[Resolved] Xender File Sharing App’s Gone Rogue

UPDATE: The feature discussed below that turned the ‘rogueness’ on for Xender has been dropped. Thus, consider the rest of the piece below as a rant from a disappointed user.

Where does that tendency come from: Developer makes great app. Because of the greatness, many troop to use the app. Developer all of a sudden get so money-conscious they start sneaking ads here and there, and building their app in the way that there’s no opt-out to their ads. Where does that thing come from? Is it the devil?

The urge to write this article came up, as a result of Xender’s quick charge features getting in my way, whiles I try to debug an error when I test run an app I’m building on my Android.

TL;DR:

• Pick up your phone
• Uninstall Xender File Sharing app (whichever way you please, via play store or ES explorer, whatever. Just uninstall it)
• Pop some champagne.
• Open Play Store and install SHAREit app.
• You’ll happily live ever after

I’ve been using Xender close to a year now. A friend of mine introduced me to it. He had a game the size about 1.5 Gig and had to send to me. I had less than 30 minutes to spend. Xender came to the rescue. Within minutes, the data file was sent. Everyone wins! Until….

In about a month or two ago, Xender threw in an update that sent the whole world into chaos, yes, chaos, but for the right reasons. Reviews started coming in on Play Store about a new villain introduced in the Xender app.

It is called, Quick Charge. Lemme be honest here. I do not know who the …. thought of adding a ‘Quick charge’ feature, which essentially closes some apps so that the phone would charge faster when connected to plug for juice.

‘Quick Charge’? I always knew that term too, in recent years, refer strictly to devices that are hardware made in such a way to allow faster battery charging. The point? Hardware-related.

I did not know with a badpy quick-charge feature, infested with ads, my phone could charge faster. It doesn’t make sense. Whoever brought that idea up, and executed it is a real douche. How can one be so foolish rolling out a feature so useless and stupid? At the current cost, they’re facing?

It wasn’t as if there isn’t any ad in the app already. Two things: 1) Let us pay for a premium version of the app, that’s no-ads enabled. 2) Let us use a free version, which comes with ads IN the app.

Xender chose number 2 of above, then added an extra bonus. Everyone knows people visit their lock screen several times within the day for many reasons: To check the time, see if new notification, sometimes even read notifications right and there. Nice.

Whoever added the Quick Charge feature probably said:

“Oooh Google Android, how could you be so senseless. Instead of adding ads to the lockscreen, which the user can’t turn off, you place notifications. Who reads notifications!”

It is unfortunate Xender had to resort to such mischievous, unprofessional, lack-of-users-respect approach. I think such a move is one of the worst things you could do to your users. All I can think of Xender is an app developed by a great developer(s), who got money-hungry, and decided to go full money-hunting instead of listening to their users.

It is easy to lose sight of what’s more important. When products like Xender makes surprisingly insane moves like these, when they come crashing to the ground eventually, it is fun to watch.

SHAREit, the app I switched to has over 100 million downloads. Xender stands at 5 Million. Xender was great. Of course, 100+ M people using an app can be considered a great app. But for me, I was looking for what works. And they say, if it works, don’t change it. Until…

Xender decided to go rogue.