Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Stratechery VS SuperCollider

Compare Stratechery VS SuperCollider and see what are their differences

Stratechery logo Stratechery

New layout, same great words about big tech

SuperCollider logo SuperCollider

A real time audio synthesis engine, and an object-oriented programming language specialised for...
  • Stratechery Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-06-12
  • SuperCollider Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-04-25

Stratechery features and specs

  • Insightful Analysis
    Stratechery provides deep and comprehensive analysis of technology and media businesses, offering insights that are valuable to industry professionals.
  • Expert Commentary
    The content is written by Ben Thompson, who is well-regarded in the tech industry for his expert understanding of business strategy and market dynamics.
  • Regular Updates
    Subscribers receive multiple updates each week, ensuring they are always up-to-date with the latest developments and trends in the tech industry.
  • Focus on Business Strategy
    The platform focuses on the intersection of technology and business strategy, providing a unique perspective that blends technical knowledge with strategic insights.

Possible disadvantages of Stratechery

  • Subscription Cost
    Stratechery operates on a subscription model, which may not be affordable for everyone interested in its content.
  • Niche Focus
    The analysis is heavily focused on technology and media companies, which may not appeal to individuals outside these sectors.
  • Content Density
    The articles and updates can be quite dense and detailed, which might be challenging for casual readers or those unfamiliar with the subjects.
  • Limited Free Content
    There is limited free content available, so potential subscribers have minimal opportunity to sample the material before committing financially.

SuperCollider features and specs

  • Powerful Synthesis Engine
    SuperCollider offers a powerful real-time audio synthesis engine that allows users to create complex and nuanced sounds, making it ideal for experimental music and sound design.
  • Extensive Library of Ugens
    SuperCollider comes with a comprehensive library of unit generators (UGens), which are ready-made building blocks for audio and control signal processing.
  • Flexibility
    SuperCollider supports a wide range of methods for sound generation and manipulation, from simple waveform synthesis to algorithmic composition and live coding.
  • Cross-Platform
    SuperCollider is cross-platform and runs on macOS, Windows, and Linux, making it accessible to a wide range of users.
  • Open Source
    Being open-source, SuperCollider is free to use and has an active community that contributes to its development, ensuring it continually evolves and improves.
  • Live Coding
    SuperCollider supports live coding, allowing users to write and modify code in real-time during performances, which is highly valued in the experimental and electronic music communities.
  • Integrated Development Environment (IDE)
    SuperCollider includes its own IDE, which provides features like syntax highlighting, code completion, and documentation tools, making it more accessible to users.

Possible disadvantages of SuperCollider

  • Steep Learning Curve
    SuperCollider has a steep learning curve, particularly for those who are new to programming or digital signal processing, which can be initially discouraging.
  • Sparse Documentation
    While there is documentation available, some users find it sparse or difficult to understand compared to other music programming environments, making it harder to learn.
  • Complex Syntax
    The syntax of SuperCollider can be complex and less intuitive for beginners, which can result in a slower learning process for new users.
  • Performance Overheads
    Real-time performance might suffer on less powerful hardware due to the computational demands of complex synthesis and processing tasks.
  • Fragmented Community Resources
    Although there is a community around SuperCollider, resources such as tutorials and forums can be fragmented and vary in quality, which can make finding reliable help challenging.
  • Limited GUI Capabilities
    SuperCollider's native GUI capabilities are limited and less polished compared to more specialized software for graphical user interfaces.

Analysis of SuperCollider

Overall verdict

  • Yes, SuperCollider is considered a very good tool, especially for those interested in experimental music and sound art. It is widely used by musicians, composers, and researchers within the digital audio community, largely due to its expansive feature set and supportive community.

Why this product is good

  • SuperCollider is highly regarded for its capabilities in sound synthesis and algorithmic composition. It offers a powerful and flexible environment for sound design, live coding, and generative music. The platform is open-source, which allows users to contribute and extend its functionalities. Its programming language is specifically designed for music and audio, providing a rich and versatile set of tools for creating complex auditory experiences.

Recommended for

  • Musicians looking to create experimental or generative music
  • Sound designers interested in creating complex audio environments
  • Composers specializing in algorithmic composition
  • Researchers focusing on audio synthesis and digital signal processing
  • Artists looking for an open-source platform for live coding and sound art

Stratechery videos

Ben Thompson, founder of Stratechery | Code 2018

More videos:

  • Review - How Ben Thompson built Stratechery | Code Media 2017

SuperCollider videos

Making Music with SuperCollider

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Stratechery and SuperCollider)
Startups
100 100%
0% 0
3D
0 0%
100% 100
Productivity
100 100%
0% 0
Music Generation
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Social recommendations and mentions

SuperCollider might be a bit more popular than Stratechery. We know about 33 links to it since March 2021 and only 32 links to Stratechery. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Stratechery mentions (32)

  • Ask HN: What computer science blogs do you have bookmarked?
    Stratechery (https://stratechery.com) These are basically all ML/AI blogs except Ludicity. Any others I should add? - Source: Hacker News / 8 months ago
  • Magic/tragic email links: don't make them the only option
    1. Indirect security downsides. Pushing people to access personal email on work devices (or vice-versa) isn't exactly a win for security. Another annoying _passwordless_ system is to email or SMS an OTP the end user can type in. While this sucks, it at least allows you to easily log in in situations where you don't have a clear and easy copy/paste path from the email client to the browser you want to log in to.... - Source: Hacker News / 9 months ago
  • Ask HN: Favorite Blog in 2024?
    Shameless plug - I write at https://writervivek.com But here is my list: Https://daringfireball.net https://stratechery.com https://tldr.tech among a few. - Source: Hacker News / 9 months ago
  • Where Did All the Tech Bloggers Go?
    Ben Thompson should be on that list https://stratechery.com/. - Source: Hacker News / about 1 year ago
  • Sam Altman, Greg Brockman and Other to Join Microsoft
    Founder of https://stratechery.com/ More about him and his blog at https://stratechery.com/stratechery-plus/. - Source: Hacker News / almost 2 years ago
View more

SuperCollider mentions (33)

  • Describing musical domain with F#
    At this point, we can produce the array of pitches that are midi notes. To create sound from these notes I've used a specialized programming language called SuperCollider. I won't dive much into details here, but you may have a look at the code if you're interested. Beware, there are quite a lot of branches there and all of them contain some interesting code. - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • Ask HN: Create audio software akin to physics engines?
    This is essentially sound design from first principles. There's a good book here: https://www.amazon.com/Designing-Sound-Press-Andy-Farnell/dp/0262014416 Note that the software used (Pure Data) can be replaced by another high-level language (SuperCollider: https://supercollider.github.io/) pretty easily. I know of no "tool" to do what you want because there are few things that are universal to different kinds of... - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Harnessing Screams with Tidal Looper
    Since then, I've been working more and more with TidalCycles. TidalCycles is an open-source live coding framework for creating patterns written in Haskell. TidalCycles uses SuperCollider on the backend, another language I've been using for live coding. Recently, I started using Tidal Looper for live vocal processing. This blog post will walk you through what you need to get started with vocal looping with Tidal... - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
  • Csound
    Csound is... "interesting". If you want to play with something more modern, have a look at https://supercollider.github.io/ instead. - Source: Hacker News / about 2 years ago
  • MuseScore 4.1 is now available
    For the intrepid, especially those annoyed with the purported input-sluggishness of musescore et al, an interesting text-based alternative is LilyPond https://lilypond.org/ My dad wrote an opera using LilyPond in vim, though I believe these days he's actually doing more with supercollider, which skips sheetmusic and goes right to sounds: https://supercollider.github.io/. - Source: Hacker News / about 2 years ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing Stratechery and SuperCollider, you can also consider the following products

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Sonic Pi - Sonic Pi is a new kind of instrument for a new generation of musicians. It is simple to learn, powerful enough for live performances and free to download.

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VCV Rack - A cross-platform modular synthesizer.