'Holy Winamp! Opera Puts a Music Visualizer Inside Its Browser' (pcworld.com)
(Sunday November 16, 2025 @03:34AM (EditorDavid)
from the it-really-whips dept.)
- Reference: 0180093267
- News link: https://entertainment.slashdot.org/story/25/11/16/0827245/holy-winamp-opera-puts-a-music-visualizer-inside-its-browser
- Source link: https://www.pcworld.com/article/2973350/holy-winamp-opera-puts-a-music-visualizer-inside-its-browser.html
An anonymous reader shared [1]this report from PC World :
> It won't whip the llama's ass, but Opera has added a Spotify visualizer to its latest iteration of its free Opera One browser. Known as Sonic, the visualizer will be part of Opera's Dynamic Themes, which use the WebGPU standard to employ a dynamic theme that runs in the background of the browser. It's essentially a shader, which uses your PC's graphics engine to generate the moving background.
>
> The browser also comes with a music player, which is set to Spotify by default. Users will have an opportunity to upgrade to Spotify Premium as part of the browser upgrade, Opera said. Opera's Sonic theme... takes the Spotify input and transforms it into a dynamic background.
"As any old tech head knows, the original visualizer was found in Winamp, which would sync visualizations to the beat and flow of music being played," the article points out.
And 27 years later, WinAmp arrived as an app in Apple's App Store and Google Play and [2]in April of 2024 . (The latest version was apparently released this May — and you can also download it to your desktop...)
Somewhere along the way, Winamp also announced " [3]Winamp for Creators ," which they're describing as a dedicated platform for music artists with monetization and promotion tools, music management services, and other essential resources "to help creators take control of their careers" (including "a powerful social media publishing tool that lets users write a single post and push it to all their social media channels simultaneously.")
[1] https://www.pcworld.com/article/2973350/holy-winamp-opera-puts-a-music-visualizer-inside-its-browser.html
[2] https://winamp.com/press/winamp-player-launch
[3] https://winamp.com/creators
> It won't whip the llama's ass, but Opera has added a Spotify visualizer to its latest iteration of its free Opera One browser. Known as Sonic, the visualizer will be part of Opera's Dynamic Themes, which use the WebGPU standard to employ a dynamic theme that runs in the background of the browser. It's essentially a shader, which uses your PC's graphics engine to generate the moving background.
>
> The browser also comes with a music player, which is set to Spotify by default. Users will have an opportunity to upgrade to Spotify Premium as part of the browser upgrade, Opera said. Opera's Sonic theme... takes the Spotify input and transforms it into a dynamic background.
"As any old tech head knows, the original visualizer was found in Winamp, which would sync visualizations to the beat and flow of music being played," the article points out.
And 27 years later, WinAmp arrived as an app in Apple's App Store and Google Play and [2]in April of 2024 . (The latest version was apparently released this May — and you can also download it to your desktop...)
Somewhere along the way, Winamp also announced " [3]Winamp for Creators ," which they're describing as a dedicated platform for music artists with monetization and promotion tools, music management services, and other essential resources "to help creators take control of their careers" (including "a powerful social media publishing tool that lets users write a single post and push it to all their social media channels simultaneously.")
[1] https://www.pcworld.com/article/2973350/holy-winamp-opera-puts-a-music-visualizer-inside-its-browser.html
[2] https://winamp.com/press/winamp-player-launch
[3] https://winamp.com/creators
GPL violations get figured out (Score:2)
by AcidFnTonic ( 791034 )
Did the GPL violations get figured out from that famously bad open source attempt?
Will it whip the Llama's ass? (Score:2)
by thesjaakspoiler ( 4782965 )
Just asking for a friend.
The most important question (Score:2)
by nospam007 ( 722110 ) *
How do I shut it OFF?
Winamp??? (Score:2)
"As any old tech head knows, the original visualizer was found in Winamp" Some old tech heads will remember music visualizers decades earlier. I mean, atari and sony aren't exactly obscure companies.
Re: (Score:2)
Not to mention Amiga had visualizers before people even knew what Windows was..
Re: (Score:2)
> Not to mention Amiga had visualizers before people even knew what Windows was..
In fact, [1]music visualizers [wikipedia.org] existed even before people knew what windows were !
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_chime
Re: Winamp??? (Score:2)
Sorry, thatâ(TM)s a wind audiolizer.
Re: Winamp??? (Score:2)
Is it really 2025 and Slashdot can't handle smart quotes? That just hurts. Slashdot used to be where all the nerds went to keep up on the bleeding edge of tech. How far it's fallen :(