Audacity 3.0 | Download or Delete?

Editor Malcolm Owen of Apple Insider called attention this past week to a recent Audacity Privacy Policy Update. The latest update to the free Audacity 3.0 DAW has raised concerns with some over their intent behind data collection. Understandable, as any software sending data back to servers in Russia raises red flags for many users these days. That talk also generates a lot of clicks from readers though. Audacity has since released a response to the confusion, in an attempt to clarify the changes they made.

Still, it’s interesting to see Owen ratchet the fear up in his speculation. The orignal Fosspost blog post ‘Audacity is now a Spyware’ was later changed to ‘Audacity is now a Possible Spyware, Remove it ASAP’ by their team – yet Owen makes a fair effort to seemingly imply that some authority has determined this spyware status as fact, in an published ‘report’.

So as a user, should you delete & avoid Audacity 3.0? Should you stop recommending it? Is it really audio spyware sent from Russia? Has it even been ‘called spyware in a report’ as Owen claims?

Trust?

You should always evaluate any software you use or recommend before downloading & installing it these days. Paid or free, you should get into the mindset of being aware of what you’re putting on your machines. It can be very difficult though, to know what’s going to happen with your data behind the scenes. This can make it hard to trust that any software won’t open you up to vulnerabilities. So, is Audacity really any different? Does throwing words like ‘spyware’ around so casually help any of us in the long run?

Alexandre Prokoudine’s [ @prokoudine on Twitter ] ‘Level Headed Conversation about Audacity‘ may answer some questions for you. He breaks things down in a bit more detail, and with a stronger focus on fact vs hypotheticals. He attempts to explain why the rush to generate click-bait headlines may be leading folks to the wrong conclusions. Now that the hysteria has died down from the initial reporting & Audacity has responded, there doesn’t seem to be a whole there technically to talk about. Is Alexandre’s assessment on the mark in your mind, or is there real cause for concern, unique to Audacity 3.0?

It has been a number of years since we’ve needed Audacity on any of the machines here. Though having a free DAW to recommend to new users is always a valuable resource. After reading so much about it this week, we decided to download Audacity 3.0 to try out. We are also revisiting Gimp right now as a free PS alternative & to see what we’ve missed lately in that world.

Free favorites?

What are you using or recommending for a free or low cost DAW these days? Some Windows, mac & Linux users have been recommending OcenAudio, which looks very simple, but surely there are others too.

Read Alexandre Prokoudine’s full article at Libre Arts