7 ms·

I remember with nostalgia the mp3blaster. I spent years listening to it in my terminal. At one point I used only cli without graphical desktop on slackware and

by Habgdnv 7mo ago

I remember with nostalgia the mp3blaster. I spent years listening to it in my terminal. At one point I used only cli without graphical desktop on slackware and one of my TTYs was dedicated to it. Turns out these times are forever gone - never to come back. The huge disappointment when I tried this on the first run to play a mp3 file from my local disk and it initiated outbound connection. Why a local CLI player needs outbound TCP connection to play a local file from my local disk?!?! The answer was in the source. It is called telemetry. Back then when I used mp3blaster we used to call this spyware, but the times had changed since then.

tosti 7mo ago
OIC: https://github.com/bjarneo/cliamp/blob/main/telemetry/telemetry.go https://github.com/bjarneo/cliamp/blob/main/telemetry/teleme... Should be easy to nerf, but the build instructions are kinda vague. Clone, and then what? Something like "go build" or something I guess. Looks cool though
- Habgdnv 7mo ago
  I saw it, it is NOT spyware. It just sends a random UUID. It is just a personal disappointment for the fact that it is something so simple as a console player and yet connects somewhere. But that's just me. I grew up in other times. Also I just compiled mp3blaster and I am listening to it again. So cool!
  - antisol 6mo ago
    If it phones home without explicitly asking the user for permission in advance, it's spyware.
- gesis 7mo ago
  There's a config variable and a cli flag to disable. That seems reasonable to me.
  - userbinator 7mo ago
    to disable All such surveillance behaviour should strictly be OPT IN.
- deleted 7mo ago
  [deleted]
- userbinator 7mo ago
  No personal data is collected IP address (which can be geolocated) along with a unique identifier is not considered "personal data"? This is basically a tracking cookie. It also seems to use HTTP, which is itself widely fingerprintable based on what request headers it sends.
- GrayShade 6mo ago
  It's gone: https://github.com/bjarneo/cliamp/commit/085734a86343a80176d2ca96a5af09a054e0511e https://github.com/bjarneo/cliamp/commit/085734a86343a80176d...
  - taneliv 6mo ago
    Thanks for pointing this out, to me it seems quite a good response. I wouldn't mind opt-in telemetry, but possibly the participation rate would be too low to make use of it.
    - stavros 6mo ago
      My issue with telemetry is that 99% of software ends up not using it. Why have it? And definitely don't have it by default. Your users will come tell you what they want, making telemetry useless, especially when it's an OSS project you're mostly building for yourself.
      - rob74 6mo ago
        Except that telemetry can give you more complete (and foolproof) information than what users report. But yeah, that could also be solved by having debug info that users can attach to their report, the app doesn't have to "call home" for that...
        stavros 6mo ago
        I agree, but it's a cost/benefit thing. Most OSS projects aren't big enough to do anything with the telemetry, so you're just paying in goodwill for no reason.
    - kgwxd 6mo ago
      Opt-in via extension, fine. Opt-in via flag, unreliable. The spyware code should never be anywhere near the main codebase.
  - tosti 6mo ago
    Yay! Also, I hadn't noticed an entire section about building from source. Sorry about that. Good work!
samplatt 7mo ago
The times haven't changed. It's still spyware, it's just been normalised.
deleted 7mo ago
[deleted]
liendolucas 7mo ago
You can still set up an mpd server: https://www.musicpd.org/ https://www.musicpd.org/ that runs on your local files.
senko 6mo ago
Back in the day I used to use mpg123. It's still available, but most of the time today I use mpv (successor to "mplayer", handles video too, opens a separate window, zero chrome) or ffplay, since they have wider format support. No playlist or even file management - they do show id3tags, that's about it. No telemetry, SaaS chicanery or "improvement" upgrades every few days, either.
anthk 6mo ago
I used to use mocp under Unix but nowadays it's just audio/zuke in 9front with plumber settings for playlists.

by Habgdnv 7mo ago

tosti 7mo ago

OIC: https://github.com/bjarneo/cliamp/blob/main/telemetry/telemetry.go https://github.com/bjarneo/cliamp/blob/main/telemetry/teleme... Should be easy to nerf, but the build instructions are kinda vague. Clone, and then what? Something like "go build" or something I guess. Looks cool though

Habgdnv 7mo ago
I saw it, it is NOT spyware. It just sends a random UUID. It is just a personal disappointment for the fact that it is something so simple as a console player and yet connects somewhere. But that's just me. I grew up in other times. Also I just compiled mp3blaster and I am listening to it again. So cool!
- antisol 6mo ago
  If it phones home without explicitly asking the user for permission in advance, it's spyware.
gesis 7mo ago
There's a config variable and a cli flag to disable. That seems reasonable to me.
- userbinator 7mo ago
  to disable All such surveillance behaviour should strictly be OPT IN.
deleted 7mo ago
[deleted]
userbinator 7mo ago
No personal data is collected IP address (which can be geolocated) along with a unique identifier is not considered "personal data"? This is basically a tracking cookie. It also seems to use HTTP, which is itself widely fingerprintable based on what request headers it sends.
GrayShade 6mo ago
It's gone: https://github.com/bjarneo/cliamp/commit/085734a86343a80176d2ca96a5af09a054e0511e https://github.com/bjarneo/cliamp/commit/085734a86343a80176d...
- taneliv 6mo ago
  Thanks for pointing this out, to me it seems quite a good response. I wouldn't mind opt-in telemetry, but possibly the participation rate would be too low to make use of it.
  - stavros 6mo ago
    My issue with telemetry is that 99% of software ends up not using it. Why have it? And definitely don't have it by default. Your users will come tell you what they want, making telemetry useless, especially when it's an OSS project you're mostly building for yourself.
    - rob74 6mo ago
      Except that telemetry can give you more complete (and foolproof) information than what users report. But yeah, that could also be solved by having debug info that users can attach to their report, the app doesn't have to "call home" for that...
      - stavros 6mo ago
        I agree, but it's a cost/benefit thing. Most OSS projects aren't big enough to do anything with the telemetry, so you're just paying in goodwill for no reason.
  - kgwxd 6mo ago
    Opt-in via extension, fine. Opt-in via flag, unreliable. The spyware code should never be anywhere near the main codebase.
- tosti 6mo ago
  Yay! Also, I hadn't noticed an entire section about building from source. Sorry about that. Good work!

samplatt 7mo ago

The times haven't changed. It's still spyware, it's just been normalised.

deleted 7mo ago

[deleted]

liendolucas 7mo ago

You can still set up an mpd server: https://www.musicpd.org/ https://www.musicpd.org/ that runs on your local files.

senko 6mo ago

Back in the day I used to use mpg123. It's still available, but most of the time today I use mpv (successor to "mplayer", handles video too, opens a separate window, zero chrome) or ffplay, since they have wider format support. No playlist or even file management - they do show id3tags, that's about it. No telemetry, SaaS chicanery or "improvement" upgrades every few days, either.

anthk 6mo ago

I used to use mocp under Unix but nowadays it's just audio/zuke in 9front with plumber settings for playlists.