Tech YouTuber Marques Brownlee, or MKBHD, is stepping out of the reviewer function and into the mindset of a builder. This week, he launched a wallpaper app known as Panels on iOS and Android, the place he’s personally curating high-quality digital wallpapers from artists — however in fact, there’s a catch. To be able to entry high-resolution wallpapers with out viewing adverts, customers have to cough up about $50 per yr, or $12 per thirty days.
With virtually twenty million YouTube subscribers, Brownlee holds numerous energy in his tech opinions. He’s so influential that he’s been blamed for tanking hyped firms like Fisker and Humane after he posted unfavourable movies about their merchandise. These accusations are misguided — Fisker’s vehicles had critical safety flaws, and Humane’s AI pin barely labored regardless of elevating $230 million earlier than transport a product, which most likely contributed extra to those firms’ failures than a YouTube video. Nonetheless, given Brownlee’s repute as a keen-eyed, discerning tech reviewer, followers had excessive expectations when he introduced that he was launching an app.
The Panels app has a robust premise. When Brownlee is reviewing a brand new cellphone, laptop computer, or smartwatch, his gadgets all the time have significantly fashionable wallpapers. As he identified when asserting the app, if you happen to sort “where does mkbhd…” into Google, one of many first options is “… get his wallpapers.”
He couldn’t have picked a greater time to launch the app, both. Final week, Apple launched the iPhone software program replace iOS 18, which emphasizes lock display screen and house display screen customization. So, there ought to be an urge for food for glossy, high-resolution wallpapers that enable you to get probably the most out of iOS 18. However the flaw of Panels is that the costs are too steep. You should use the app without spending a dime and obtain decrease decision pictures if you happen to watch two thirty-second adverts per picture — however that form of money seize appears like one thing Brownlee himself would disparage.
A redeeming high quality of the app is its try to unlock a brand new revenue stream for digital artists in a time when generative AI is such a risk. Brownlee mentioned that funds are being cut up 50-50 with artists — if a consumer buys a wallpaper for about $8, and Apple takes 30% of the fee, then the artist could be left receiving about $2.80 per buy. Because it’s really easy to search out cool, high-res images on-line, Brownlee is making an attempt to create a marketplace for one thing that folks aren’t used to paying for. However, if anybody has the sway to make it work, it might most likely be a tech influencer with as a lot attain as Brownlee. If artists could make some further, passive revenue from the app, what’s the hurt?
Properly, by way of knowledge privateness, there might be hurt. Followers rapidly identified that based on the App Retailer, Panels might monitor customers’ location, utilization knowledge, and private identifiers throughout different apps and web sites. To Brownlee’s credit score, he posted on X quickly after the launch to handle the difficulty.
“First thing we’re doing is fixing the excessive data disclosures, as people rightfully brought up. For transparency, we’d never actually ask for your location, internet history, etc. The data disclosures (that everyone is screenshotting) is likely too broad, and largely driven by what the ad networks suggest. Working to fix that ASAP,” he mentioned.
He added that he may also dial again advert frequency for the free model of the app.
For what it’s price, you may nonetheless get cool new wallpapers from the free model of Panels. However the lower-resolution pictures don’t look nice except you add Apple’s filters, and it’s troublesome to think about paying the worth of a Spotify subscription to get round that barrier.
“Part of building in public is getting mass feedback immediately, which is pretty dope,” Brownlee wrote. “Almost exactly like publishing a YouTube video.”
