That would be the case if the GUI one would be a wrapper for the CLI utility.
It depends how privacy conscious you are. They aren’t stealing data or anything but definitely over the line for me from a privacy perspective.
It was first reported in 2018:
Here is another:
Here are the reported sites they were connecting to:
https://www.googletagmanager.com
https://www.google-analytics.com
https://d1l6p2sc9645hc.cloudfront.net
https://api.mixpanel.com
https://data.gosquared.com
https://data2.gosquared.com
https://google-analytics.com
https://googletagmanager.com
https://connect.facebook.com
https://www.facebook.com
The final straw for me was where they acknowledged that their opt-out settings were broken but basically said they had other priorities to work on first.
Things didn’t get all that much better over a year later:
Since then, I have been unwilling to trust them from a privacy perspective. There are too many other alternative flashing tools out there.
Test for yourself, try a big ISO etcher vs dd. I am not talking about a 5% speedup. More like 2x performance. I have never looked into why that is so it may be possible to optimize dd in a similar manner.
Well, I will. Even if that means installing that spyware 
Hmm you are right, I’ve noticed they are showing adds, but I didn’t think they need to call google and others like them to show those ads.
Popsicle looks great: simple, minimal… great. Instant switch! 
One more thing:
$ sudo pacman -Rsnc etcher
checking dependencies...
Packages (1) etcher-1.5.94-1
Total Removed Size: 223,54 MiB
:: Do you want to remove these packages? [Y/n]
:: Processing package changes...
(1/1) removing etcher [##############################################################] 100%
:: Running post-transaction hooks...
(1/3) Arming ConditionNeedsUpdate...
(2/3) Updating icon theme caches...
(3/3) Updating the desktop file MIME type cache...
223MB for a simple utility like that. Now that’s bloat. I hate Atom.
My balena-etcher build fails…
Installing dependencies
npx: installed 435 in 7.216s
npm ERR! cb() never called!
npm ERR! This is an error with npm itself. Please report this error at:
npm ERR! <https://npm.community>
npm ERR! A complete log of this run can be found in:
npm ERR! /home/ana/.npm/_logs/2020-06-01T16_03_59_642Z-debug.log
make: *** [Makefile:97: electron-develop] Error 1
==> ERROR: A failure occurred in build().
Aborting...
checking dependencies...
:: nodejs optionally requires npm: nodejs package manager
Have you tried the `status=progress` flag?
That’s what refuses to work well. I t usually start OK, then after a while it appears to freeze, although it does continue to the end. I end up going for a smoke break, and then reading a book, and then seeing if it finished! At least adding the beep helped a bit (sometimes I could hear it while reading).
Yes, it does that. It never was taking too long though, but maybe I just had nothing to compare it to. It is a simple core utility and works for my simple expectations.
With this balena not building I am going to be stuck forever with dd it seems 
Well - I find mintstick OK, and I’m going to have a look at popsicle (now that I’ve heard of it). I was slow to change from burning a DVD, so I’m not up-to-date 
Come to think of it, that applies to more than getting ISO’s ready to use!
It is working for me. Are you using the standard version of npm and is your system otherwise up to date?
I don’t know.
ana % yay balena-etcher I
1 aur/balena-etcher 2:1.5.95-1 (+196 8.08%)
Flash OS images to SD cards & USB drives, safely and easily
==> Packages to install (eg: 1 2 3, 1-3 or ^4)
==> 1
:: Checking for conflicts...
:: Checking for inner conflicts...
[Repo Make: 5] semver-7.3.2-1 node-gyp-6.1.0-1 npm-6.14.5-1 oniguruma-6.9.5_rev1-1 jq-1.6-2
[Aur: 1] balena-etcher-2:1.5.95-1
==> Remove make dependencies after install? [y/N] y
1 balena-etcher (Build Files Exist)
==> Packages to cleanBuild?
==> [N]one [A]ll [Ab]ort [I]nstalled [No]tInstalled or (1 2 3, 1-3, ^4)
==> n
:: PKGBUILD up to date, Skipping (1/1): balena-etcher
1 balena-etcher (Build Files Exist)
==> Diffs to show?
==> [N]one [A]ll [Ab]ort [I]nstalled [No]tInstalled or (1 2 3, 1-3, ^4)
==> n
:: Parsing SRCINFO (1/1): balena-etcher
[sudo] password for ana:
resolving dependencies...
looking for conflicting packages...
Package (5) New Version Net Change
community/jq 1.6-2 0.65 MiB
community/node-gyp 6.1.0-1 6.35 MiB
community/npm 6.14.5-1 20.48 MiB
community/oniguruma 6.9.5_rev1-1 0.83 MiB
community/semver 7.3.2-1 0.08 MiB
Total Installed Size: 28.39 MiB
:: Proceed with installation? [Y/n]
Just updated it (2 packages) and will try again.
It is successfully installed
As a Gnome head, I have been using “disks” for years with no problems what so ever.
Highlight the target USB drive, click on Options, then Restore Disk Image, then navigate to the source ISO. I don’t know about speed, but it is very reliable.
Pudge
Try the package in the official repository:
Edit: nevermind this, it’s not going to show like that in EOS. I was sure it’s in the Arch repos, but it’s actually in the Manjaro repos.
I didn’t know that there’s another one. I already installed from AUR…
Trying to measure it’s speed, but not sure how to do that with a gui app to be honest. I set a timer for 10 mins (given that dd needs ~5 mins), but it didn’t even get to 40%…
Now it’s super-precise and scientific seconds=0;while true; do ((++seconds)); sleep 1;done 
Going to stop it manually when it finishes.
Flashing it on an oldest USB stick with the whole 8GB (this thing is ancient) I could find, so it can be seen better.
Thank you for the recommendation, I didnt know Popsicle existed! Works well for me too
Hah! I’m using Disks a lot, I explicitly install it in any DE if it’s not there already.
I had no clue about that feature
I also use Etcher. Never had an issue with it.
How are you getting this to come up? I only get AUR packages.
Didn’t know about the install version. I use the app stand alone version.
cough wrong distro cough