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After reading discussions on this for years, I feel now that only a small part of piraters would now still go for that. A lot of them would argue that the price

After reading discussions on this for years, I feel now that only a small part of piraters would now still go for that. A lot of them would argue that the price point is still wrong, or whatever restrictions are left are still unreasonable.

dmitriid 9y ago
Netflix's rise to be the king of streaming is directly related to viewers opting in for the ease of use and safety of Netflix (similar thing happened with Steam: it squashed piracy into nothingness even in countries like Russia). Now that you will have to pay for Netflix, and HBO, and Disney, and Amazon Prime, and Hulu (I think they have exclusive deals), and that a lot of this content will not be available in non-US markets, the pirate sites will see a rise again.
- user5994461 9y ago
  Steam is localized for Russians, including the language, the payment options and the games are listed with a lower price.
mustacheemperor 9y ago
I think Steam is a fine counterpoint, given it was once extremely common to pirate PC games and many people just stopped bothering once it was easier to just buy it on Steam.[0] I was happy to pay for Hulu until it took 3 ad breaks of 3 ads each (some demanding I "interact" by holding an additional 3 minutes of my time hostage if I refuse) to get through a 20 minute episode of a cartoon that aired on MTV in the mid 90s. [0]http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/114391-Valves-Gabe-Newell-Says-Piracy-Is-a-Service-Problem http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/114391-Valves-Gabe...
- zerocrates 9y ago
  Isn't that pretty much the same amount of ads you'd have seen if you'd actually watched it on MTV in the 90s? Or actually probably less? I avoid Hulu because of the ads too, and digital advertising is often more invasive (I haven't seen the "interact" thing you mention but it sounds awful). It's just interesting to me how much lower the tolerance for ads is between media.
mentos 9y ago
Yea I think I agree with this, most piraters are doing so because they are so used to the idea of FREE that the idea of spending any money at all on content is a disaster to them.
- FRex 9y ago
  That's bullshit and hearsay. Until content is provided in convenient standard formats, DRM free (it does fuck all beyond annoying paying customers already), offline friendly, region lock free, etc. it's an apples to oranges comparison. An often offline/mobile binge watcher's only choice for watching conveniently is piracy or paying way more than the price of the content itself his in mobile data fees due to streaming enforcement. You can't even rip your own DVD or BluRAy legally due to DMCA supposedly. I wanted to get my favorite anime ever legally and this is the end result (TL;DR; - I maybe could get an Amazon Fire TV and pay 20 dollars to stream into it in SD quality while BluRay 1080p rips mp4s are floating around torrents): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989321 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989321 Or are you going to tell me I should get a Fire TV and watch in half the quality and only on it, or hunt and get that DVD or BluRay from a private person on an auction site, just so I lose money and not get stuff for free, despite the studio not getting any from that purchase? Not everyone is streaming the latest Game of Thrones or something. Niche stuff goes out of print, into copyright hell (NOLF game series), studios go bust (so no one who produced the content gets compensated for it, thus moral argument is gone), there are region locks (and Poland is no small or poor market for anime), arbitrary restrictions (on what languages and subs you get, on quality, on devices you can use, stream only enforcement, etc.) and then it's "theft" to want something you actually can't buy (and that would be feasible to be available with 0 impact on profits, and that's is actually available illegally and conveniently).
  - s73ver_ 9y ago
    Not being available in exactly the way you want it is not an excuse for you to pirate.
    - dmitriid 9y ago
FRex 9y ago
And why would people in their right mind want to pay (for example as it is with many anime) for a stream only option, with no choice of subs or dubs given, no file download, etc. instead of getting it for free, cheaper, easier, faster, better, offline, etc. Come back to argue your point when the actual offer differs only in cost and not in quality and convenience. When content providers will provide subs in a standard format, allow freely sub translations by third parties into languages they don't translate to, allow file download, DRM free, not region locked (it does fuck all and streaming sites and torrents are full to the brim weeks or months after releases), without tedious processes to confirm you are who you are and live in the right country (the only thing that they should care about is the payment), a.k.a. never. For an extreme example see here (where my only legal and maybe available option for an anime that's floating around everywhere as 1080p BluRay rip is to get an Amazon Fire TV and hope I can stream it in SD quality to it after paying 20 dollars for the privilege): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989321 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989321
s73ver_ 9y ago
Yup. There are a lot of pirates who simply feel entitled to everything, and won't pay for anything. And yet, they would be the first to complain when they don't get paid for their own work. Hell, on the @forexposure_txt twitter, there's a pirate Patreon site (taking the content that usually requires a donation, and offering it for piracy), and they're still asking for donations. And they honestly don't see the issue with it.
mschuster91 9y ago
I went from pirate to Netflix once it became available in DE. Still too bad that e.g. ST Voyager or pretty much anything old is ultra gross quality... no wonder when the stream is 300mb per episode when a DVD rip is easily 3x the bandwidth.
- paulmd 9y ago
  I wonder if the problem is bad source material/generational loss. TNG is available in 1080p source, do you find low-bandwidth streams of that to be more palatable?
  - mschuster91 9y ago
    > I wonder if the problem is bad source material/generational loss. For VOY at least I suspect generational loss - for example, there is a noticeable Moire on Voyager's deflector dish in the intro.

dmitriid 9y ago

Netflix's rise to be the king of streaming is directly related to viewers opting in for the ease of use and safety of Netflix (similar thing happened with Steam: it squashed piracy into nothingness even in countries like Russia). Now that you will have to pay for Netflix, and HBO, and Disney, and Amazon Prime, and Hulu (I think they have exclusive deals), and that a lot of this content will not be available in non-US markets, the pirate sites will see a rise again.

user5994461 9y ago
Steam is localized for Russians, including the language, the payment options and the games are listed with a lower price.

mustacheemperor 9y ago

I think Steam is a fine counterpoint, given it was once extremely common to pirate PC games and many people just stopped bothering once it was easier to just buy it on Steam.[0] I was happy to pay for Hulu until it took 3 ad breaks of 3 ads each (some demanding I "interact" by holding an additional 3 minutes of my time hostage if I refuse) to get through a 20 minute episode of a cartoon that aired on MTV in the mid 90s. [0]http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/114391-Valves-Gabe-Newell-Says-Piracy-Is-a-Service-Problem http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/114391-Valves-Gabe...

zerocrates 9y ago
Isn't that pretty much the same amount of ads you'd have seen if you'd actually watched it on MTV in the 90s? Or actually probably less? I avoid Hulu because of the ads too, and digital advertising is often more invasive (I haven't seen the "interact" thing you mention but it sounds awful). It's just interesting to me how much lower the tolerance for ads is between media.

mentos 9y ago

Yea I think I agree with this, most piraters are doing so because they are so used to the idea of FREE that the idea of spending any money at all on content is a disaster to them.

FRex 9y ago
That's bullshit and hearsay. Until content is provided in convenient standard formats, DRM free (it does fuck all beyond annoying paying customers already), offline friendly, region lock free, etc. it's an apples to oranges comparison. An often offline/mobile binge watcher's only choice for watching conveniently is piracy or paying way more than the price of the content itself his in mobile data fees due to streaming enforcement. You can't even rip your own DVD or BluRAy legally due to DMCA supposedly. I wanted to get my favorite anime ever legally and this is the end result (TL;DR; - I maybe could get an Amazon Fire TV and pay 20 dollars to stream into it in SD quality while BluRay 1080p rips mp4s are floating around torrents): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989321 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989321 Or are you going to tell me I should get a Fire TV and watch in half the quality and only on it, or hunt and get that DVD or BluRay from a private person on an auction site, just so I lose money and not get stuff for free, despite the studio not getting any from that purchase? Not everyone is streaming the latest Game of Thrones or something. Niche stuff goes out of print, into copyright hell (NOLF game series), studios go bust (so no one who produced the content gets compensated for it, thus moral argument is gone), there are region locks (and Poland is no small or poor market for anime), arbitrary restrictions (on what languages and subs you get, on quality, on devices you can use, stream only enforcement, etc.) and then it's "theft" to want something you actually can't buy (and that would be feasible to be available with 0 impact on profits, and that's is actually available illegally and conveniently).
- s73ver_ 9y ago
  Not being available in exactly the way you want it is not an excuse for you to pirate.
  - dmitriid 9y ago

FRex 9y ago

And why would people in their right mind want to pay (for example as it is with many anime) for a stream only option, with no choice of subs or dubs given, no file download, etc. instead of getting it for free, cheaper, easier, faster, better, offline, etc. Come back to argue your point when the actual offer differs only in cost and not in quality and convenience. When content providers will provide subs in a standard format, allow freely sub translations by third parties into languages they don't translate to, allow file download, DRM free, not region locked (it does fuck all and streaming sites and torrents are full to the brim weeks or months after releases), without tedious processes to confirm you are who you are and live in the right country (the only thing that they should care about is the payment), a.k.a. never. For an extreme example see here (where my only legal and maybe available option for an anime that's floating around everywhere as 1080p BluRay rip is to get an Amazon Fire TV and hope I can stream it in SD quality to it after paying 20 dollars for the privilege): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989321 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989321

s73ver_ 9y ago

Yup. There are a lot of pirates who simply feel entitled to everything, and won't pay for anything. And yet, they would be the first to complain when they don't get paid for their own work. Hell, on the @forexposure_txt twitter, there's a pirate Patreon site (taking the content that usually requires a donation, and offering it for piracy), and they're still asking for donations. And they honestly don't see the issue with it.

mschuster91 9y ago

I went from pirate to Netflix once it became available in DE. Still too bad that e.g. ST Voyager or pretty much anything old is ultra gross quality... no wonder when the stream is 300mb per episode when a DVD rip is easily 3x the bandwidth.

paulmd 9y ago
I wonder if the problem is bad source material/generational loss. TNG is available in 1080p source, do you find low-bandwidth streams of that to be more palatable?
- mschuster91 9y ago
  > I wonder if the problem is bad source material/generational loss. For VOY at least I suspect generational loss - for example, there is a noticeable Moire on Voyager's deflector dish in the intro.