To me, audiotool is a program made to make music accessible to new, upcoming, and less financially fortunate musicians. I've used the software on and off since I was 15 years old (I'm 25 now), and the fact that I've been able to stick with it for as long as I have is something really special to me. I've learned synthesis, mixing, mastering, and much more through making my music with this software, and working within its limitations. I've prided myself in knowing almost everything about this DAW, whether I used every feature or not, and mostly being content with using those same tools for almost all of my music.
So why is it that the proposition of VST support, and stem uploads feels like a step back in my mind? Maybe I'm a purist, maybe I'm incredibly jaded, or maybe I'm too far disassociated from the website at this point to understand the greater picture. I wanna ask you guys this same question, and see if I'm alone in this mentality.
Please keep discussion civil, and polite when making your responses, otherwise I'll probably delete your comments.
A place to make music for fun in my free time. I randomly found audiotool from the Chrome Web Store in middle school, so I've been messing with it since. I think audiotool was a Flash application back then when Adobe Flash was still supported.
Audiotool for me, is a lot of things. It's very close to my heart on a personal level for numerous reasons. This was my first real DAW, it's where I've built my music production experience from the ground up, and it's where I grew up. I joined AT as a middle schooler who was struggling to find himself, what he wanted to do, and just confused overall. I just kept making music and connecting with the community, growing my skill, learning what I could, and ultimately found myself in the process. Now I'm a senior and I know for a fact I want to continue making music as my career and my life.
In terms of software, Audiotool is amazing DAW that breeds creativity through it's limitations. Through the years my outlook on the studio went from "it's the most complex thing I've ever used" to "it's not enough and feels immature" to my current standpoint of "What can this thing do?" For a while, a few years after joining I felt that the limitations of the DAW deemed AT as a "building block DAW" and nothing more. A DAW that acts as a bit of a tutorial, a software that people can learn how to do music production then move on to bigger and better DAWs. And while I would LOVE to have and use a DAW such as FL Studio or Logic, I'm still content producing within AT. I'm learning so much even after five or six years, and I'm still not even using AT to it's full potential.
The community will change and fluctuate. That's just a fact of any social platform. Many people will join, some will be well known and build a legacy, and some will leave. No one will stay on the site forever, and we can't expect the community as a whole to stay the same forever. Just in the five years I've been here I've seen a change in the community myself. The best thing we can do is to continue spreading positivity throughout the site, instead of doing nothing except reminiscing and criticizing the new "generations" so to speak
Overall Audiotool is a very important DAW, you just gotta look for it.
my second daw (if you count soundtrap). as a chromebook kid, and as someone who recently became a teen AND just discovered audiotool a few weeks ago, i was shocked to find an entire community and a generation that grew up here (literally from when i wasnt even born to when i was an infant / toddler that AT seems like it had reached its peak back then)
despite seeing a lot of comments and everything thats been going on in general, ill probably be here for a while just making music (i wont be engaging too much, however, if the site is "dead" and more toxic than how it apparently used to be).
however, i do feel quite selfish for being here mainly as im too broke to afford a "professional" daw nor do i want to eat up my parents' computer storage / ram with production software. maybe ill stick around to see what happens to AT in the years to come
its a piece of online history that has many features and quirks (and crippling limitations that make me wanna cry) that professional producers could learn from nowadays
for me was my very first actual DAW, I was switching between fl studio and audiotool until i stopped using it. recently i started to use audiotool again now that i learned how to create my sounds and i'm working on my 10 year old drafts
It was my entry into music production overall. It's such a great gateway to working with sound. One has to think a lot about it's limitations and how to exploit them to get interesting sounds. The remixes, collaborative aspect, the fact that it's free and browser based is such an amazing tool to introduce all these important concepts of music. To this day, I believe that the educational potential of this DAW is underappreciated and not used enough.
It's also community and friendship to me. I've built connections with people who think on the same wavelength as me, have the same interests, the same struggles, are open, incredibly accepting and helpful for me. And yet the community is a sharp double edged sword.
Even though the stem and vst part of AT leaves me a bit disgruntled, I think it could open a whole new world of opportunities. Though my distrust in stems remains. So much more sampled music here nowadays. Often don't know where they come from and I often feel disappointed when I see that a synth has been made outside of AT. The more this happens, the more it could portrait the image of AT being inferior, which imo could lead to an even more rapid downfall of the site.
I suppose one reason I've been so disconnected is the silence, and the stasis that Audiotool is in at the moment. It's fun to watch something grow, and develop while you're interacting with it, but if what you're playing with never changes, never grows, never flourishes, no matter how deep or varied it can be, it will become boring eventually. That can vary for a lot of people, and I've more than passed my limit, I think.
For me, Audiotool is a new planet, and I love exploring all these valleys... There are sometimes wonderful discoveries, but also cold austere corners without any charm. So, isn't beauty the twin sister of ugliness?
Beyond this conquest, this site allows us to travel, to meet, to share, to criticize, to exchange.... in short, to accomplish what our modern societies no longer seem able to provide us.
I treat myself to incredible trips while staying in front of my computer.
I love the spirit of this community, I love the ability of users to always push the limits, to create from tiny bricks, tracks that are so well constructed and professional.
A place to make music for fun in my free time. I randomly found audiotool from the Chrome Web Store in middle school, so I've been messing with it since. I think audiotool was a Flash application back then when Adobe Flash was still supported.