[HN Gopher] It's hard to say who's winning the streaming wars, b...
___________________________________________________________________
It's hard to say who's winning the streaming wars, but customers
are losing
Author : anderspitman
Score : 177 points
Date : 2021-11-19 18:52 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (apitman.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (apitman.com)
| [deleted]
| tamaharbor wrote:
| Thepiratebay and a good VPN should solve a lot of your problems.
| anothernewdude wrote:
| What's the VPN for?
| vkou wrote:
| While it's plausible to believe that all VPNs are actually
| honeypots for the police to catch criminals, getting sued
| over torrenting something is a civil case.
|
| In this case, the hope is that your VPN won't accept money
| from media rights holders, in exchange for your data.
| comeonseriously wrote:
| Are you saying something without actually saying something?
| tamaharbor wrote:
| It seems to have stopped those annoying piracy letters from
| my internet provider.
| avalys wrote:
| You know, you don't need to watch any TV at all.
| anothernewdude wrote:
| Honestly one thing netflix has done for me: I'm watching far
| less.
| Mikeb85 wrote:
| Meh, I'm much happier with internet + paying for individual
| streaming services than I ever was with a full cable TV package.
|
| Plus Netflix and Amazon are actually creating some decent
| content.
| zibzab wrote:
| I think pirates are winning.
| Notorious_BLT wrote:
| Exactly this. For a couple of years, I was onboard with
| streaming. It was convenient and frictionless. But now I find
| myself having to search google to find out which service a
| movie/show is on, only to find its on none of the ones I have.
| I pay for Hulu, share my inlaws Netflix account, and I have
| Amazon Prime. If whatever I want isn't readily available on one
| of those, I immediately just pirate it and put it on my Plex
| server (and my backup drive), where I'll always have access to
| it.
|
| Gabe Newell put forward his thoughts on piracy and the success
| of Steam as a digital content platform about a decade ago now,
| saying "The easiest way to stop piracy is not by putting
| antipiracy technology to work. ... It's by giving those people
| a service that's better than what they're receiving from the
| pirates." And for a couple of years, I think streaming services
| achieved that. Netflix and Hulu really did seem to capture the
| market in paid services because they were so convenient. But as
| the market fractures into smaller and smaller services, I think
| a lot of people are going to turn back to piracy.
| anothernewdude wrote:
| I only subscribe to Netflix, and these days I don't even bother
| to check if things are on there first. If its a show I actually
| want to watch, why not go where it's guaranteed to be?
| threevox wrote:
| Only viable solution
| commandlinefan wrote:
| Are they though? They make less money than streaming
| services... I do believe they actually lose money hosting these
| piracy sites.
| Sohcahtoa82 wrote:
| Yup. That's me to an extent.
|
| I subscribe to Netflix, HBO, and Disney. If what I want to
| watch isn't on either of those three, it's getting pirated.
| handrous wrote:
| I sometimes pirate things that are on services I'm paying for
| just because I don't want to have to remember which one has
| the thing I want to watch, every time I go to watch it, or
| switch between apps if watching multiple shows, or whatever.
| jasomill wrote:
| The only thing that _really_ tempts me to piracy are shows
| only available for streaming via iOS apps that disable
| picture-in-picture viewing during commercial breaks.
|
| This particular behavior should really be banned by App
| Store guidelines, as it generates no revenue for Apple, and
| I can't imagine a single provider willing to forgo ad
| revenue from iOS users as a whole over such a rule.
|
| Show commercials, if you must, but trying to _force me to
| pay attention to commercials_ via technological means is
| where I draw the line.
|
| Instead of actually bothering to pirate the show, however,
| I generally just do something else.
|
| I'm honestly curious why (AFAIK) major content producers
| haven't looked beyond existing revenue streams and
| experimented with freemium (or at least "low-costium")
| models, along the lines of Microsoft studios releasing
| current AAA titles through Game Pass -- which, while not
| free, is arguably inexpensive -- but charging extra for
| optional in-game purchases and DLC.
|
| In other words, make base versions of shows available for
| free or at a low cost, then charge a few bucks per season
| for premium features like early access to episodes, 4K/HDR,
| and bonus content. For major franchises, at least, I
| imagine there are at least enough fans willing to pay, say,
| $10-20 per season for such features to make such a venture
| worthwhile.
| input_sh wrote:
| If it isn't in two streaming services I'm paying for, you're
| damn right I'm pirating it.
|
| Not like I have any other choice anyway when some stuff is just
| geolocked from me (Disney+, some HBO stuff, etc).
| toun wrote:
| Ignoring cost, there's two things preventing me from watching
| content legally in acceptable quality: DRMs and connection
| speed.
|
| The day streaming providers allow downloading high quality, DRM
| free video files to watch for later, I'll happily pay 3 bucks
| per movie.
|
| As it stands, I can't play anything >720p because of DRMs. If
| you're willing to prevent paying customers from watching what
| they're paying for, just for the sake of reassuring your
| shareholders that you're combatting piracy (though failing
| miserably), then I have no remorse torrenting your content.
| judge2020 wrote:
| > As it stands, I can't play anything >720p because of DRMs.
|
| Should be able to play 4k via the official Netflix app on
| Windows, assuming you have the relevant chain of DRM
| protection (ie. TPM might be required, along with HDCP cables
| and monitors).
|
| > (though failing miserably),
|
| I'd argue that they're winning, actually - torrenting these
| days requires some upfront costs (hard drives and a media
| server) and an initial time investment (dedicate $xx hours to
| learning and managing a media server + media library
| software). It's much easier to punch in your credit card to
| the 3 streaming services you want to use that month.
|
| This is on top of the fact that most media giants contract
| out a service to automatically send DMCA takedown requests to
| the ISP of every torrent peer. If you're in the U.S. doing
| this, you're most likely going to get a letter from your ISP
| asking you to stop torrenting illegal content. Xfinity in
| particular has a 3 (or 6?) strike system for DMCAs, after
| which they'll terminate your service. Any torrenting
| effectively must be accompanied by a VPN that is torrent-
| friendly and ignores DMCAs.
| input_sh wrote:
| > (hard drives and a media server)
|
| Eh? I'm pretty sure at least 80% of pirates just delete the
| movie/show from their PC/laptop when they're done watching
| it, _maybe_ casting it to a TV in the process.
| toun wrote:
| Yes, but those are all non problems for anyone remotely
| tech-savvy. The point is, DRMs are hurting paying customers
| and do not even make it more difficult for pirates: when
| you download a torrent, DRMs are already completely
| stripped, so the only people prevented from consuming DRM'd
| content are paying customers with non-HDCP compliant
| hardware. That's insane.
| brewdad wrote:
| I'm happy to not deal with the world of pirating much these
| days. Only things I really pirate are some BBC/UK shows that
| likely won't ever make it to the US and the GD Pac-12 Network
| because they can't get their act together and get their network
| on any streaming service worth subscribing to.
| ghaff wrote:
| There are also very few shows that I absolutely have to
| watch. There's far more good content out there than I have
| time to watch so if something is hard to get at, I'm
| generally fine with moving on to the next thing. I don't
| watch a lot of video.
| mgaunard wrote:
| Why would you try to watch a TV show on your phone? Is that a
| zoomer thing?
|
| Can you not just download stuff from NZB and use whatever open-
| source software you like to stream and play it on your computer
| device of choice?
| ericmay wrote:
| > Why would you try to watch a TV show on your phone? Is that a
| zoomer thing?
|
| Maybe you're at the airport or on a plane/train/car, maybe you
| don't own a laptop, maybe you're traveling for work and just
| brought your work laptop, maybe someone else is using the TV,
| maybe...
|
| Plenty of reasons you might watch a TV show on your phone
| lol...
| skinnymuch wrote:
| I am surprised it's questioned. If you're watching something
| like reality tv, big screen isn't needed.
|
| I watch all my TV while walking usually. Trying to lose some
| gained weight. iPad/tablet can work too if I'd want to.
| smugglerFlynn wrote:
| Sure grandpa let's get you to bed
| skinnymuch wrote:
| I watch stuff on my phone, my brother does it all the time, a
| friend in their 40s does too. We are all the two generations
| after Zoomers.
|
| Unless it's an action thing, a bigger screen isn't needed.
| Phone is on me and quicker.
|
| I'm not sure what NZB is. I just want to quickly watch
| something usually.
| robbyking wrote:
| I very very rarely watch TV, but when I do it's usually on my
| phone. I don't have a television, so when my wife and I watch a
| movie together it's on our laptop, but when I'm by myself I
| prefer my phone.
| spideymans wrote:
| A sizeable minority of Gen-Z adults to not even own or use a
| TV. Streaming on phones/tablets/laptops is "good enough", so
| why shell out the money for a TV?
|
| Heck, even when my Gen Z friends do have a TV _right in front
| of them_ , they'll often end up watching TV on their laptops or
| phones anyways. I suppose it's easier than fiddling with a
| Chromecast.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| I got interested in the show _Alter Ego_ on Fox and wanted to
| catch up on what I 'd missed. Fox let me watch one episode before
| registering (and paying?) but I was able to watch it all on
| Youtube.
|
| Odds are better that you find anything on Youtube than any place
| else unless it is a Chinese TV series that shouldn't be obscure
| but practically is. (Like how I had to get a bootleg of _Three
| Kingdoms_ from Singapore.)
| tyingq wrote:
| Did a few searches, and YouTube does seem to have great access
| for a lot of titles.
|
| It's not always real economical though. One season of the
| Handmaid's Tale is only available to buy, not rent. And it's
| $25. I could pay for 2 months of "no ads" Hulu and get that
| season and everything else they have, for less.
|
| So fragmentation is still an issue.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| > So fragmentation is still an issue.
|
| Maybe Apple is doing the right thing by forcing everything to
| go through the App Store on iOS.
| tyingq wrote:
| Not fragmentation of payment, fragmentation of streaming
| rights across Netflix, Hulu, Disney, Prime, etc. I don't
| see the two as particularly related.
| PaulHoule wrote:
| I think many of the things you find on Youtube aren't
| supposed to be there but they get uploaded anyway.
| skinnymuch wrote:
| Yeah Alter Ego isn't. I think parent was looking at
| officially available paid offerings only. Not pirated
| streaming which the grandparent/OP is referring to. Content
| creators don't get anything in that case though.
| skinnymuch wrote:
| I believe the OP meant bootleg uploaded copies. Otherwise
| like you said. Many streaming services have it: Hulu, Fubo.
| Even Fox's subsidiary Tubi has it. Which is free streaming I
| believe with ads. A one month subscription will usually be
| cheaper then buying.
| pazurduy wrote:
| The problem relies on the vertical integration (streaming and
| production), this is no a new problem, actually it's the same
| problem as it was with movie theaters back in 1948 (https://en.wi
| kipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Paramount_Pic...), I've
| remember watched a video about it a few years ago
| (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDF-S68kx5o)
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I went to the TV app on my iPhone, searched for Survivor,
| scrolled to season 41 episode 9, and saw I could watch it for $3,
| or you can sign up for Paramount+.
| yellow_postit wrote:
| Searching across multiple services is a key feature I have yet
| to find a reliable option for. For syndicated shows I want to
| see if they exist on a service I already pay for and if not,
| price shop.
|
| CanIStreamIt used to fill this gap but no longer.
| skinnymuch wrote:
| Justwatch and reelgood are reliable enough. I usually use
| justwatch through https://Trakt.tv
| readflaggedcomm wrote:
| Rokus do that for any of their channels that supports it,
| which are a whole lot.
|
| You can use it on the web, too, and it shows which channels
| require a subscription: https://www.roku.com/whats-on/search
| I assume it's accurate for those services across other
| platforms than just Roku.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| The TV app on macOS and iOS does this. Except for Netflix
| stuff, but that is because Netflix does not want to
| participate.
| sakopov wrote:
| Is that $3 on top of 4 streaming subscriptions you're already
| paying for?
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| It is $3 to instantly watch it as long as Apple decides to
| keep serving it and/or does not ban you from their services.
|
| Presumably, if you subscribe to Paramount+, then you can also
| watch it as long as you are paying the monthly fee.
|
| My point is I got to the media I was looking for rather
| quick. I would never spend my time watching Survivor for
| free, much less pay for it, but my opinion of the experience
| of trying to watch it was quick and easy.
| bikeshaving wrote:
| I think not being subjected to terrible, emotionally manipulative
| ads for 1/3 of the time you're watching TV/Movies is the actual
| win for consumers in the streaming era.
| asdff wrote:
| You still get ads in the streaming era, they just are served in
| different ways.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| I moved to the USA in 1989, and after 24 years in the UK, found
| trying to watch TV in the US totally unbearable. I thought it
| was because (a) the shows were so bad (b) the ads were
| terrible.
|
| Netflix has made it clear to me that although many of the shows
| were awful, not all of them were, and that being able to see
| them without ads gave me a totally different appreciation for
| what (some) people were trying to do on TV over the last 3
| decades.
| nvarsj wrote:
| Youtube will get there soon enough.
| morsch wrote:
| You know, you can pay them to remove the ads. Gives a bigger
| share to the video authors, too. (Yes, this won't skip
| sponsored content in the video.)
| thrower123 wrote:
| It's a little thing, but given the choice of watching something
| on a streaming app versus watching the same show on the cable
| DVR and having to fast-forward through the commercials, even
| with smart-resume, it's kind of a no-brainer.
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| We were at an AirBNB with cable, and let our kid watch a bit of
| children's cable content.
|
| My _god_ , the ads. So many. So flashy. After every single one,
| she was _convinced_ she needed whatever toy was being peddled.
|
| Never again.
| switch007 wrote:
| Cable has been "adverts with a bit of content" for a long
| time !
| blfr wrote:
| It's hilarious that after a decade of explosion in streaming the
| corps still can't (don't want to) beat the experience of torrents
| + mpv.
|
| The latter is particularly interesting since there are no
| licensing issues. Every professional streaming service should
| have a better player than mpv. None actually do.
|
| You could say that it's always like that because pirates get
| their content for free. However, Spotify and others managed just
| fine with music which used to be even more widely pirated than tv
| shows and movies.
|
| (Survivor.S41E09.Whos.Who.in.the.Zoo is available on torrents in
| 1080p.)
| judge2020 wrote:
| Let me know when mpv can run on a smart TV. Most people watch
| via smart tv/streaming box (roku, google tv, etc), so the
| players work for them there.
|
| The real competition is Plex/Emby/Jellyfin allowing access to
| people's media libraries in a way that's mostly on-par with
| existing services, and the added benefit of having all content
| truly in one place. The issue is that there isn't a completely
| legal way to get media content as unencrypted files (since
| ripping blu-rays is legal, but breaking the software
| protections to do it isn't).
| asdff wrote:
| If you know how to install mpv you know how to hook up a
| laptop to a TV.
| JakeAl wrote:
| This isn't entirely the corps fault, but legacy legal licensing
| agreements on each. and every. piece. of content. Not to
| mention all the unions you ave to deal with to make sure all
| the talent in the content gets paid. Clearances AND tracking
| can be a nightmare. A lot of that has improved in the pat
| decade as digital/streaming agreements are now standard, but
| getting content (like the music in a show for example) cleared
| for all territories can still be a headache.
| iso1210 wrote:
| Meh, I'm winning, at least here in the UK. I have Disney, Apple,
| Netflix, Amazon and BBC, including the option to buy/rent new
| stuff on amazon, giving me massive amounts of choice for less
| than mother-in-law pays for her Boomer TV package with Sky, and
| she gets adverts!
|
| Apple was 'free' with the last phone I bought, but I'll pay for
| it when the next season of For All Mankind is on.
|
| Still have to torrent stuff. Paramount literally won't let me buy
| the latest version of Discovery after their shocking "fuck you"
| to the world this week.
| julienb_sea wrote:
| I will say its hard to beat the torrent pipeline. Quality VPNs
| are dirt cheap, and with a solid connection, you can sequentially
| download and start watching almost immediately, essentially just
| like streaming.
| wccrawford wrote:
| The predicted fracture has started, with different networks
| starting their own streaming services. Luckily, there seems to be
| an acceptable minimum level of quality in the UI and service so
| far, which was one of my fears.
|
| We subscribe to a number of the services, but it's _still_
| cheaper than cable TV and there are no commercials, and it 's all
| "on demand" which still seems to be pretty iffy on cable
| directly.
|
| I feel like it's going to be a constant struggle to only
| subscribe to the ones that we're actually using, but it isn't as
| bad as I feared yet.
|
| I'm still predicting that they'll get ridiculously fractured, and
| then realize their mistake and start bundling together again.
|
| It has kind of already happened with Paramount+ and Showtime's
| bundle, and I think some of the others were doing it before them
| even. But these bundles are just a bandaid. You still need to
| actually use 2 different sites/apps to view your TV, and it's
| hard to get a list of what shows have new episodes across all the
| sites/apps. We end up just starting up each app and checking
| until we find something we want to watch right then.
| Iefthandrule wrote:
| What services are you using that have no commercials? I would
| definitely consider Netflix auto-playing content by default a
| type of commercial.
|
| I must have touched a nerve among the Netflix base
| JKCalhoun wrote:
| > The predicted fracture has started
|
| They'll eat themselves then. We're being nickeled and dimed to
| death with all the streaming services and the kids at least are
| not going to pay: they'll share accounts. And when that stops
| working they'll just go somewhere else where the content is
| free.
| elliekelly wrote:
| Have you tried Peacock's UI yet?
| e40 wrote:
| The predicted fracture and uptick in downloading. I subscribe
| to several services, yet I still download copies to watch in
| Plex because it's so much easier. Some of the streaming apps
| (HBO Max, looking at you) are horrible. I don't feel bad
| shifting my usage to a working app.
| asdff wrote:
| The anticipation on the executives part is probably something
| like a total squeeze on consumers, where they have no other
| option but to pay for these services to be in the know with the
| times or whatever (like how _Squid Game_ memes have popped up
| everywhere overnight).
|
| The reality on the consumer end is that people are paying less
| money over all. Me personally I pay for like one service and
| have the logins from like six family and friends. I don't even
| know who is paying for the underlying account, someone's mother
| down the line I'm sure. I'm not alone with this either. As more
| services pop up, people become less likely to want to have yet
| another individual subscription, and its very common to hear
| about people sharing account info among friends and family.
|
| However it's gotten to the point of annoyance where even I will
| just resort to piracy half the time, with access to every
| streaming service at my fingertips, because there are still
| some movies that for whatever reason are rented digitally for
| something like $4 for 72 hours as if we've stepped back in time
| and reverted to the brick and mortar blockbuster business model
| for the information age vs offering a sane alternative.
|
| It really blows my mind how merciful the RIAA has been on the
| otherhand allowing Spotify and Apple Music to have such a vast
| and unsplintered catalog.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| > The predicted fracture has started, with different networks
| starting their own streaming services.
|
| I do not understand why anyone would have expected any
| different. Is that not the beauty of the internet? That you can
| consume the content from anyone, regardless of the owner of the
| wire coming into your house? (which should not be a private
| entity in the first place, but that is a different topic)
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| I think that the hope was that you could pick a single
| service, pay them, and access anything.
|
| When stated that baldly, it's fairly clear that this was
| never going to happen. Nevertheless, I think many of us would
| have preferred if, for example, content _creators_ [0] did
| not all have their own streaming service, and cross-licensed
| to different streaming services, meaning that stuff wasn 't
| available on only 1 such service.
|
| [0] of course, in reality, no content creators have their own
| streaming service. They strike up deals with production
| companies, who strike up deals with distribution companies,
| some of whom have a streaming service, and those that don't
| strike deals with streaming services.
| Raidion wrote:
| I think people clearly want something like a Spotify or
| YouTube music, but for video content. You can host videos all
| you want on the internet, but YouTube and Spotify are popular
| because of it's aggregation and suggestions.
|
| I want to watch shows that I'd like, I don't care who makes
| them. Finding good stuff to watch is harder than watching it,
| and people would clearly pay for a unified service that
| recommended you (and enabled 1 click viewing) of content
| regardless of license holder.
|
| You can clearly see why content owners wouldn't want to do
| it, you lose the "stickiness" of your product, and have to
| compete with other shows for eyes, without the friction of
| "exit the app, open another app, find what you manually have
| discovered".
|
| There's probably a 9 figure startup idea in there if you can
| figure out how to do it without getting sued.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| Your last two lines here co-explain each other. You will
| get sued, bceause content owners like their "sticky" to
| remain "sticky".
| majormajor wrote:
| Hulu, for Showtime and HBO pre-HBO-Max, had the best approach
| I've seen to bundling. Amazon offered the same stuff - and more
| add-ons, even - but their UI is godawful, while Hulu's has
| improved a lot since it's crazy redesign.
|
| Disney doesn't seem interested in keeping a one-stop-shop,
| though. There's weird crosstalk where I can see NHL games from
| my ESPN+ subsciption on Hulu, apparently, now, but not Disney's
| own Disney+ stuff? And the HBO deal seems unlikely to live
| forever with HBO Max being its own thing now, with its own
| separate set of content.
| jandrese wrote:
| This is true and it is annoying, but there is an upside. When a
| streaming service starts to suck, it is super easy to cancel
| just that one service. Consumers finally have some pushback on
| the programming.
|
| Cable ate itself when most channels realized that reality
| programming is astoundingly cheap to produce and it made no
| difference on their income. If you are subscribed to the Sci-Fi
| streaming service and it switches to pro wrestling content, you
| just cancel the service.
| baby wrote:
| Personally I stick to netflix and pirate other content.
| humaniania wrote:
| Selfish. Pay for what you're watching or find something else
| to do.
| colinmhayes wrote:
| How does not paying for something you weren't going to pay
| for anyway harm anyone? If it was a physical good, sure.
| But a zero marginal cost good? nah that's not selfish at
| all.
| baby wrote:
| I'd add that I watch it, and then I talk about it, making
| more people want to watch it.
| danbolt wrote:
| I think if the copyright on the work is older than 25
| years, its immoral to extract rent on it. As much as a lot
| of Netflix's stuff isn't that great, at least they're
| making new content to talk about. Disney doesn't really
| deserve any more money for A New Hope.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I think this is a reasonable point. There is no cogent
| argument that society benefits from Disney having a 100+
| year copyright term.
| 9679467j9464 wrote:
| Hey, I got some boots that need licking too...
| baby wrote:
| Na, I want to watch what my friends are watching without
| paying for 6 different streaming services. Do you have a
| problem with that?
| lp0_on_fire wrote:
| Agreed. I always find this argument from people really odd.
|
| "They don't sell what I want in the form that I want
| therefore it's OK for me to steal what I want in the form I
| want"
|
| Would they apply to same logic to Costco for instance?
| "Costco only sells the widget I want in 10 packs so that
| gives me the (moral) license to steal one widget from the
| producer"
| ripdog wrote:
| Theft deprives the seller of the object, causing direct
| financial losses. With piracy, there's no difference
| between someone who doesn't consume the media and someone
| who pirates.
|
| If consuming media without paying the copyright holder is
| morally wrong, then so is second hand purchasing and
| selling, as well as rentals. Indeed, copyright industries
| have a long and storied history of trying to shut down
| rental chains, to some success in Japan.
|
| Just because you paid someone some money to view a TV
| series, doesn't mean you paid the people who funded
| production.
| baby wrote:
| No, but I would go and buy that from Amazon. Because
| Amazon is practical. Like pirating.
| yakubin wrote:
| I pay for Netflix and pirate what is available on Netflix,
| because my local video player has much better hardware
| acceleration than web browsers, is more efficient and as a
| byproduct gives me better video quality.
| slothtrop wrote:
| Occasionally do this because I don't want to give Disney and
| Amazon another cent. Sometimes you can pay content creators
| directly, but not always.
| dymk wrote:
| But you still want to consume the media that Disney and
| Amazon makes (and at the end of the day, is hiring artists,
| writers, and animators), so you see some value in it.
|
| Kind of muddies this righteous stance you're pretending to
| take.
| slothtrop wrote:
| > Kind of muddies this righteous stance you're pretending
| to take.
|
| You're projecting.
|
| > But you still want to consume the media that Disney and
| Amazon makes
|
| Barely. I'd never pay for it, except as stand-alone
| content.
| Brendinooo wrote:
| This isn't a very strong post. Customers are losing because you
| can't access an episode of a show you like?
|
| Difficulty in watching some things has been present from the
| earliest days of streaming, and has only been less of a pain as
| the world has moved away from cable. (I never had DVR, so the
| pre-streaming world for me meant either watch it live, record it
| to VHS, or maybe catch it "On Demand".)
|
| I know what it's like to be in your situation (usually when
| trying to stream live sports), but the remedy is almost always to
| do a bit of research and decide if you want to take the path they
| want you to take.
|
| I'm very happy with the streaming landscape right now, and I
| think it's way better than it was five years ago.
| CyanLite4 wrote:
| It's a little more complicated than "an episode". For instance,
| the most popular cable program "Yellowstone" is on the
| Paramount Network. New episodes are shown there for a few days,
| but prior episodes are on NBC's Peacock network. Many other
| popular shows are that way--new episodes on one platform
| (Chicago Med on Hulu), prior episodes on another platform
| (earlier eps in Netflix).
|
| The Star Trek franchise is a grab bag between Amazon Prime,
| Netflix, Hulu and Paramount+.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| TV app on macOS and iOS solves this problem, outside of stuff
| on Netflix. I know it is a solution only for Apple users, but
| if a content owner does not want to make it easy for people,
| then that is the content owner's problem.
| LanceH wrote:
| There are some college sports that are maddening. Need cable
| type subscription to get the Big Ten Network, but some of the
| games appear on the subscription service B1G. Their presence
| on one or the other is mutually exclusive. Then some matches
| will appear on ESPN, or if somehow popular enough on an
| actual network. And that's just to follow a single team.
|
| The thing is that everything is sliced up and packaged not to
| present a single package of what the customer wants. Rather,
| it is packaged so that what the customer wants is distributed
| across multiple packages which must all be purchased
| separately. Look at the NFL - Monday night football ESPN,
| Thursday Amazon Prime, Sunday Night - NBC, Sunday Day -
| various.
|
| I'm just done chasing. Bring me my entire team's season or
| get no money from me at all. I can understand the odd game
| out, but this has been deliberate.
| xhevahir wrote:
| This person goes to great lengths to catch an episode of
| Survivor. They worry about how they're going to watch movies
| during a camping trip. I know it's not the point of the article,
| but maybe this problem would be less onerous if one could just
| unplug, and do something else for fun.
| threevox wrote:
| There's no point in paying for essentially any streaming service
| these days. Piracy legitimately provides a better user experience
| for free if you know how to do it right
| post_break wrote:
| I used to pirate everything. Now it's easier to just pay for a
| subscription and get what I want in the highest quality ever. I
| will say though, I will never "buy" something digitally like on
| iTunes or whatever.
| baq wrote:
| Outside of the US it just isn't possible to sign up to some
| services!
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I disagree. I want to support the content I like. So I type it
| into my browser, find the content owner, see if they have a
| quick and easy way to buy it directly from them, and then watch
| it.
|
| If that takes more than a few seconds, I open up TV app on my
| phone, search it, and decide if it is worth buying.
|
| If it is any more difficult than that, I spend my time doing
| something else. The situation is much better than the old days
| of relying on Comcast.
| cardanome wrote:
| > I disagree. I want to support the content I like. So I type
| it into my browser, find the content owner, see if they have
| a quick and easy way to buy it directly from them, and then
| watch it.
|
| How often can you just buy the content? There are many movies
| that I would love to buy and own but there is no option. It
| is either lend them for streaming or buy a super expensive
| blue ray which I don't get to own because of DRM. I wish
| there was a gog.com kind of solution.
|
| The only way I can truly own a movie is to pirate it.
|
| I get wanting to help content creators but I think it is fine
| to help just some of them (especially the smaller ones).
| There is no reason to feel bad about not helping all of them.
| Pirating something can still help the creators buy creating
| more attention. You might not pay for it but the friend you
| are telling about it, might. Or you might pay later after
| having more money.
| softwaredoug wrote:
| Pre-streaming watching episode 9 looked like waiting and hoping
| the DVDs would come out for this show. They'd cost about $50 for
| a season.
|
| Pre-DVD you'd just be screwed. Your show would be episodic (much
| of Star Trek TNG) and you'd hope to catch as much as you can on
| syndication or reruns.
| lapetitejort wrote:
| Shows on VHS existed. I watched all of Twin Peaks Season 2 that
| way before it released on DVD.
| majormajor wrote:
| It was very sparse. "Episode bundles" were common, like
| "here's two TNG episodes" that might be thematically but not
| necessarily chronologically linked, more like "best of"
| releases. Getting complete sets of many shows meant recording
| them yourselves.
| drewg123 wrote:
| I was kind of agreeing with the author, right up until he talked
| about setting up a pipeline involving Plex to have a good UX.
| Maybe I'm in the minority, and maybe I'll get downvoted, but to
| me, Plex has a horrific UX.
|
| 1) If I import something its scanners cant' scrape metadata for,
| it might as well not even exist. Its not displayed to me at all.
| I have to fiddle with title and re-scan until its metatdata
| scraper finally realizes what it is.
|
| 2) They've gone to some dark patterns to convince you to make a
| plex account and log in, just to talk to a server on the same
| LAN.
|
| 3) They now hide your content and promote their own streaming
| content in a tv-channels like grid. I don't want any of that, I
| just want my movie library, don't make me scroll for it.
|
| There are other frustrations, but these are the high points. I
| need to find time to setup kodi again..
| seanalltogether wrote:
| 1. I completely agree. It's super frustrating that all these
| random kids videos I have I can't just drop in a folder and
| have Plex pick them up and just show them in alphabetic order.
| jjulius wrote:
| I use Plex (I don't pay for a Plex Pass) too, and I don't have
| the same issues.
|
| 1.) This only happens for me if, say, I use youtube-dl to
| download a music performance and then drop it in. Every time
| I've gone outside of my Sonarr/Radarr setup to manually add a
| TV show or movie, it's always handled the metadata just fine.
| It's when I throw it a curveball (that, tbh, I expected) that
| it doesn't handle it for me. Maybe I've just been lucky?
|
| 2.) Completely agree with you here. I'd love to know if there's
| a workaround, though I haven't spent any time looking into it.
|
| 3.) Not the case for me. My home page goes Recently Watched ->
| Recently Added Movies -> Recently Added TV -> the streaming
| bullshit you mentioned. The UI loads with the left menu open,
| and all I need to do is hit "down" one for TV, twice for
| movies; no scrolling necessary. To your point, I wish that it
| didn't show those extra streaming options _at all_.
| sbierwagen wrote:
| 4) Plex only supports some codecs. Oddly enough, my Samsung TV
| seems more flexible than Plex. For a handful of video files
| it's easier to just stick them on a USB stick and walk over to
| the TV than to wander lost in the dark forest of video
| transcoding.
| AndroidKitKat wrote:
| Have you looked into Jellyfin? It's not got quite the same
| polish, but I've been using it pretty happily for about 7
| months now.
| handrous wrote:
| Seconded. Happily running it in a Docker container on an old
| Linux box. Set-up took minutes and it's been working, through
| occasional upgrades, for something like two years now without
| a hiccup. I mostly use the Roku and Web clients.
|
| I spent years trying to get Kodi how I wanted it and it just
| never worked out. Between the jank and the way they've chosen
| to structure the UI, I don't think I'll _ever_ like Kodi.
| Jellyfin is a much better fit for me, with no tweaking at
| all.
| sokoloff wrote:
| I'm pretty happy with Plex, happy enough to buy a lifetime sub
| a few years back. I didn't like when they started to mix in
| some of their Plex TV or whatever it is, but I (and my kids)
| find it pretty damn easy to use and at this point, I think I've
| paid around $3/mo for it.
| MivLives wrote:
| I switched to Emby for these reasons. It works like Plex did
| six or seven years ago. The one downside is they charge for the
| android tv app, but otherwise I haven't run into many problems.
| It seemed a bit more feature complete then Jellyfin last time I
| looked.
| anderspitman wrote:
| Apologies if anyone is having issues with my site. It was down
| for a bit while I was on the road earlier, but seems to be
| working now. Here's an archive just in case it happens again:
|
| https://web.archive.org/web/20211119221003/https://apitman.c...
| majormajor wrote:
| If you look at twenty years ago, there's far more content
| available now, for far less money. Your minimum cable outlay back
| then would still cover the cost of a couple streaming services.
|
| What there _isn 't_ is a good way to get a single subscription to
| watch anything you want. The cable bundle was close to that for
| TV content, but very lacking for movies. So if you want to watch
| a really wide sampling of TV content, it can feel like we're
| going backward, since there's no more one-stop-shop.
|
| Careful what you wish for? The big desire then was a la carte,
| and right now you can bounce between streaming services at will,
| and they're all still far easier to cancel than cable.
|
| Some things have fallen through the cracks, particularly long-
| running (going back to the pre-streaming era) major-network
| content like the aforementioned Survivor (a random missing
| episode seems like a weird problem, would love to know what was
| going on). And getting US content stuff internationally is often
| sub-par, although... I don't recall stories of this being easy at
| all two decades ago.
|
| So consumers are overall definitely winning, but it's not a
| perfect victory for everyone.
| ZetaZero wrote:
| I want more a la carte. Give me one service without bundles
| where every "channel" has a price. I don't want my provider
| negotiating a 14-channel package for every viewer (YouTubeTV
| and NBC Universal). I don't want MTV and VH1, but I do want
| Tennis Channel (which isn't an option).
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| > I don't want MTV and VH1, but I do want Tennis Channel
| (which isn't an option).
|
| Do not pay Disney, and send an email to the US Tennis
| Association or whoever keeps contracting with ESPN.
|
| If you keep paying Disney to watch Tennis, you will never get
| it a la carte.
| smugglerFlynn wrote:
| Apple TV did just that, but you have to manually purchase all
| the separate streaming services available locally
| II2II wrote:
| People seem to forget how bad things used to be. We are
| extremely fortunate with the ability to watch what we want,
| when we want, without being interrupted by commercials, for an
| extremely low cost. There also appears to be a great deal of
| progress with respect to being able to view programs/movies
| produced for foreign markets. But the best thing is:
|
| > you can bounce between streaming services at will, and
| they're all still far easier to cancel than cable.
|
| Add to that cheaper, since you don't have to deal with
| connection fees. If you know that you're not going to have the
| time to use the service for a couple of months because you're
| too busy with work, you don't have to pay for it. If you have
| decided that you are going to spend most of your summer
| pursuing outdoor recreational activities, you don't have to pay
| for it. If you're going on the road for a few weeks (vacation
| or business), you don't have to pay for it. If you decide that
| you want to watch programming on two different streaming
| services, you can simply rotate through the services on a
| monthly basis and only pay for one service at a time.
|
| Why do I bring all of this up when it's not directly related to
| the article: it's because these articles reek of entitlement.
| Yes, there are times when licensing causes shows or movies to
| fall through the cracks. On the other hand, the situation is
| also far better than it used to be when using the same metrics.
| Not only that, but it can be a heck of a lot less expensive
| even when factoring in the cost of an Internet connection.
| maxerickson wrote:
| My internet provider is the cable monopoly, so they win
| anyway.
|
| I could get DSL, but it's shit here and anyway only ~$25
| cheaper than the cable (which is 5x faster...).
|
| For $15, I could get cable tv, apparently diverting what I
| currently pay for internet away from profit and over towards
| channel fees.
|
| I've never fully digested them, but Michigan seems to have
| shitty franchise laws written in service of the large cable
| companies.
| citizenkeen wrote:
| On the one hand, we got what we asked for: _a la carte_.
|
| I think what makes people frustrated is that cable channels
| were _themed_. I was frustrated that I was paying for TLC and
| Bravo because I didn't watch reality tv. I was paying for
| Discovery even though I didn't watch nature shows. I was
| paying for Lifetime even though I didn't watch cheap shows
| for women. I was paying for ESPN even though I didn't watch
| sports.
|
| I wanted to pay for the comedy, the scifi/syfy, the cartoons,
| and the kids programming. That was, like, five or six
| channels.
|
| Which streaming service do I go to now for the science
| fiction? Which streaming service do I go to now for the
| horror or the feel-good sitcoms?
|
| Streaming arose during the collapse of genre channels. There
| are now three genres of programming: prestige, drek, and
| children's.
| mortenjorck wrote:
| _> There are now three genres of programming: prestige,
| drek, and children 's._
|
| This is something I've been feeling for awhile but haven't
| managed to articulate this clearly. All new programming is
| either a mega-budget tentpole or it's something to fill out
| the menus.
| ethbr0 wrote:
| I think of that as "Look at all the new shows Netflix
| has" -> "95% of new Netflix shows wouldn't have been
| funded under the old model, because they're bad"
| jfengel wrote:
| Most of them aren't so much "bad" as "of narrow taste".
| They certainly look awful to me, but Netflix isn't just
| throwing money away. They've got a ton of data on what
| people want to watch. Somebody is watching this dreck.
|
| Some of it is genuinely a failure. Funding an
| entertainment project is always a pig in a poke. Even
| promising things sometimes just flop. But streaming makes
| it possible to lower the opportunity costs of those
| flops, so they can take bigger chances.
| henrikschroder wrote:
| One thing I actually miss from themed channels is that they
| selected content for you, which is actually nice sometimes.
|
| Yes, sometimes you just want to watch a specific show and
| you want to watch it _now_ , and the streaming services are
| great for that.
|
| But sometimes you just want to turn on the TV and watch
| something, anything, without really making a choice. I
| still have cable because it's included in the rent, and
| sometimes it's nice to just switch the channel to FXX or
| something and get maybe an old episode of the Simpsons, or
| a new episode, or maybe some Family guy, or maybe an old
| episode of some other comedy series, or maybe something
| completely new.
|
| And that's nice and has value, but streaming services
| absolutely suck at that, because you always have to make a
| choice yourself with them.
| ethbr0 wrote:
| I realized exactly this recently: people don't channel
| surf anymore, and I kind of miss it.
|
| It was relaxing to me, post- many cable channels (81?),
| pre- guide/DVR, to just click through.
|
| "Oh, Armageddon is on again. Hercules. (flip, flip,
| flip)" and then settle on something random, pulled from
| what's currently playing.
|
| It used to be: survey and then choose from a very limited
| but rotating subset of all content.
|
| Now it's: choose from all content ever and then find
| where the content lives and then figure out how much of
| it you want to watch.
|
| For movies, the new way seems superior. For TV, it feels
| like a lot has been lost. And overall, I feel like the
| new system definitely leads to winner-take-all.
| Aloha wrote:
| I miss just being able to "watch what's on"
|
| It's why I still subscribe to satellite radio.
|
| (and yes, I've thought about subscribing to video service
| from Spectrum, but I'm not a huge TV watcher)
| abruzzi wrote:
| Its funny, but I never watched broadcast TV or Cable
| primarily becuase "just watching whats on" meant a 99%
| chance of sitting through dreck that I can't stand, so I
| never did it. In 1995, I had a collection of over 200 VHS
| tapes of movies I loved (all purchased, not copied.) In
| 2005 I had a collection of 500 DVDs that I had purchased.
|
| Today, I have about 700 movied ripped from DVDs (and the
| DVDs still in boxes somewhere), and 500 movies purchased
| on iTunes. I don't subscribe to Netflix, Amazon Prime,
| HBO, or any other streaming service because, again, 99%
| of it is dreck I can't stand. So instead I have a
| collection of 1200 movies that I like and specifically
| chose and purchased. Some are better than others, but
| they're all ones I like.
| tomnipotent wrote:
| > 500 movies purchased on iTunes
|
| iTunes sells licenses, not movies. Providers can pull
| content from iTunes and you lose access to whatever you
| paid for.
| jfengel wrote:
| Netflix has a "Play Something" button for precisely that
| situation.
|
| https://about.netflix.com/en/news/play-something-netflix-
| doe...
|
| It can pick either something you're already watching (TV
| series or unfinished movie), or guess something based on
| what it has learned about you. Of course it's just the
| Netflix catalog, but that's pretty extensive.
|
| It sounds godawful to me, so I've never used it. But it
| sounds like almost precisely what you just asked for.
| techsupporter wrote:
| > Which streaming service do I go to now for the science
| fiction?
|
| Exactly. Every company has segmented their content _by
| company_ , not by type. Sure, I can buy a subscription to
| Boomerang and get a lot of cartoons, but it's just the
| cartoons owned by Warner. But not all of them, because
| they've moved some of them--like Dexter's Laboratory--off
| to be HBO Max exclusives.
|
| There's no way to say "I want a science fiction themed
| service" that includes Paramount and HBO and the old PTEN
| and the like, because no company would stand for another
| service mixing their IP like that.
| II2II wrote:
| Cable channels were themed, but cable packages were not.
| There was not a realistic chance of that changing. The
| technology was not good enough for that. If I recall
| correctly, analog cable depended upon bandpass filters that
| were rarely perfect so it was best to group channels in
| blocks. When digital cable entered the fray, the other
| motivation entered the forefront: it simply didn't make
| business sense to sell individual channels.
|
| When it comes to that business sense, we probably have the
| closest thing to perfection today. Streaming services are
| forced to compete against each other, with the only real
| constraints being the cost/restrictions of licensing
| content and the cost of distribution (i.e. not controlling
| infrastructure to the home). It is very easy and relatively
| inexpensive to pick and choose, provided that you are
| willing to defer your viewing. You also have the choice
| between large streaming services that offer a broad range
| of genres and smaller ones that offer more specialized
| programming.
|
| Yes, that closest thing to perfection is far from perfect.
| On the other hand, I very much doubt that we are going to
| get anything closer unless we are willing to pay the price.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Cable channels were themed, but cable packages were
| not.
|
| Themed packages did and do exist, though most channels
| for cable were normally available mainly through stacked
| tiers. But alongside the main generic tiers, language-
| specific (especially spanish language) and some other
| (sports, often) themed packages were available from many
| cable providers, and premium channels were often
| available in themed groups as well as individually.
| nvarsj wrote:
| Is that true?
|
| I remember most people, including myself, would get the full
| DirectTV/Cable subscription, hook up TiVo, and just
| record/watch on demand whatever you want. Those days seem
| impossible now. It certainly feels like things have
| regressed.
| ghaff wrote:
| Well, anything that was part of the cable package--which
| increasingly was not where a significant amount of top TV
| (and certainly films) were available from, especially
| without adding on a lot of premium content like HBO.
|
| I canceled my cable TV as I increasingly realized I simply
| was watching either live or recorded on my TiVo stuff once
| in a blue moon.
| wintermutestwin wrote:
| >Careful what you wish for? The big desire then was a la carte,
| and right now you can bounce between streaming services at
| will, and they're all still far easier to cancel than cable.
|
| "a la carte" means I don't subscribe to anything and instead I
| have access to "all the things" with a separate charge for each
| thing. The whole idea back then was to compete with the ease
| and access of piracy like Steam did.
|
| That said, "careful what you wish for" currently applies to
| sitcom episodes for rent on Amazon costing more per minute than
| mega budget movies.
| bamboozled wrote:
| If you're living outside the US getting content in English
| isn't anywhere as easy as it should be. These services are
| definitely America centric.
|
| It's been good for me, I just watch a whole lot less crap and
| get more sleep.
| dnissley wrote:
| I think this is an apples to oranges comparison, since single
| episodes of tv shows aren't generally available to rent,
| unlike movies.
| mynameisash wrote:
| > What there isn't is a good way to get a single subscription
| to watch anything you want.
|
| I would even settle for a way where I can ask, " _Where_ can I
| stream X? " There used to be canistream.it -- which is
| apparently now being rebuilt but has long been mostly useless.
| Fingers crossed that it becomes useful.
| baq wrote:
| They funniest (saddest) answer is the Pirate Bay.
| jwcooper wrote:
| justwatch.com works pretty well, at least in the USA.
| jbay808 wrote:
| Works well in Canada too (as long as you are on their
| Canadian site).
| nefitty wrote:
| JustWatch is pretty good.
|
| https://www.justwatch.com/
| delecti wrote:
| The Google TV app does a good job at that. It checks all my
| installed apps and links directly to the media item in that
| app if I pick a piece of media on one. It will also link to
| services I don't have, or offer a pay-to-play through Google
| itself.
| javajosh wrote:
| I did a search for "streaming search" and got
| https://reelgood.com/ and https://www.justwatch.com/. Roku
| also has a search engine called "What's On".
| https://www.roku.com/whats-on.
|
| Now if only someone would combine all of these search
| engines...
| anothernewdude wrote:
| What bothers me is missing shows from my Countries' offerings.
| Netflix is supposed to have Arrested Development. Not from my
| Country. Why? No information.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| The answer is always the same: no licensing deal could be
| arranged. The precise reasons for that may vary, and
| certainly the license holders will vary, but since there's
| essentially nothing you could do about that, there seems to
| be little point in Netflix telling you over and over "this
| would be available if we could get a license deal"
| Hypx_ wrote:
| I suspect cost of streaming services will increase though.
| Cable didn't get as expensive as it did overnight after all.
| ryandrake wrote:
| There is also too much "content" being made, and not enough
| quality movies to watch. There's a recent reddit thread[1]
| about this weird trend lately where more and more of what's
| offered is junk "made for TV" quality content. Even the word we
| use for it is revealing: Content. So boring. So gray and bland.
| Like a dry cardboard media ration made specifically to be
| consumed by some global ISO-standard Consumer. Everything has
| this odd B-movie With Big Stars hue. But two months after you
| view it, you struggle to even remember what it was about.
| Polished, featureless content, but hey, it's in 4K and stars
| Dwayne Johnson.
|
| High-quality, daring, inspired, more than superficially
| controversial, world-changing movies are another casualty of
| the rise of streaming.
|
| 1:
| https://old.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/qx4rtu/i_think_movi...
| tenebrisalietum wrote:
| > High-quality, daring, more than superficially
| controversial, world-changing movies are another casualty of
| the rise of streaming.
|
| Yes, but what has maybe replaced the movie is the high-
| quality, daring, world-changing series. Squid Game,
| Outlander, etc. Directors and consumers are now no longer
| limited to a 3 hour time in the theater, as far as the art of
| the motion picture is concerned.
| vlunkr wrote:
| I don't see why you would blame that on streaming. There was
| plenty of low-quality content before netflix. Movie budgets
| have gotten huge, in order to guarantee a return, they play
| to the lowest common denominator, including international
| audiences.
| asdff wrote:
| Movie budgets don't have to be huge. Most A24 films cost 10
| million to make.
| antasvara wrote:
| Is there some difference between streaming companies and
| classic movie studios that makes this the case? Arguably, the
| current state of movies is a direct result of studios
| realizing that well-produced, middle of the road content is
| the most profitable.
|
| Of course, I could be missing something about the industry
| and how streaming has shaped it. I just struggle to see how
| the streaming ecosystem has different content requirements
| than a normal movie studio.
| vineyardmike wrote:
| > Is there some difference between streaming companies and
| classic movie studios that makes this the case?
|
| Yes. Movie studios and streamers have different business
| models. Movie studios also deal with more "legacy" actor
| contract negotiations and the like (see disney v scarlet).
| Theater released movies make most of their money upfront,
| and make money out on a per-view basis. So they need as
| many viewers as early as possible.
|
| With streamers, they can lose the subscription any month,
| and only gain it back if they lure you - so they're
| incentivized to give you "anchors" that keep you there.
| Think game of thrones keeping people subscribed to HBO
| month over month or Squid Games that gets lots of
| attention. Once you're there, they just have to have
| "something" for those days you don't really know what to
| watch. That "something" is different for everyone, so they
| have to make lots of low budget generic stuff that appeals,
| collectively, to a wide audience. Each show/movie can have
| few viewers, because its going for niche targeting en mass
| - think themed cable channels but one company has to make
| something for each theme. Once a streamer makes a show, its
| "free" to them to share it with as many people as possible,
| but also doesn't cost them anything to not show it.
|
| Ben Thompson (stratechery) has talked about this a lot,
| check him out!
| ethbr0 wrote:
| Summary: streamers are valued by how long their tail is,
| movie studios are valued by how high their ceiling is.
| asdff wrote:
| The big difference is that movie studios actually directly
| offer higher quality content, simply due to the fact that
| they make a side business of selling their low quality
| content to companies like Netflix who are more than happy
| to purchase a finished film and throw it on the front page
| for all their subscribers to see even if its crap. The
| movie studio is able to get a return on a steaming pile of
| crap film that was probably super cheap to produce and
| avoids the reputation tarnish, netflix is able to advertise
| a wider catalog and hey, sometimes these junk films really
| do pop off for netflix like what happened with _Kissing
| Booth._
| joe_guy wrote:
| > Is there some difference between streaming companies and
| classic movie studios that makes this the case?
|
| I have no inside knowledge and am fully speculating,
| including some random tidbits I've read here and there.
|
| Think about how Netflix changed when moving from DVD to
| streaming. They used to optimize for recommending you
| movies you would rate highly. Now it's all about what keeps
| people viewing the longest.
|
| 2 middle of the road acceptable movies that you rate a 6/10
| is more viewing time than 1 higher quality production that
| you'd rate a 9/10 -- I doubt the costs are they cut and dry
| but I think that's the idea. More content that is passable
| wins out against less content that is of higher quality.
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| >Arguably, the current state of movies is a direct result
| of studios realizing that well-produced, middle of the road
| content is the most profitable.
|
| yes, if streaming movies well-produced, middle of the road,
| not terribly expensive is most profitable - as per this
| recent discussion
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29247571 on red notice
|
| if cinema, big expansive events most profitable (currently)
|
| if shows, high quality addictive, dramatic, character
| driven, etc. is most profitable
|
| why is quality series more profitable than middle of road?
| because you have to get people to make the investment of
| spending 10+ hours.
|
| why are medium quality competence streaming movies most
| profitable? because many people are willing to spend 90
| minutes passing the time with something mildly enjoyable,
| despite the many draws on our time it's still not seen as a
| serious investment.
|
| why are big events blah blah blah - because it costs a lot
| to go out it is a hassle compared to staying home, I tend
| to go to restaurant as well when I do it so for me at least
| it definitely has to have been a night worth it at the end,
| and something big is more likely to make everyone like whoa
| I had an experience I can't have at home.
| stefan_ wrote:
| Can I intercede and say that $170 cable bills were never a
| thing outside the US?
| jen20 wrote:
| This is only true in letter (rather than spirit) because
| subscription television in the UK was delivered by satellite
| ("Sky") rather than cable - a fully loaded sports and movies
| package would easily dwarf $170/mo, and still required a
| separate phone line from BT in addition.
| switch007 wrote:
| I've never met anyone paying >PS100/mo for Sky. Is/was that
| a thing?
| rhino369 wrote:
| They weren't a thing inside the USA unless you loaded up on
| premium movie and sports channels. From 2004~2018 I always
| paid around 45-60 for basic cable. Sometimes less if I
| bundled with internet.
| the_only_law wrote:
| Interestingly, much higher quality internet/mobile network
| access seems to also be cheaper outside the US. I was kinda
| shocked when I heard how much some acquaintance paid for
| gigabit internet/ 4G mobile in Spain.
| hackingforfun wrote:
| Canadian mobile networks are more expensive than the US,
| and are some of the most expensive in the world [1].
|
| [1] https://openmedia.org/article/item/2021-rewheel-report-
| shows...
| laurent92 wrote:
| Yes. Internet has always been 30EUR here in France, and
| nowadays 20EUR per month for fibre. Mobile is 12EUR for
| 50-100GB. Many people thank the EU's competition watchdog
| for that, and it's probably politically desired. It still
| didn't create a Silicon Valley ecosystem, though ;)
| brewdad wrote:
| Surely you mean outside of North America. From my
| understanding, the cable situation was always even worse in
| Canada.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Media content is typically sold based on the populations'
| purchasing power. It is why the same book is sold in Asia for
| $5 that is $50 in the US.
|
| Since the marginal cost of selling an additional unit is near
| zero, it makes sense for sellers to heavily price
| discriminate such that poorer people are charged what they
| can afford and richer people are charged what they can
| afford.
| laurent92 wrote:
| Would it be legal to ask for a paysheet and determine the
| price based on that? When I hear price discrimination, I do
| understand that it's always been the deal, but I wonder
| whether we're trending towards something proportional to
| salary.
| PeterisP wrote:
| That would not be prohibited, but it might not be a good
| business idea due to customer resistance.
|
| Classic economic theory on pricing lists commonly used
| options that essentially try to achieve that but with
| various indirect methods:
|
| 1. provide discounts to various demographics that are
| known afford less - e.g. students, seniors, etc.
|
| 2. provide different prices at times or places that have
| customers with different average ability to pay - e.g.
| geographic discrimination, and also discounts provided at
| times when traditionally employed people can't take them.
|
| 3. simple "inconvenient obstacles" e.g. coupon schemes,
| intentionally created queues, etc where people who accept
| the inconvenience get a better price, and people who can
| afford to pay more simply don't bother and pay.
|
| 4. Direct, prolonged, serious personal bargaining and
| haggling, resulting in an individually negotiated price
| that depends on your willingness to pay.
|
| But IMHO people would not like if it was explicitly based
| on their ability to pay, so companies try to disguise
| that.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| I am sure it is legal to ask for the pay sheet, but no
| seller would give you that. Sellers usually do not price
| discriminate merchandise that is not differentials within
| the same country since commerce within the country cannot
| be easily restricted.
|
| That is where brands come in for differentiable products.
| The generic brand lotion and the name brand lotion might
| come from the same factory. Maybe it is even the same
| product, or the different in quality is only slightly
| better for the name brand. But now the seller can target
| people willing to pay $x for lotion, and people willing
| to pay $2x for basically the same lotion.
|
| Or you implement "binning", where products of worse
| quality get branded differently, even though the sale
| price difference between the better quality product and
| the generic quality product is disproportionately larger
| than the cost to produce the better quality product than
| the generic product.
|
| Anyway, you cannot do this for a movie or tv show, so the
| sellers of movies/tv shows do it more crudely via country
| or region of the world.
| majormajor wrote:
| Sure, but even the $20/$30 minimum cable packages in the US
| were more than Netflix is today, without even including
| inflation.
|
| What was the situation outside of the US if you wanted to
| watch The Sopranos or Sex and the City or something else on
| HBO back then? My assumption is that this wasn't all free and
| over the air?
| tuatoru wrote:
| No. In NZ we only got what the local broadcasters had
| licensed.
|
| In retrospect, they did a great job of curation.* I seem to
| spend more time looking for something to watch than
| watching, and often just give up and go to bed.
|
| * Up til subscription satellite TV became available.
| Quality was inversely related to the number of available
| channels.
| ssivark wrote:
| But any payment to Netflix is on top of the (significantly
| higher) ransom one pays to Comcast/Spectrum/etc for leasing
| bandwidth on the pipes (which cable bills include in the
| default). So cost of streaming content today is Netflix +
| internet connection with enough bandwidth.
| dwighttk wrote:
| >Your minimum cable outlay back then would still cover the cost
| of a couple streaming services.
|
| I'm paying twice as much for cable internet as I used to pay
| for basic cable, before even starting to pay for a streaming
| service.
| slothtrop wrote:
| I think the archaic system with tv/movies that does not exist
| (in the same capacity) with games and music is the point of
| frustration with customers. The barriers are a bit strange.
| Consumers aren't really averse to spending money for content
| they want, as evidenced not just from streaming but Steam/GOG,
| which by contrast directly benefits creators more. With paid
| streaming it's more abstracted. You're paying, but with the
| machinations it's unclear how well content creators are
| compensated or how it will eventually benefit them. Even with
| music the option to directly support artists, with digital
| download purchases, is dead easy between Bandcamp and other
| options. Can't do that with film, have to buy a physical copy
| that will be eventually be obsolete hardware, and costs more.
| To be fair I think there's more of a "one and done" attitude
| people have towards film, consumed then disposed, so streaming
| lends better to it.
| fragmede wrote:
| Per https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/ a $50 cable bill
| from 1990 is about $110 now. Depending on where your reference
| point is, more streaming for less money _sounds_ good, but don
| 't forget Netflix was around with no real competition for a
| _long_ while, and at $10 /month. $50 (for
| Netflix+Hulu+Paramount+Disney/whatever vs $10 is quite the
| increase!
| mdasen wrote:
| I think expecting Netflix to stick around at $10/mo with such
| a library of content was unrealistic. Sometimes there are odd
| fluctuations in markets.
|
| For example, the current used car market has insane values
| with used vehicles costing more than the MSRP on new ones
| sometimes. Likewise, when Netflix had no competition, they
| were able to sign deals with content providers for almost
| nothing because content providers thought streaming was
| worthless. Either streaming was going to fail and that $10
| deal would go away or streaming was going to succeed and
| content providers wouldn't license content so cheaply. That
| era was an odd thing in the market before content owners
| realized that streaming wasn't just a little additional
| revenue, but a replacement for their service.
|
| I don't think you can really compare a market blip to a
| sustainable business model. HBO and others weren't going to
| continue licensing their catalogues to Netflix once it was
| clear that streaming was popular. They made the mistake of
| licensing to Netflix assuming that they'd be getting a little
| extra pocket money rather than cannibalizing their services.
| That mistake is probably the reason Netflix is the giant it
| is today. Netflix signed deals to license content before
| content owners realized the value of streaming. They used
| that content to gain subscribers until they could afford to
| build their own library of first-party content.
|
| Even from Netflix's side, they might have been spending more
| on content than they wanted to long-term to try and gain
| subscribers that would be sticky as their library waned and
| they transformed from "we licensed most of the content you
| want" to "we're another HBO with a limited content
| selection".
|
| These things happen. We saw MoviePass come and go because it
| was an unsustainably good deal.
|
| I think it's also important to remember that back in that era
| of Netflix, most people were still paying for cable and
| renting DVDs. Maybe you weren't, but most people were. I
| think it's important to think about the whole amount that
| people were spending and people were spending a lot on their
| entertainment. It was perfectly normal to head to a
| Blockbuster and spend $10 renting two DVDs each weekend. That
| feels like such an alien concept today, but people were
| spending $100 on cable plus $40 on rentals and getting a lot
| less entertainment than they are today.
|
| Sure, if you were one of the few that only had Netflix, it
| was a glorious time. $10/mo never bought so much
| entertainment! Likewise, if you were a MoviePass subscriber,
| no one had ever gotten so many theater tickets for so little
| money. But it wasn't going to last because it was
| unsustainably good. Once MoviePass found that people would
| actually use the service, it was dead in the water. Once
| content owners saw that people would cancel their HBO
| subscription because Netflix had HBO's content, the era of
| Netflix having such an expansive library for so cheap would
| end as the deals ran out.
|
| Comparing current prices to a market blip isn't really a fair
| comparison - but there was a pretty great 5 years in there.
| majormajor wrote:
| You could definitely pay less than $50 for cable throughout
| the 90s, it's HD which I remember pushing prices up. But
| those would be your basic packages, without addons, and
| especially without HBO and such.
|
| But now if all you wanted was HBO, you could get it for under
| 20 bucks if you have anything but the slowest internet
| packages!
| ghaff wrote:
| Except Netflix never had the streaming content that you can
| get today for $50--both because of its own original content
| and because a lot of content (especially films) was never
| available on Netflix streaming.
|
| I agree with the parent. Without live TV, a streaming bundle
| you assemble is clearly cheaper than you were paying for
| cable TV (or cable TV plus Netflix) in the US. Today, add a
| live TV streaming service and you're probably back to about
| price parity with a lot more choice of content.
| stocknoob wrote:
| Plus, you can share it with family members. And watch on
| multiple devices. And turn services on/off without having to
| get on the phone. It's much, much better.
| fshbbdssbbgdd wrote:
| > Survivor (a random missing episode seems like a weird
| problem, would love to know what was going on)
|
| Music licensing?
| majormajor wrote:
| I think that's pretty unlikely for something made this year.
| YoutubeTV and other Cable co's should be pretty similar in
| that regard. Buying the music for availability on "cable
| cable" and "CBS's own app" but not "streaming cable" would be
| baffling.
| freetinker wrote:
| Not to mention 4K HDR, spatial audio, etc. How quickly we take
| things for granted.
| OminousWeapons wrote:
| > Careful what you wish for? The big desire then was a la
| carte, and right now you can bounce between streaming services
| at will, and they're all still far easier to cancel than cable.
|
| I feel like people say they want a la carte but that's not
| actually what they want. What they want is all the good content
| and none of the crap filler content, for cheap. People pushed
| for a la carte because in their mind all content costs the
| same, so they figured that by removing the content they don't
| want and only keeping the content they do want, they would save
| tons of money. They don't understand that the good content
| (live sports, FX, AMC, HBO, et al) is precisely what studios
| are charging a premium for and what is driving most of the cost
| in packages in the first place.
|
| It's roughly akin to someone looking at a Vegas buffet that
| costs $100 and features 100 entrees and saying "well there are
| 100 entrees but really all I want is the cheese, prime rib,
| crab legs, and caviar, so if I remove the other 96 entrees then
| this should cost $4" then being shocked when they are still
| charged 40 dollars. Sure it's cheaper but in their minds it
| should be an order of magnitude cheaper than it is.
| baq wrote:
| Remember that streaming services don't only compete with each
| other, but they also compete with torrents. Netflix won not
| because of being cool or good, but because it was way more
| convenient than torrents for the majority of content. This
| isn't true anymore, as all major studios want in on the
| market, which makes the TAM _smaller_ due to fragmentation
| and lost network effects. (It is common to hear people saying
| they won't pay for more than 1, 2, maybe 3 services.) Ice is
| thinner than it seems, but streaming services know this.
| margalabargala wrote:
| > Your minimum cable outlay back then would still cover the
| cost of a couple streaming services.
|
| It would not cover a typical US internet bill with speeds to
| support streaming, plus a couple streaming services.
| majormajor wrote:
| True, the edge case of "I want TV but not internet" users are
| not in a great place to access streaming content. They still
| have all their existing cable content, though, at least? And
| in 2001, good chance they were already paying for internet
| back then too.
|
| I don't think it's realistic to assume "no internet" is a
| standard default these days, though, regardless of if/how you
| watch TV.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| It's not "no internet". It's "low bandwidth" internet. If
| it wasn't for streaming or downloading OS updates, would
| most people need fast internet?
| majormajor wrote:
| What do you mean by low bandwidth? 56K dialup? 1.5Mbps
| DSL? 10Mbit?
|
| Streaming only was able to take off because broadband
| (back then this wouldn't even have been that much,
| >~2Mbps) was already widespread. So I'd say yes, nobody
| liked waiting for slow connections.
| sokoloff wrote:
| Most people working from home (or remote schooling, even
| occasionally) would need more than low bandwidth
| internet.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Yes? HD video calls and backing up your personal media.
| Even an old person can benefit from high upload being
| able to do a remote doctor visit with an HD camera.
| _jal wrote:
| I'm the opposite. I want "internet but not TV". If you're
| in Comcast land, you'll pay for cable either way.
|
| > I don't think it's realistic to assume "no internet" is a
| standard default these days
|
| About 1 in 6 US households has no internet access, nowhere
| near a small enough number to start rolling up
| alternatives.
| margalabargala wrote:
| Do you have more details or a source on this? I'm
| wondering if the 1 in 6 is no centralized household
| internet, or no access whatsoever e.g. via a smartphone
| with a data plan.
| _jal wrote:
| The info I'm thinking of came from a Pew report that went
| around work, I'm not finding that on the public internet.
| There is this, which comes up with a similar number:
|
| https://datareportal.com/reports/digital-2020-united-
| states-...
|
| That also claims:
|
| "The number of mobile connections in the United States of
| America in January 2020 was equivalent to 107% of the
| total population."
|
| I'm not sure how to disaggregate that to humans. I do
| personally have more than one device with a data plan,
| although I'm not sure how typical that is.
| ghaff wrote:
| Not sure I understand. I pay Comcast for Internet but
| dropped both cable TV and landline a couple years ago and
| cut the bill in about half.
| readflaggedcomm wrote:
| That's not my experience with decades of different
| Comcast subscriptions in one city.
| II2II wrote:
| I don't know what the situation is like in the US, but in
| Canada: the typical cost of basic cable service plus a couple
| of cable packages in 1990 cost roughly the same as basic
| internet service plus a streaming service today. It is
| difficult to even claim that this comparison is even remotely
| fair for a variety of reasons.
|
| - The only major loss with the current system is local
| programming. You may be able to get it with free OTA
| channels, but people subscribed to basic cable in the 1980's
| and 1990's simply because cable was more reliable than a good
| residential antenna tower so it is justifiable to count this
| as a loss.
|
| - The current system is much better in that you can watch
| commercial free programs when you please, any given streaming
| service is usually less expensive than any given cable
| bundle, and the content in any given streaming service will
| usually have more in common than the channels in any given
| cable bundle. (Cable companies were notorious for putting
| similar channels in different packages.) As an added bonus:
| the "watch when you please" aspect means that you can defer
| viewing, may that be to switch between streaming services to
| keep monthly costs down or to simply cancel during the months
| when you have better things to do than watch television.
|
| - The current system is also better in that Internet service
| can replace many other products and services. Subscribing to
| newspapers is a novelty these days. If it wasn't for societal
| expectations, people would have dropped phone service since
| the Internet provides far better communications options than
| traditional landlines.
| _dark_matter_ wrote:
| Huh, this is a good point actually. I was going to argue that
| people have internet anyways, but that's not always the case.
| My FIL would have to both lay an internet cable, pay for
| internet, and pay for streaming to switch.
| blacksmith_tb wrote:
| True, but the cost of that connection also covers plenty of
| non-watching, so it would be fairer to add only a portion. I
| suppose if you measured it by data transfer watching is
| likely a large chunk, but you wouldn't choose to go without
| any kind of connection, even if you weren't interested in
| streaming, unless you really couldn't afford it.
| thegginthesky wrote:
| The biggest difference is that people use the internet for
| far more things than just streaming, so the internet bill is
| diluted into the overall utility. For example, without good
| internet speeds you couldn't attend classes properly in lock
| down, nor attend meetings with people across the country or
| world.
|
| Good internet is becoming more of an overall utility than
| just a luxury.
| margalabargala wrote:
| Fair point, I suppose that would be kinda like including
| the price of a TV onto the cable bill comparison, and then
| the computer on streaming, and etc etc.
| agumonkey wrote:
| I've seen teachers and young students during covid, it
| wasn't pretty.
|
| I have that feeling that internet is boiling frogs making
| people think it's that amazing christic thing when a few
| phone calls and organization would go as deep. Plus kids
| and teachers are often computer illiterate, a single file
| format can delay information for days if not weeks because
| people don't know how to mail or open something.
| [deleted]
| jedberg wrote:
| > a random missing episode seems like a weird problem, would
| love to know what was going on
|
| In almost every case like that, the answer is "we can't figure
| out if this is licensed for streaming because it didn't exist
| yet". Usually it's music, which they licensed for "broadcast
| and video cassette release" or some similar language. In most
| cases they've decided DVD is close enough to VHS to still
| count, but is streaming? Courts haven't really decided yet.
| majormajor wrote:
| That's why this case is weird: it's a brand new episode. And
| it is in the CBS streaming app. Just missing from YouTube's
| cable product.
| foobarian wrote:
| Maybe there is a dollar sign or backslash or something in
| the title/description. Or a rogue UTF8 byte order mark [1]
| throwing off some comparison :-)
|
| [1] https://www.markhneedham.com/blog/2012/09/03/a-rogue-35
| 72732...
| FroshKiller wrote:
| The season 8 premiere of Forged in Fire last year got
| pulled because one of the contestants turned out to be a
| neo-Nazi with a visible neo-Nazi tattoo.
| jedberg wrote:
| Ah. That is odd. Maybe there was an error in the master
| file given to YouTube or a glitch in their encoder that
| skipped it.
| dools wrote:
| Apple TV is a one stop shop to see what's available then you
| can choose to subscribe to stuff if you want
| paconbork wrote:
| I'm just waiting until we come full circle and can purchase a
| bundle of streaming services. Maybe it will come with phone and
| internet
| yellow_postit wrote:
| This is happening already -- with some T Mobile packages I get
| Netflix and Spotify included.
| Shadonototra wrote:
| i still torrent my media consumption not because it's free, but
| because it's hassle free, it works the same way it worked decades
| ago
| Futurebot wrote:
| Licensing, copyright takedowns, and partnership agreements make
| things that appear seemingly simple in fact quite complicated.
| That, and supporting a myriad of devices (plus different versions
| of those devices with different capabilities, plus all the
| different store integrations and their quirks) make for a very
| complicated set of organizational requirements.
|
| There's no good answer here in markets this complicated
| oxymoran wrote:
| 1) eww, too many Google products 2) you can't go camping without
| watching movies??? Maybe you need a little tech break...
| jedberg wrote:
| What we need is a company to come together and make deals with
| all the different streaming services and put them into one
| interface. The could charge like $100/mo and share the fees with
| all the other companies.
|
| This is obviously a joke, but honestly, it seems like the
| direction we are heading -- cable V2.
|
| I really wish streaming video had a similar licensing model to
| audio -- pay a central licensing authority for the content, and
| it's the same price for everyone. Then the streaming services
| could compete on their UI and the content creators will compete
| on making popular content.
| nvarsj wrote:
| Whoever can pull this off will be the next iTunes/Spotify. But
| I don't think it will happen until piracy starts becoming a
| major problem and streaming services are pressured to
| consolidate to compete. Plex shows there is a larger potential
| here.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| That is not cable v2.
|
| The distinguishing feature of cable (and satellite) was that
| you had no option to instantly play what you want when you want
| where you want. And no option to instantly watch from the media
| owner and cut out middlemen. And no option to watch select
| episodes or subscribe for only 1 month.
| jedberg wrote:
| No, that was the distinguishing feature of linear TV. You can
| tell because cable has those features now too, for the
| content that is already in their system. They are now trying
| to get more content in to their system.
|
| What cable did was bring multiple networks together into a
| single interface which had never been done before.
| asdff wrote:
| The other big thing that cable did when it first came out
| to stand out vs free over the air TV was that it didn't
| have ads initially.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| A TV antenna plugged into a TV that can change channels
| brings multiple networks together in a single interface.
|
| But the point is all those bundles were only necessary due
| to lack of technology that could connect content owners
| directly to content viewers. We even have search engines
| that, theoretically, you should be able to search the
| content's name, get to the content owner's website, and be
| presented with the options of how you can watch it.
|
| Edit: I think I get your point, that bundling might be more
| economical for content owners. And that cable facilitated
| that by subsidizing less watched content with more watched
| content. But I guess in that case, I am guessing the cable
| company just becomes the content owner (like Comcast) and
| the various content owners get big and produce a variety of
| media.
| colinmhayes wrote:
| I don't understand what the problem with multiple services is.
| Is going to a different site really that difficult? There are
| plenty of aggregators that tell you the good stuff on each
| site, and their recommendations are usually better than each
| sites' anyway.
| jedberg wrote:
| It's a logistical nightmare. It's fine perhaps for a single
| person, but with kids and less technical elderly parents, it
| becomes troublesome.
|
| Every new device requires logging into a bunch of services.
| When a login expires I have to explain how to log in again
| and what the password is. The kids (and I!) have to remember
| which content they want to watch right now is on which
| service.
|
| At least with cable I could just leave a single page
| instruction sheet that said "press this button on the remote,
| and the cable will turn on, here are the channel numbers you
| care about".
| baq wrote:
| Guessing what is where is the worst part. It's (again)
| easier to pirate everything even if you're paying for
| subscriptions.
| bungledash wrote:
| SoundExchange kind of works like you describe but not quite.
| You report to them "I played X for user Y at time Z," and they
| go cool, for the billing period and that play count, it's
| $4,000 to clear your rights. What's left unspoken is you still
| need a redistributable copy of the _recording_ before you can
| do that. SoundExchange does not provide that and buying
| something from iTunes or Amazon, for example, still doesn't get
| you legal in most cases. You're looking at Beatport Pro and
| even more expensive things like that designed for
| professionals.
|
| Worse: SX only covers the recording. You still have to talk to
| the big three licensing agencies about the written music. (That
| was my understanding about 15 years ago in Internet radio. This
| point might have changed.)
|
| There isn't an insert coin receive MP3 with all rights attached
| service, which sounds like how you've understood SoundExchange
| to work, and what you're lobbying for in video. I agree that
| would be cool but it's extremely unlikely for the same reason
| you can't do it with SX.
| jedberg wrote:
| I'm talking more about the system that radio uses, where
| anyone who wants to run a radio station has a place to get
| the content and pay the same fee.
| bungledash wrote:
| Oh yeah, I'm familiar with that, too. That makes more
| sense. Believe it or not that doesn't clear the big three
| for music either, or at least didn't when I got out of the
| business a decade ago. But BMI and such have special deals
| with real radio that would make Internet radio weep, so
| you're right it's better. (Former MD here.)
|
| That's the likely outcome. They'll probably push for the
| mechanical video recording and the creative content within
| it to be different licenses just like music. And then
| you'll still have to license the music within it, probably
| both the recording and the creative. IP structure in
| complex media is so entwined there won't be a simple answer
| here, I'm afraid. I wish it weren't so.
|
| The worst outcome possible would be a lot of creative folks
| in a television production realizing the distinction
| between the two music licenses and creating a setup where
| there is five or six for video (script license, series
| license, translation license, likeness licenses, blah
| blah).
| horsawlarway wrote:
| I cannot agree strongly enough on this.
|
| It's really, really shitty that media consumption has been
| commoditized in the way it has - with every service having
| to secure rights (at different times and varying prices),
| and users constantly being forced to either add an
| additional service or cancel a service to watch the content
| they actually want to watch.
|
| The radio licensing model would have (and still would be)
| SO much freaking better.
| lapetitejort wrote:
| Quick, find me the 90's era SNL character movie _Bob Roberts_ ,
| starring Tim Robbins, Giancarlo Esposito, and Gore Vidal. It's
| not available anywhere. Until obscure movies like this are a few
| taps away, streaming services will have not met their true
| potential.
| kkjjkgjjgg wrote:
| Lately none of the movies I am looking for are available. I've
| been starting to think of classics I should watch with my kids.
| Ruefully buying DVDs again.
| skinnymuch wrote:
| The Critereon Collection might be able to handle a lot of
| classics. I've never checked it out personally. Only heard
| about it.
| capitainenemo wrote:
| Netflix DVD service does in fact still exist... They even
| have an android app.
| kkjjkgjjgg wrote:
| Interesting. I'm in Germany, will see what I can find.
| nickthegreek wrote:
| googled it to find the whole thing is on vimeo. So...
| technically its on a streaming service.
| jeroenhd wrote:
| Star Trek Discovery started a new season this week. Usually here
| in the Netherlands episodes come out a day later, so I thought
| I'd watch the last season finale the day before it came out so I
| was up to speed.
|
| Turns out Paramount pulled the show from Netflix to put it on
| Paramount+
|
| As a Star Trek fan, j thought what the heck, let's see how
| expensive a subscription to that is. Turns out it's not available
| in this country. It'll launch as part of something called
| SkyShowtime, a separate service including multiple American
| streaming platforms, somewhere in 2022.
|
| So I shrugged and added the show to Sonarr. Within minutes, I had
| all the episodes available for my viewing pleasure.
|
| It's like these companies don't want my business. They pull
| content from my existing subscription, make it impossible for me
| to buy their service and then complain about the terrible threat
| of piracy at the same time.
|
| It's time for someone to set up a service that aggregates all
| other services so viewers can enjoy their content without chasing
| platforms. I'll pay for the extra services once content isn't
| being shifted around anymore, which is clearly going to take
| another decade.
| baby wrote:
| Competition is giving us better and more content.
| lordnacho wrote:
| As a father my guess is Disney is winning. They'd get 2X my money
| if they had fine print that said "You have to pay again for
| Frozen". Basically they just have to hook your kid on one thing
| and then they're getting your subscription. The number of
| rewatches of the same content has got to be through the roof for
| them.
|
| All the other streaming services are fighting over your remaining
| 1-3 slots in your household. Of them it would seem Amazon looks
| good because they make you think you're getting a deal with
| Prime, but it doesn't seem to have the same pull as a 5 year old
| who needs to watch Disney.
|
| The others also have the disadvantage that adults are going to
| know how to share an account. With kids you don't want to be
| coordinating it.
|
| As for UX, I don't quite understand why anything is ever taken
| off the streaming service. Isn't it one of the things that makes
| it better than a Blockbuster? Every movie you've ever had on can
| be left there. There's gotta be a way to shove the long tail
| content on some slower/less replicated infrastructure, but maybe
| it isn't a technical consideration.
| oezi wrote:
| I don't get Disney+ at all, exactely because of this: if you
| want to watch Frozen 50 times, a DVD is a much better deal. You
| can get the entire Disney/Pixar catalog of kids movies for the
| price of a year's subscription.
| vlovich123 wrote:
| It's complex licensing deals and other revenue streams (hotels,
| airplanes, foreign broadcasts, regional monopolies etc) that
| are the reason. You accessing some cold content is not an issue
| for them. They have enough spare capacity to handle small
| volume requests like that easily.
| judge2020 wrote:
| > I don't quite understand why anything is ever taken off the
| streaming service.
|
| Probably won't happen for the first-party services like Disney
| Plus, Paramount, etc. but things leave Netflix because the
| deals for streaming usually last 5-15 years; no studio exec
| wants to be the name attached to something like "Netflix gets
| exclusive streaming rights to this film in perpetuity" when 50
| years down the line it would've made more sense to relicense it
| to X other company or bring it into your own streaming library.
| It's not anywhere near a technical limitation like you suggest,
| it's a money issue.
| [deleted]
| arnvald wrote:
| Disney should easily be winning globally, but outside of
| America they're failing to launch their service in new
| countries. I have friends in Europe who'd pay for Disney+ to be
| able to watch Star Wars and Marvel series but they can't,
| because the launch is postponed until mid-2022. I'm quite
| surprised they haven't tried to launch faster, seeing that we
| have more lockdowns coming and people will be spending more
| time in front of tv again
| baby wrote:
| Really? I don't know anyone with Disney and everyone I know has
| netflix. Maybe for families with kids.
| [deleted]
| shoto_io wrote:
| Star Trek new season got canceled just recently, because
| Paramount pulled it off Netflix. It was due to start coming days.
| Now people have ti wait until 2022 and get the then available
| paramount subscription on top of Netflix, Disney, and A+.
|
| Who is willing to do that? I bet many people will opt for illegal
| downloads again.
| 6chars wrote:
| To clarify for anyone in the US, this applies to everyone
| _outside_ the US. Previously, Paramount released Star Trek:
| Discovery on Paramount+ in the US and Netflix everywhere else.
| Now it's Paramount+ everywhere, only that doesn't exist
| everywhere yet.
|
| It's amazing to me that the company feels that the benefits of
| this outweigh the goodwill it costs them among the fanbase.
| Trekkies are going apeshit over this. It makes me more hesitant
| to buy Star Trek media in the future, and I'll admit I'm not
| one to change my buying patterns based on companies' behavior
| ordinarily.
| LinAGKar wrote:
| Not just that, they're not releasing them yet outside the USA
| and Canada even in places that do have Paramount+, such as
| the Nordics. So outside the USA and Canada, Prodigy and
| Discovery are pirate-exclusives even if you are subscribed to
| Paramount+.
| mattnewton wrote:
| Why would they pull it before having a replacement ready? Is
| this just classic US-first thinking where the rest of the
| world kinda fell through the cracks?
| comeonseriously wrote:
| The only winning move is not to play.
|
| I think a lot of people will just do without.
| HWR_14 wrote:
| I thought Paramount didn't put any of their new Star Trek shows
| on Netflix.
| easton wrote:
| They only did that in the US, Netflix had international
| distribution rights.
| criddell wrote:
| If it's easy enough to start and stop a subscription, lots of
| people will do it.
|
| My family wanted to watch Mandalorian so we subscribed to
| Disney+. It took us two months to get through the series so it
| only cost $15 or so which seems like a pretty good deal for
| that many hours of TV. Since I subscribed via Apple, cancelling
| was painless. We did the same with Peacock for a different
| show.
|
| HBO, Hulu, and Netflix seem to have enough stuff that we watch
| that we've stayed subscribed to those for years now.
| ChrisLTD wrote:
| Which Star Trek season was cancelled? I can't find any news on
| it.
| spicyramen wrote:
| Quality content: HBO > Disney+ > Amazon Prime > Netflix
| tpmx wrote:
| Disney+ is mostly for kids and Star Wars remake fans, right?
|
| HBO, Apple TV+ and Netflix have all mostly fallen into this
| trap of producing really elaborate, super expensive drama shows
| that are mostly really depressing, boring and dystopic.
| Fantastic HDR cinematography though.
| skinnymuch wrote:
| Interesting. I haven't had a reason to open Disney+ up after
| the first day. Is Disney+ relevant if you don't enjoy Marvel or
| Star Wars, nor children's shows? I know it has Simpsons, Pixar,
| and more. That's pretty slim pickings compared to any other
| service though if you care for the three major categories
| above.
|
| I did watch some of the Marvel tv content as it got a lot of
| hype. I don't get it. The production quality is insanely high,
| but the shows and pacing seemed pretty tame. If that sort of
| action isn't your thing, Netflix stuff blows it out of the
| water in my opinion.
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