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What’s funny is that I’m certain that the vast majority of Linux users who were paying for this were trying really hard to watch these shows legitimately, and a

What’s funny is that I’m certain that the vast majority of Linux users who were paying for this were trying really hard to watch these shows legitimately, and almost all of them will be antagonised by this and just download torrents or similar.

mhh__ 6y ago
It increasingly seems to be only valve who understand that piracy occurs because of friction rather than price (for media like games and TV at least). I pirate quite a lot of games but if they're good I'm more than happy to buy it so I get multiplayer and cloud saves etc.
- teruakohatu 6y ago
  Pirating games seems like a terrible deal when you consider the viruses, bot nets and bitcoin mining malware.
  - reincarnate0x14 6y ago
    Those problems are almost nonexistent if you get past the public torrent sites. Lots and lots of impostor sites and users though, I assume most of it automated. The bitcoin mining problem is seeping into even free-to-play game markets, which I have mixed feelings about. On one hand, it's at least better than the corrosive influence of advertising.
  - TheNorthman 6y ago
    If you've ever contracted malware in any shape through piracy, you've been doing it wrong. Public torrent trackers are fine. The existence of various Scene indexing sites [0] allows you to verify a release before you download it. [0]: Like https://predb.me/ https://predb.me/ or https://www.xrel.to/releases.html https://www.xrel.to/releases.html
  - gsich 6y ago
    Only if you don't know what you're doing.
  - techntoke 6y ago
    There is this thing called the scene and verification files.
- user5994461 6y ago
  Sadly enough, steam games have begun to pull out Mac support (Apple deprecated major API) soon after games started porting to Mac. Even Steam cannot get games to support a platform, if the platform doesn't help it.
somehnguy 6y ago
Along the same line I went back to pirating after all the companies started pulling their stuff off Netflix in favor of standing up their own services. I tried. But fine have it your way, back to getting none of my money.
- mav3rick 6y ago
  How are you in the "right" here ? You're stealing a product and acting as if it's cool.
  - somehnguy 6y ago
    I didn't say I was in the right, nor do I think I'm cool. It's just reality that when artificial roadblocks make something more difficult than it should be people find a way around them.
  - thelastname 6y ago
    Copying isn't stealing. Without Linux support I wouldn't buy the product anyway.
Sivart13 6y ago
Odd for a big company like HBO to throw away hundreds of dollars of revenue just like that
- Shared404 6y ago
  What happens when Linux users tell their Windows/Mac friends "Hey, I've got all of $SHOW downloaded, want it?".
  - jychang 6y ago
    Nobody does that anymore. It's "Hey, I got $SHOW on my plex server, want an invite?"
    - Shared404 6y ago
      True that.
    - ta17711771 6y ago
      It's almost time for Plex to die, then. What's the new hotness, is Emby dope yet?
      - wfriesen 6y ago
        There is a free fork of Emby called Jellyfin that has replaced Plex for me. https://jellyfin.org/ https://jellyfin.org/
asutekku 6y ago
Pretty sure it cost them more to keep the service up for linuxes than they got from the people using it.
- whymauri 6y ago
  But... why? What is the cost here?
  - stu2b50 6y ago
    Developer hours (and SRE + admin hours!) to maintain.
    - whymauri 6y ago
      I'm not understanding. Why is the OS a concern of this browser-based streaming application? I don't know anything about cross-platform support, so clearly I'm missing something. Is it cross-platform DRM? I'm admittedly ignorant about this stuff.
    - kemotep 6y ago
      Were they charging Linux users less? I imagine that there is an order of magnitude more MacOS users compared to Linux. How many users does it take to break even with streaming?
alexfromapex 6y ago
What’s also funny is that if they just use the right abstraction layers developing for Linux shouldn’t be much more effort than for Mac
- saagarjha 6y ago
  They already are, it's the browser…
- user5994461 6y ago
  Mac is one platform. Linux is tens of different operating systems.
  - sleavey 6y ago
    If only there were some kind of platform agnostic hypertext language that could be used here so that vendors didn't need to care about the details of the user's operating system. /s
    - user5994461 6y ago
      I can hardly get web developers to test on another browser than Chrome, I can't imagine what it will take to get them to test on another OS.
      - sleavey 6y ago
        My point was that it shouldn't matter which user agent you use; they should all implement the standards.
      - noodlesUK 6y ago
        If none of the web devs at a big company like HBO use Linux as their daily driver (at least at home), I’d be very surprised...
- loeg 6y ago
  This is likely intentional user-agent filtering rather than any browser feature support issue. Linux is a first class platform for Chrome. Chase (the bank) does something similar.

mhh__ 6y ago

It increasingly seems to be only valve who understand that piracy occurs because of friction rather than price (for media like games and TV at least). I pirate quite a lot of games but if they're good I'm more than happy to buy it so I get multiplayer and cloud saves etc.

teruakohatu 6y ago
Pirating games seems like a terrible deal when you consider the viruses, bot nets and bitcoin mining malware.
- reincarnate0x14 6y ago
  Those problems are almost nonexistent if you get past the public torrent sites. Lots and lots of impostor sites and users though, I assume most of it automated. The bitcoin mining problem is seeping into even free-to-play game markets, which I have mixed feelings about. On one hand, it's at least better than the corrosive influence of advertising.
- TheNorthman 6y ago
  If you've ever contracted malware in any shape through piracy, you've been doing it wrong. Public torrent trackers are fine. The existence of various Scene indexing sites [0] allows you to verify a release before you download it. [0]: Like https://predb.me/ https://predb.me/ or https://www.xrel.to/releases.html https://www.xrel.to/releases.html
- gsich 6y ago
  Only if you don't know what you're doing.
- techntoke 6y ago
  There is this thing called the scene and verification files.
user5994461 6y ago
Sadly enough, steam games have begun to pull out Mac support (Apple deprecated major API) soon after games started porting to Mac. Even Steam cannot get games to support a platform, if the platform doesn't help it.

somehnguy 6y ago

Along the same line I went back to pirating after all the companies started pulling their stuff off Netflix in favor of standing up their own services. I tried. But fine have it your way, back to getting none of my money.

mav3rick 6y ago
How are you in the "right" here ? You're stealing a product and acting as if it's cool.
- somehnguy 6y ago
  I didn't say I was in the right, nor do I think I'm cool. It's just reality that when artificial roadblocks make something more difficult than it should be people find a way around them.
- thelastname 6y ago
  Copying isn't stealing. Without Linux support I wouldn't buy the product anyway.

Sivart13 6y ago

Odd for a big company like HBO to throw away hundreds of dollars of revenue just like that

Shared404 6y ago
What happens when Linux users tell their Windows/Mac friends "Hey, I've got all of $SHOW downloaded, want it?".
- jychang 6y ago
  Nobody does that anymore. It's "Hey, I got $SHOW on my plex server, want an invite?"
  - Shared404 6y ago
    True that.
  - ta17711771 6y ago
    It's almost time for Plex to die, then. What's the new hotness, is Emby dope yet?
    - wfriesen 6y ago
      There is a free fork of Emby called Jellyfin that has replaced Plex for me. https://jellyfin.org/ https://jellyfin.org/

asutekku 6y ago

Pretty sure it cost them more to keep the service up for linuxes than they got from the people using it.

whymauri 6y ago
But... why? What is the cost here?
- stu2b50 6y ago
  Developer hours (and SRE + admin hours!) to maintain.
  - whymauri 6y ago
    I'm not understanding. Why is the OS a concern of this browser-based streaming application? I don't know anything about cross-platform support, so clearly I'm missing something. Is it cross-platform DRM? I'm admittedly ignorant about this stuff.
  - kemotep 6y ago
    Were they charging Linux users less? I imagine that there is an order of magnitude more MacOS users compared to Linux. How many users does it take to break even with streaming?

alexfromapex 6y ago

What’s also funny is that if they just use the right abstraction layers developing for Linux shouldn’t be much more effort than for Mac

saagarjha 6y ago
They already are, it's the browser…
user5994461 6y ago
Mac is one platform. Linux is tens of different operating systems.
- sleavey 6y ago
  If only there were some kind of platform agnostic hypertext language that could be used here so that vendors didn't need to care about the details of the user's operating system. /s
  - user5994461 6y ago
    I can hardly get web developers to test on another browser than Chrome, I can't imagine what it will take to get them to test on another OS.
    - sleavey 6y ago
      My point was that it shouldn't matter which user agent you use; they should all implement the standards.
    - noodlesUK 6y ago
      If none of the web devs at a big company like HBO use Linux as their daily driver (at least at home), I’d be very surprised...
loeg 6y ago
This is likely intentional user-agent filtering rather than any browser feature support issue. Linux is a first class platform for Chrome. Chase (the bank) does something similar.