macarc888

As the repo says

> Proudly written without AI.

It's not quite that simple. While the codebase is open source, the website could provide binaries that were not built from the open source code (e.g by patching to add tracking). So it is necessary to trust Muse Group if you're installing from the recommended source (which the vast majority of users will be doing).

Even if there is no tracking at the moment, there is always the worry that Muse Group will "go bad" and start adding tracking, or make the later versions closed-source, etc. One could argue that it's still better than a fully closed source company - sure - but what happens to Audacity/MuseScore then?

Reliance on a single company developing code has huge benefits: as discussed in this video, the centralisation really helped with vision and planning; but it does make me slightly uncomfortable. The development is no longer "open", in the sense of community driven. The application now has a different goal (to make money for Muse Group), not necessarily aligned with what users want/need. It cuts to the core of what we actually want from free software - lack of profit motive? transparency? Of what exactly?