YouTuber MKBHD launches wallpaper app for Android and iPhone and receives a lot of criticism for this reason
In fact, MKBHD, whose name is Marques Brownlee and is famous on YouTube, and who is ultimately one of the most important, if not the biggest, tech YouTubers in the world, has just released a customization app for iPhone and Android that has been quite successful, because the criticism it has received has even caused Marques Brownlee himself to step in to provide clarifications and calm things down.
The application in question is called Panels and is available exclusively for iPhone and Android devices by following the embedded link that we leave you below, and competes in the customization section with the huge number of applications, both free and paid, that offer the download of live wallpapers to customize the desktop of our smartphones.
The truth is that Panels is a clear flaw and not only because it was just published to coincide with the iPhone 16 review conducted by MKBHD, because in addition to the youth problems that will surely spread, we must add a truly insane price for the app, $ 49.99 per year or $ 11.99 per month, as well as a large amount of permissions that the app requests and that seem unnecessary for most people.
As The Verge recently reported, Marques Brownlee himself responded to the heavy criticism from the group of users who tried the Panels app by personally assuring that he would address all the issues and concerns raised, from pricing to excessive permissions to private user data.
The fact is that the majority of Panels users confirm their concerns about privacy when permissions are asked during installation to track activity even on websites and apps, as well as the geolocation permission that might make sense to show us relevant wallpapers. MKBHD has already confirmed that these permissions will be reviewed soon with a new update.
The operation of the application is designed so that you have "amazing high-resolution wallpapers" created by digital artists who get 50% of the profits made, although the temporary subscription that is also very expensive for the service is undoubtedly not very logical in functions such as offering us a wallpaper that we will not change daily.
The free version of the app, for example, is limited in the wallpapers available as well as in quality, as it only allows you to download wallpapers in standard resolution and after watching at least two ads. Panels Plus removes the ad restrictions, though it's a hefty price to pay at $11.99 per month or $49.99 per year.
We'll see what MKBHD does to solve all this, the YouTuber has been diversifying into creating his own products for some time, as he has always been critical of what others design and make.
Application link for Android and iPhone