Rant Incoming! Why I despise Ultimate Guitar and their anti-consumer practices.

Hello, and I apologize for this soap-box, but I'm on a bit of a personal quest to highlight this shady developer and hope to steer people away from the egregious tactics they implement which is a big disservice to paying customers. I'm not expecting a whole lot of traction here (soap-box posts rarely gain such) but if just a couple people read this then I will feel a bit vindicated.

I was unwise enough to purchase the 'lifetime subscription' for $40.00 (they also have a monthly subscription plan for I believe $8.00/mo). I thought the interactive tabs were pretty helpful and it was useful having one spot to keep all my tabs together, however I quickly learned of my mistake when I started using the app post-purchase.

Rather than write a full review on the app itself (it does have it's pros/cons - one annoyance being that as a bass player I find the bass tabs to often be horribly inaccurate) I'll just tell you what I absolutely loathe about it, which is the damned advertisements.

I don't know about you guys, but I'm just so sick and tired of ads spamming my life at every turn. This is the sole reason why I cut the cord and no longer subscribe to cable. Every single moment I spend looking at an ad is another moment I spend wasting my life. I have, err... more productive ways of wasting my life!

This developer is absolutely poopy in this regard. I spent $40 on this thing! I understand developers rely on advertisements to make money and I'm not against that, but in almost all circumstances by throwing a few bucks at the developer they will remove ads and both of us are happy. Trust me, I have no problem supporting developers, every ad-based app which allows me to purchase said app to remove such ads I have purchased without hesitation.

What is poopy though is to continue doing such (and in this case in quite an aggressive manner) *after* I have already purchased the software, especially when the software costs almost as much as a new AAA video game!

Every time I boot this application up I get a modal popup asking me to purchase some useless add-on that I simply do not want. When I close that popup then I get to see a massive banner on the bottom 1/3rd of the home screen with the same advertisement. Furthermore, they implement annoying tactics like "TAB TRACKER IS 50% OFF FOR THE NEXT (X) MINUTES! ACT NOW!" (it's always "50% off" by the way).

**BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!**

Not only do they spam you with ads when you open the app and chew up a huge amount of your screen with a banner, they will also randomly throw a popup at you if you switch to another app and then back to this POS. For example, I often want to check my mail, or go to a music app to listen to the actual song I'm trying to learn, or whatever, but when I come back to this app I will often get to see another god damn popup ad. They do it randomly hoping that you will click on the add by accident. I can't even practice in peace once I've moved past their poopy home screen!

Furthermore, once you create an account it's up for good because you cannot remove it due to "marketing and analytic reasons".

I don't mind post-purchase in-app purchases if they tuck those add-ons in a menu somewhere, but screw this noise. Also, I emailed the developer voicing my concern and all I got back was effectively "We're sorry you are so emotional about this, but we are not changing our policy", so for all of these reasons I extend a hearty **SCREW YOU** to Ultimate Guitar.

I'm surprised this app has so many good reviews considering their annoying advertisement practices, though I guess I find these practices more annoying than most.

- End rant.

 

Damn man, you're good! Coding is what I do to pay the bills.