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Non-coder builds music visualizer in 24 hours using AI assistant [1]

['Ellsworth Toohey']

Date: 2025-12-31  

A self-described "hippie who barely knows how to use a microwave" used Claude AI to build a fully functional music visualizer from scratch in a single day. According to a viral post on the ClaudeAI subreddit, the circumstances were perfect: wife visiting Ireland for Christmas, Australian Shepherd zonked on Trazodone after surgery, empty house.

The poster wanted to relive his Napster-era glory days, staring at Winamp visualizers like a teenager. When he discovered Winamp doesn't run on his 2019 MacBook, Claude suggested he build his own. He'd never used GitHub and didn't know what "deploying" meant. Within hours he had a working web app at smv.club, hosted by "someone named Vercel."

The comparison he drew was to Kurt Vonnegut's "Harrison Bergeron" — a story where exceptional people wear handicaps to enforce equality. With Claude handling the coding, he'd thrown off his shackles. One commenter noted the visualizer uses React 19, Canvas 2D rendering, and Web Audio API with high-resolution FFT analysis. The creator's response to the technical breakdown: "Sir, this is an Arby's."

Previously:

• Winamp as a real-life touchscreen stereo system

• Re:AMP implements classic music player WinAMP on modern Macs

• An appreciation of the long-lost MP3 player skins of yesteryear

• Kickstarter: otherworldly glowing 'jellyfish' for the sky

• Mac users: turn any webpage into an app with Fluid

• Gnutella author quitting AOL over inability to express in code

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[1] Url: https://boingboing.net/2025/12/31/non-coder-builds-music-visualizer-in-24-hours-using-ai-assistant.html

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