For the simple task of moving bytes through a tcp connection (what the article is about) netcat will be fine.

Socat allows you to use raw interfaces, or fifos, SSL, proxies, serial ports,... as one or both end points. E.g. you can forward arbitrary tcp connections (tcp relay;) but also connect stdin/stdout if a program to a serial port... just very, very, very versatile.

http://www.dest-unreach.org/socat/doc/socat.html