and video typically have different durations. In my experience, audio is more often stored with one file per track, while video is more often stored with one file per "album", with cue marks between scenes. People are more likely to put a collection of songs from several albums in a playlist and shuffle it than single scenes from motion pictures. And video is far more likely to be unavailable from the publisher in a DRM-free format than audio.
Theres something to be said for only learning to use one program to do different several things - assuming it does it well.
I guess the thinking is that audio libraries and video libraries are so different in metadata structure that it's difficult to make one application that plays both well.
The difference is that it's 'plugins' that anything can use, rather than your specific choice of media player.
True, Video for Windows codecs and DirectShow codecs work in a wider variety of media players and editors. But I know VFW applications such as VirtualDub can't use DirectShow codecs. And I'm told VFW itself has limits that make it less than ideal for certain codecs and containers, which is why you don't see a lot of, say, MOD players using the VFW architecture. I guess Nullsoft might have developed its own input plug-in architecture to work around VFW's limits, and I have since learned about other players that can also use Winamp input plug-ins for just this reason.
As far as Frankel, he started working on a DAW called Reaper. It's a swiss army knife for audio.
I use Reaper and I love it. Inexpensive and extremely flexible. Winner, winner, chicken dinner.
IMHO, IANAL, TINLA, etc...