i was cool with it for a long time, id buy annual memberships every year(non renewing). price hikes came, that annual is a lot more daunting as a one time purchase (especially at that particular moment in time for me). i was spending a lot of time in the car attempting to use the app. it quite literally felt like a short trip was 1 song sandwiched between equal parts ads. so a trip to the grocery was kinda like 2 mins ads, song(dont you dare try to skip that song or youll get an ad, or be out of next songs as its shuffle only), maybe another song, then 2 more minutes of ads.

ive now been in a place where that membership isnt that daunting. but im good, im not gonna have my music library held prisoner from me unless i cough up a monthly fee. its quite literally unusable if you arent paying. it also seems like they intentionally make their browser based version kinda trash... to make using it to block ads a less viable option(its been a while, not sure how true this currently is).

the jellyfin option is actually what ive settled on as well, ive been a bit lazy about setting up more functionality than just for my LAN, but i will get around to it. for now i just kinda plop junk on my phone and play it through vlc, which is certainly a lazy solution but its still feels freeing.