Why wouldn't they keep all the Appsumo users on LTD and just board new users with their new subscription plans? That's what all the other LTD creators / developers do.
With this bad news, there's no longer any reason to be sure that this won't happen again with future Appsumo products. From time to time, I'd buy a new tool, just to have it on hand. But my confidence was shaken...
I bought this LTD two years ago for the day when I would eventually build courses on it. That day is today. A few days ago I received an email from uTeach that changes the terms of our LTD (scroll on for the full text in other reviews), which changes the unlimited students/courses/0% commission I purchased to 1000 students / 3 courses / 10% commission.
This company is not going bankrupt. This is clearly a blackmail attempt for the users who have spent countless hours learning their platform and designing courses. I'm so grateful that I have been going slowly and have built nothing here yet. For the people who *do* have active courses, though, they've been given less than two months to switch platforms (I only got the email a few days ago, so technically 1.5 months). Will some people just pony up and pay to keep their courses going? That is clearly what the company wants. I suspect a lot of people will be using the holidays to transition off this platform, however. What horrible, unethical, and frankly cruel timing for a horrible and unethical change. I hope someone with the capacity and resources will look into legal options, because this cannot possibly be legal.
I am very unhappy with AppSumo, too. To be honest, I haven't been involved much since they changed to the Plus plans, which while not being scammish seem like a money grab. Why should I pay monthly for access to the old deals? The non-plus deals I've seen since the change haven't been very appealing, and this experience sours me even more. I may unsubscribe and wash my hands of AppSumo if they do not make amends. I have emailed them for a refund, so we will see how that goes. As someone said below, if we are not able to get a refund, all this 'deal' is good for is a few free courses that we slap together in not much time -- but with the 1000-student limit, how long will those be useful to us? Maybe a year if we don't have much growth.
I emailed the uTeach person with a couple of basic questions and got a reply 24 hours later. I then replied to ask more specific questions (i.e. can we retire students to free up space for our 1000 student-limit, or is any student permanently taking up a slot?). That was 3 days ago and I have no reply. I suspect it is the latter, since this is clearly an unethical money-grab to try to get us to switch to a subscription that apparently costs hundreds of dollars a month. So hopefully I will get a refund from AppSumo.
I have purchased other LTDs, thankfully, and instead will be using one I found through a LTD Facebook group. The software seems to have developed nicely since I purchased it in 2020. I wondered then why they didn't want to go through AppSumo, but I wonder no more. Hopefully my other AppSumo purchases will be valid for at least, say, a *decade* before the 'lifetime deal' runs out--or, ya know, an actual lifetime. Two years is laughable.
This is the example of why I don't trust LTD's anymore
The original deal for this product was a lifetime that granted you access to unlimited everything for a product that was clearly under construction. The UI was difficult to navigate and understand, but working with it and doing an effort, you could manage to build up acceptable things. The fact that you didn't have to pay a monthly fee was the reason why one accepted the difficult UI and the never ending bugs. Customer support was a bit waky and not super friendly also, but hey... it's a lifetime deal, one single payment... you endure these things because you're helping them grow. You expect them to do better in the future.
But... surprise, surprise! This one was another terrible fail. But probably this one is the worst of all the fails AppSumo has sheltered under their now crumbling umbrella. We received and email from Uteach telling us that they were going to discontinue the LTD. 2 years after the LTD started. Now, tell me if 2 years is something similar to a reasonable time to finish a LTD. And the worst part of all is that these people are not financially broke, like other failed LTD's AppSumo has been nurturing. This one is plainly and blatantly greedy, that's all.
You would think that, after the email AppSumo send some months ago, speaking loud about "further vetting", "We hear your frustrations", " We’re prioritizing quality & curation", "More transparency" and the best "Legal action against bad actors"; they would, indeed, take legal action against a partner that has clearly broke, without reason (well, yes, greed) the LTD it had with AppSumo. Well, that would be expected.
Uteach sends an email saying "To continue bringing you and all Uteach users a top-tier experience, we have made the difficult decision to transition from a lifetime model to a subscription-based model." And telling you that your LTD now is this:
"As our dedicated members, you will still have access to all the features with the following changes:
3 courses 1 admin 1000 students 10% commission on each sale
If you would like to gain access to all the features without limitations, we will help you transition easily to one of our tiers with a 20% lifetime discount. "
What does AppSumo do? Again, rise their voice saying they're also looking into this, not to worry. What it ends up being? AppSumo saying: "They originally planned to retire lifetime accounts and move to a subscription model in January 2025 - however, our team worked closely with theirs to prevent lifetime customers from losing access." And what has AppSumo achieved in this hard negotiation?
"3 courses 1 admin 1000 students 10% commission on each sale"
So, again, we got nothing.
The product was not that good, but when you have a lifetime deal, you hope things get better with time, as the idea of being an early bird investor is that, you give money in advance for the project, you give feedback in order to refine the product and you end up getting a better product in the long run that ends up satisfying your needs, with less money, but more time and effort invested in it, as you're a sort of "test subject".
Unfortunately, it seems that is not what we have nowadays in AppSumo. Don't buy Uteach is my recommendation to you, who has read till the end.
Verified purchaser
Change
I'm sad about the change. I was really looking forward to this, but now I'm not sure
Share Uteach
Verified purchaser
Why renege on Appsumo customers?
Why wouldn't they keep all the Appsumo users on LTD and just board new users with their new subscription plans? That's what all the other LTD creators / developers do.
Share Uteach
Verified purchaser
How can you trust new deals?
With this bad news, there's no longer any reason to be sure that this won't happen again with future Appsumo products. From time to time, I'd buy a new tool, just to have it on hand. But my confidence was shaken...
Share Uteach
Verified purchaser
Scam scam scam
I bought this LTD two years ago for the day when I would eventually build courses on it. That day is today. A few days ago I received an email from uTeach that changes the terms of our LTD (scroll on for the full text in other reviews), which changes the unlimited students/courses/0% commission I purchased to 1000 students / 3 courses / 10% commission.
This company is not going bankrupt. This is clearly a blackmail attempt for the users who have spent countless hours learning their platform and designing courses. I'm so grateful that I have been going slowly and have built nothing here yet. For the people who *do* have active courses, though, they've been given less than two months to switch platforms (I only got the email a few days ago, so technically 1.5 months). Will some people just pony up and pay to keep their courses going? That is clearly what the company wants. I suspect a lot of people will be using the holidays to transition off this platform, however. What horrible, unethical, and frankly cruel timing for a horrible and unethical change. I hope someone with the capacity and resources will look into legal options, because this cannot possibly be legal.
I am very unhappy with AppSumo, too. To be honest, I haven't been involved much since they changed to the Plus plans, which while not being scammish seem like a money grab. Why should I pay monthly for access to the old deals? The non-plus deals I've seen since the change haven't been very appealing, and this experience sours me even more. I may unsubscribe and wash my hands of AppSumo if they do not make amends. I have emailed them for a refund, so we will see how that goes. As someone said below, if we are not able to get a refund, all this 'deal' is good for is a few free courses that we slap together in not much time -- but with the 1000-student limit, how long will those be useful to us? Maybe a year if we don't have much growth.
I emailed the uTeach person with a couple of basic questions and got a reply 24 hours later. I then replied to ask more specific questions (i.e. can we retire students to free up space for our 1000 student-limit, or is any student permanently taking up a slot?). That was 3 days ago and I have no reply. I suspect it is the latter, since this is clearly an unethical money-grab to try to get us to switch to a subscription that apparently costs hundreds of dollars a month. So hopefully I will get a refund from AppSumo.
I have purchased other LTDs, thankfully, and instead will be using one I found through a LTD Facebook group. The software seems to have developed nicely since I purchased it in 2020. I wondered then why they didn't want to go through AppSumo, but I wonder no more. Hopefully my other AppSumo purchases will be valid for at least, say, a *decade* before the 'lifetime deal' runs out--or, ya know, an actual lifetime. Two years is laughable.
Share Uteach
Verified purchaser
This is the example of why I don't trust LTD's anymore
The original deal for this product was a lifetime that granted you access to unlimited everything for a product that was clearly under construction. The UI was difficult to navigate and understand, but working with it and doing an effort, you could manage to build up acceptable things. The fact that you didn't have to pay a monthly fee was the reason why one accepted the difficult UI and the never ending bugs. Customer support was a bit waky and not super friendly also, but hey... it's a lifetime deal, one single payment... you endure these things because you're helping them grow. You expect them to do better in the future.
But... surprise, surprise! This one was another terrible fail. But probably this one is the worst of all the fails AppSumo has sheltered under their now crumbling umbrella. We received and email from Uteach telling us that they were going to discontinue the LTD. 2 years after the LTD started. Now, tell me if 2 years is something similar to a reasonable time to finish a LTD. And the worst part of all is that these people are not financially broke, like other failed LTD's AppSumo has been nurturing. This one is plainly and blatantly greedy, that's all.
You would think that, after the email AppSumo send some months ago, speaking loud about "further vetting", "We hear your frustrations", " We’re prioritizing quality & curation", "More transparency" and the best "Legal action against bad actors"; they would, indeed, take legal action against a partner that has clearly broke, without reason (well, yes, greed) the LTD it had with AppSumo. Well, that would be expected.
Uteach sends an email saying "To continue bringing you and all Uteach users a top-tier experience, we have made the difficult decision to transition from a lifetime model to a subscription-based model." And telling you that your LTD now is this:
"As our dedicated members, you will still have access to all the features with the following changes:
3 courses
1 admin
1000 students
10% commission on each sale
If you would like to gain access to all the features without limitations, we will help you transition easily to one of our tiers with a 20% lifetime discount. "
What does AppSumo do? Again, rise their voice saying they're also looking into this, not to worry. What it ends up being? AppSumo saying: "They originally planned to retire lifetime accounts and move to a subscription model in January 2025 - however, our team worked closely with theirs to prevent lifetime customers from losing access." And what has AppSumo achieved in this hard negotiation?
"3 courses
1 admin
1000 students
10% commission on each sale"
So, again, we got nothing.
The product was not that good, but when you have a lifetime deal, you hope things get better with time, as the idea of being an early bird investor is that, you give money in advance for the project, you give feedback in order to refine the product and you end up getting a better product in the long run that ends up satisfying your needs, with less money, but more time and effort invested in it, as you're a sort of "test subject".
Unfortunately, it seems that is not what we have nowadays in AppSumo. Don't buy Uteach is my recommendation to you, who has read till the end.
Share Uteach