I've long been impressed with the progress that MuseScore is making and this seems like a huge jump forward.
Under the design direction of Martin Keary, we are making significant improvements to the interaction models and interface of MuseScore 4
For those interested, Martin Keary (aka Tantacrul on YouTube) creates these very impressive YouTube videos of reviews of music notation software. His reviews are usually very scathing, but an honest critique.
After his video reviewing MuseScore, the MuseScore team spent a lot of time addressing the issues he pointed out and eventually hired him!
I just watched the MuseScore video. I get that he’s trying to be entertaining, but he just comes off as a jerk to me. Doesn’t make him less correct of course, but do we really need a blood-vomiting Shostakovich or imagined email exchange making fun of “New All” (among other examples)?
Honestly, it’s disappointing that this is the default way to criticize someone’s work, however bad it may be.
Imagine if your users, teachers or even parents critiqued your work in this way.
I'm willing to give it a pass because it's in good faith and he gives praise as well; it's not like an Angry Video Game Nerd-style rant. Also, this is a review for his YouTube audience more than it is criticism aimed at MuseScore's designers. I'm sure he wouldn't critique the work of his kids or students this way.
Tangentially related but super cool, Tantacrul was part of a project[0] with David Bruce where 5 composers of various backgrounds were given the same brief (basic themes, instrumentation, etc.) to see how different people came up with different ideas. Each of the composers are also worth their own follows as well.
This idea was taken from Andrew Huang (who himself took it from a photography channel) who puts the same sample in front of different electronic music producers[1]
The original "4 Photographers Shoot the Same Model" [0] series by Jessica Kobeissi that Andrew Huang's series was inspired by was nominated for a Shorty Award [1] in 2019.
As soon as I saw this pop up on HN, I thought “hey, MuseScore — isn’t that the notation software Tantacrul loves to hate?”. I’m not a composer, and I’d never heard of let alone used MuseScore before stumbling on his videos a couple of weeks ago. What a great surprise to see they’ve been listening to their critics!
After finding his channel I slowly worked my way through watching all his videos. One of my favourites is about “sonification”, or creating sound from of data. Might be quite interesting to the HN crowd: https://youtu.be/Ocq3NeudsVk
Even in his video he said he liked many parts of MuseScore — he never said he totally hated it. His critique of it was much more entertaining than scathing.
His opinions and tastes are somewhat odd imho, so despite some good observations, his opinions ought to be taken with a grain of salt. For instance, in his Dorico video, he doesn't seem to appreciate that some of the software's design stems from a separation of content and appearance (much like TeX), which has has long term benefits to the user that may not be apparent at first.
Although it may not really fit what you're looking for, there was a one-hour video linked here a few days ago that critiziced the entire modern desktop GUI landscape.
After I watched his videos I thought the same thing. Almost every big piece of software would benefit greatly from a Tantacrul-like teardown, but I also realize that such a thing would require a whole heap of real-world domain knowledge and possibly hundreds of hours of use to track down all the issues so thoroughly.
Only tangentially related, but EEV Blog recently did a video on PCB design BOM (Bill of Materials) optimization where he took a random open-source project as a counter-example.
I'm not an electrical engineer, nor do I design PCBs, but it was still pretty interesting if you're into that sort of critique.
I love Tantacrul's videos. The humor is great in general, and when you deal with terrible UIs on a daily basis (like I am on my job), it hits close to home.
They really are great. As much interest as there is in user interface design, and as much as it dominates our lives as designed artifacts, the field has very few serious critics. Tantacrul’s videos are a great template of how to make interaction design criticism both thorough and riveting.
Comments
I've long been impressed with the progress that MuseScore is making and this seems like a huge jump forward.
For those interested, Martin Keary (aka Tantacrul on YouTube) creates these very impressive YouTube videos of reviews of music notation software. His reviews are usually very scathing, but an honest critique.
After his video reviewing MuseScore, the MuseScore team spent a lot of time addressing the issues he pointed out and eventually hired him!
They're also quite entertaining. Worth a watch even if you have just a passing interest in UI/UX design and no clue about music engraving.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLm9VVia9DFSUVK24lR9mS...
(This playlist contains some other stuff as well, but the interface design ones are clearly labeled in the titles.)
I just watched the MuseScore video. I get that he’s trying to be entertaining, but he just comes off as a jerk to me. Doesn’t make him less correct of course, but do we really need a blood-vomiting Shostakovich or imagined email exchange making fun of “New All” (among other examples)?
Honestly, it’s disappointing that this is the default way to criticize someone’s work, however bad it may be.
Imagine if your users, teachers or even parents critiqued your work in this way.
As someone who has spent many hours dealing with Musescore's frequently bizarre UI, I found it hilarious and cathartic
It reminds me of the Zero Punctuation's style. It's probably not for everyone but it clearly has an appreciative audience.
I'm willing to give it a pass because it's in good faith and he gives praise as well; it's not like an Angry Video Game Nerd-style rant. Also, this is a review for his YouTube audience more than it is criticism aimed at MuseScore's designers. I'm sure he wouldn't critique the work of his kids or students this way.
Tangentially related but super cool, Tantacrul was part of a project[0] with David Bruce where 5 composers of various backgrounds were given the same brief (basic themes, instrumentation, etc.) to see how different people came up with different ideas. Each of the composers are also worth their own follows as well.
This idea was taken from Andrew Huang (who himself took it from a photography channel) who puts the same sample in front of different electronic music producers[1]
[0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWDITMZW1XE [1]: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLW9UYOmoXTQmEQecw3Owi...
The original "4 Photographers Shoot the Same Model" [0] series by Jessica Kobeissi that Andrew Huang's series was inspired by was nominated for a Shorty Award [1] in 2019.
[0] https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMHISHSRJwdYhG0YFufX84Efv...
[1] https://shortyawards.com/11th/photographer
As soon as I saw this pop up on HN, I thought “hey, MuseScore — isn’t that the notation software Tantacrul loves to hate?”. I’m not a composer, and I’d never heard of let alone used MuseScore before stumbling on his videos a couple of weeks ago. What a great surprise to see they’ve been listening to their critics!
After finding his channel I slowly worked my way through watching all his videos. One of my favourites is about “sonification”, or creating sound from of data. Might be quite interesting to the HN crowd: https://youtu.be/Ocq3NeudsVk
Tantacrul is now the head of design for MuseScore. Presumably he doesn't totally hate it anymore.
Even in his video he said he liked many parts of MuseScore — he never said he totally hated it. His critique of it was much more entertaining than scathing.
His opinions and tastes are somewhat odd imho, so despite some good observations, his opinions ought to be taken with a grain of salt. For instance, in his Dorico video, he doesn't seem to appreciate that some of the software's design stems from a separation of content and appearance (much like TeX), which has has long term benefits to the user that may not be apparent at first.
Does anybody knows other youtuber, talks, blog, that criticize real-world user interface? Is a fascinating topic
Although it may not really fit what you're looking for, there was a one-hour video linked here a few days ago that critiziced the entire modern desktop GUI landscape.
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AItTqnTsVjA
Discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23480002
After I watched his videos I thought the same thing. Almost every big piece of software would benefit greatly from a Tantacrul-like teardown, but I also realize that such a thing would require a whole heap of real-world domain knowledge and possibly hundreds of hours of use to track down all the issues so thoroughly.
Only tangentially related, but EEV Blog recently did a video on PCB design BOM (Bill of Materials) optimization where he took a random open-source project as a counter-example.
I'm not an electrical engineer, nor do I design PCBs, but it was still pretty interesting if you're into that sort of critique.
I love Tantacrul's videos. The humor is great in general, and when you deal with terrible UIs on a daily basis (like I am on my job), it hits close to home.
The cheese melts in the microwave; the music melts in Sibelius.
Tantacrul’s review of Sibelius’ might be the most entertaining serious critique of a software user interface ever posted to YouTube.
https://youtu.be/dKx1wnXClcI
They really are great. As much interest as there is in user interface design, and as much as it dominates our lives as designed artifacts, the field has very few serious critics. Tantacrul’s videos are a great template of how to make interaction design criticism both thorough and riveting.
I would love to see him critique a niche tracker like goattracker or SID Factory II :)