10 ms·

Do people use this kind of software for anything other than piracy? Serious question.

kyriakos 6y ago
There are legit uses but I must admit piracy is the main one. On the other hand some activities are legal depending where you live.
aidenn0 6y ago
I use it via libreElec for my set top box. I have ripped my entire Blu-ray collection to mkv, and also watch disney plus and Netflix on it.
Mediterraneo10 6y ago
Kodi is a media center for playing whatever media you already have, even if it is your own rips or your own purchased downloads. Kodi was already a popular application for years before someone decided to sell prepackaged devices running Kodi that included a third-party pirate-streaming plugin.
- kyriakos 6y ago
  Even if you don't use any plugins for streaming pirated content a lot of people use it as a player for downloaded torrents or streaming from seedboxes.
- dogma1138 6y ago
  I’ve used kodi since it was XBMC, “backups” was always its main focus, the amount of content available as a DRM free download is extremely limited and if we are realistic the amount of people that do their own rips form movies they own can probably fit in a movie theatre. Kodi never went full on popcorn time but it’s pretty useless for anything but a large and quite likely pirated media collection.
  - forty 6y ago
    You can have a DVD reader plugged to it and I also have a DVB-T adapter to watch TV. There are also emulators to play games nowadays (how legal that is most likely depends on the country you are in).
    - dogma1138 6y ago
      And how many people do you think use it as a DVB-T/DVD player? I don’t understand really why is it so controversial to admit that Kodi’s sole existence is dependent on piracy as it provides a good UX to a large library of media files. Same goes for Plex, everyone knows what it’s used for. Sure there can be legitimate uses for this software but without the piracy angle we know that it wouldn’t be maintained or even really exist. Kodi started as a homebrew media player for the Xbox to play additional media formats and files from sources other than the main DVD drive.
      - forty 6y ago
        No idea, but at least I do use it for legal content. I believe it even works with some steaming DRM nowadays (even though I don't use that). No idea what others are doing, but I don't see why people would use kodi to see pirated content more than other video player/media center. A pirated video file should be readable everywhere.
dogma1138 6y ago
Probably not, unless you create backups of Blu-ray movie you buy the legitimate use of Kodi and Plex is questionable, Plex at least offers streaming channels. I’m still waiting for a decent service to centralize all available content amongst my streaming providers Apple TV seems to only work with Amazon Prime atm. I would pay for a service that does this, bonus points if they can also tie in an automatic vpn to bypass goeblocks so you’ll have access to the entire library of a given provider regardless of your location. I tried building one at some point but no provider offers a decent API to get that data and scraping them was too hard and Netflix makes it very hard to do.
- zodiakzz 6y ago
  Your waiting is pointless for a device as walled as an Apple TV because such an app won't be allowed on a FAANG app store.
  - easton 6y ago
    It doesn't need to be, Apple is building that app. In fact, they already have it on there, the only notable holdout for the centralized progress/search functionality is Netflix. Hulu, HBO Max, Disney+ and Prime are there already. https://www.apple.com/apple-tv-app/ https://www.apple.com/apple-tv-app/
    - dogma1138 6y ago
      Apple-TV only shows me prime video, I also have Disney+ and Netflix, it seems that Disney+ is supported based on their site but not Netflix.
    - zodiakzz 6y ago
      Wow neat! Happy to be proven wrong. This opens up the possibility of an open source app by reverse engineering the Apple TV app.
- kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
  Some of us use it for watching legally recorded OTA broadcasts.
covidthrow 6y ago
Yes. My wife and I have a strict "pay for what you consume" policy in this house. I'm a former "industry" professional, so I have the utmost respect for people being compensated on whichever end they process/release material we prefer. (Usually Blu-ray, but sometimes digital if we can't find Blu-rays.) In fact, it's so important to us that we have only a handful of pre-owned movies/TV; all stuff we can't buy new. Obviously it's a bit of a legal gray area to rip Blu-rays we purchased, but we don't do anything that would prevent content creators/platforms from receiving compensation. We don't format-shift (i.e. If we have a DVD, we don't obtain an HD version) and only rarely platform-shift (i.e. download a Blu-ray if we've only purchased the streaming rights) if that's the only option. Legally shady but ethically sound stuff we do: - torrent TV shows that we own the same-resolution discs for (it's faster than ripping/transcoding hundreds of hours of video) - torrent TV/movies we've purchased effectively-lifetime licenses for (willing to remove if for a good ethical reason a platform revokes said license; hasn't happened yet though) - pre-download Blu-rays we order if it'll take some time to get here - torrent the very limited number of broadcast TV shows we record and strip ads from (this is probably the most questionable thing we do, ethically) Far as music, most platforms at this point allow some form of non-DRM download, so we generally don't do anything unusual. We use several unauthorized plugins for our music streaming services, but do not download/keep anything we haven't purchased. We absolutely do not "preview" stuff. If we want to "preview", we rent the movies and watch them there. If we choose to purchase, we may torrent, but generally just wait to rip. No doubt we're in a minority, but Kodi is an invaluable way for us to consume our ethically-sourced content. (Even our children's friends seem to have ethics with this stuff, i.e. if they "gift" some MP3s to a peer, they'll also give them a gift card so they can purchase that content. Not sure how common it is, but I certainly don't remember doing this during the early days of CD ripping and Napster.) I don't have a huge problem with some people fudging a little more than we do, but take great offense at people who use it simply for the pirating plugins. I don't, for example, take much issue with people geo-shifting stuff they can't otherwise obtain. (The content creator is still in the same $0 profit situation their publisher put them in.) But stuff like Popcorn Time is really not cool for pretty much anyone except people who can't obtain the content for whatever reason. Make of it what you will. But guns don't kill people; people kill people.
- 6y ago
Bayart 6y ago
There's a surprising number of people who archive and read from NAS/server their physical media. I've always been tempted to believe it was nothing more than a cope-out to justify the existence of software that facilitates mass piracy (because I myself don't see the point of it for anything else than analog media), but it seems to be at least a very active niche.
noja 6y ago
It's a video player.
jokethrowaway 6y ago
Mainly use it to watch YouTube
parrellel 6y ago
It's a nice interface for a media pc / diy dvr, and having searchable metadata is nice. I'd have it set up right now but they are terrible with plugin compatibility between versions, and the hacks various people have done to provide front-ends for legitimate streaming services are touch-and-go. The blatant piracy angle does seem to be the bigger market at this point.
mopsi 6y ago
I use it as a media player for screens in a retail store. Runs nicely off a Raspberry PI.
r_singh 6y ago
I tried to use it to build a dynamic digital signage solution for the medical industry and it was a nightmare. I persisted and wrote a plug-in that pulled data from a file that was updated with an API. I was impressed at first, but soon, the inconsistency of the experience on different platforms killed it for me. Ultimately it was easier to run Android on an Odroid and use React Native to build an app. I got the use-case all wrong though. A good use case is running Netflix on a Pi.
yannovitch 6y ago
I, for one, use it mostly with legal extensions to watch public videos and listen to internet radios, because I have an old TV without smart features, and it does the job well. I use it too to "cast" Youtube videos to the TV (very easy to do with the "Kore" app (or "Send2Kodi" for iOS users)), as I don't want to use Chromecast.

There are legit uses but I must admit piracy is the main one. On the other hand some activities are legal depending where you live.

aidenn0 6y ago

I use it via libreElec for my set top box. I have ripped my entire Blu-ray collection to mkv, and also watch disney plus and Netflix on it.

Mediterraneo10 6y ago

Kodi is a media center for playing whatever media you already have, even if it is your own rips or your own purchased downloads. Kodi was already a popular application for years before someone decided to sell prepackaged devices running Kodi that included a third-party pirate-streaming plugin.

kyriakos 6y ago
Even if you don't use any plugins for streaming pirated content a lot of people use it as a player for downloaded torrents or streaming from seedboxes.
dogma1138 6y ago
I’ve used kodi since it was XBMC, “backups” was always its main focus, the amount of content available as a DRM free download is extremely limited and if we are realistic the amount of people that do their own rips form movies they own can probably fit in a movie theatre. Kodi never went full on popcorn time but it’s pretty useless for anything but a large and quite likely pirated media collection.
- forty 6y ago
  You can have a DVD reader plugged to it and I also have a DVB-T adapter to watch TV. There are also emulators to play games nowadays (how legal that is most likely depends on the country you are in).
  - dogma1138 6y ago
    And how many people do you think use it as a DVB-T/DVD player? I don’t understand really why is it so controversial to admit that Kodi’s sole existence is dependent on piracy as it provides a good UX to a large library of media files. Same goes for Plex, everyone knows what it’s used for. Sure there can be legitimate uses for this software but without the piracy angle we know that it wouldn’t be maintained or even really exist. Kodi started as a homebrew media player for the Xbox to play additional media formats and files from sources other than the main DVD drive.
    - forty 6y ago
      No idea, but at least I do use it for legal content. I believe it even works with some steaming DRM nowadays (even though I don't use that). No idea what others are doing, but I don't see why people would use kodi to see pirated content more than other video player/media center. A pirated video file should be readable everywhere.

dogma1138 6y ago

Probably not, unless you create backups of Blu-ray movie you buy the legitimate use of Kodi and Plex is questionable, Plex at least offers streaming channels. I’m still waiting for a decent service to centralize all available content amongst my streaming providers Apple TV seems to only work with Amazon Prime atm. I would pay for a service that does this, bonus points if they can also tie in an automatic vpn to bypass goeblocks so you’ll have access to the entire library of a given provider regardless of your location. I tried building one at some point but no provider offers a decent API to get that data and scraping them was too hard and Netflix makes it very hard to do.

zodiakzz 6y ago
Your waiting is pointless for a device as walled as an Apple TV because such an app won't be allowed on a FAANG app store.
- easton 6y ago
  It doesn't need to be, Apple is building that app. In fact, they already have it on there, the only notable holdout for the centralized progress/search functionality is Netflix. Hulu, HBO Max, Disney+ and Prime are there already. https://www.apple.com/apple-tv-app/ https://www.apple.com/apple-tv-app/
  - dogma1138 6y ago
    Apple-TV only shows me prime video, I also have Disney+ and Netflix, it seems that Disney+ is supported based on their site but not Netflix.
  - zodiakzz 6y ago
    Wow neat! Happy to be proven wrong. This opens up the possibility of an open source app by reverse engineering the Apple TV app.
kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
Some of us use it for watching legally recorded OTA broadcasts.

covidthrow 6y ago

Yes. My wife and I have a strict "pay for what you consume" policy in this house. I'm a former "industry" professional, so I have the utmost respect for people being compensated on whichever end they process/release material we prefer. (Usually Blu-ray, but sometimes digital if we can't find Blu-rays.) In fact, it's so important to us that we have only a handful of pre-owned movies/TV; all stuff we can't buy new. Obviously it's a bit of a legal gray area to rip Blu-rays we purchased, but we don't do anything that would prevent content creators/platforms from receiving compensation. We don't format-shift (i.e. If we have a DVD, we don't obtain an HD version) and only rarely platform-shift (i.e. download a Blu-ray if we've only purchased the streaming rights) if that's the only option. Legally shady but ethically sound stuff we do: - torrent TV shows that we own the same-resolution discs for (it's faster than ripping/transcoding hundreds of hours of video) - torrent TV/movies we've purchased effectively-lifetime licenses for (willing to remove if for a good ethical reason a platform revokes said license; hasn't happened yet though) - pre-download Blu-rays we order if it'll take some time to get here - torrent the very limited number of broadcast TV shows we record and strip ads from (this is probably the most questionable thing we do, ethically) Far as music, most platforms at this point allow some form of non-DRM download, so we generally don't do anything unusual. We use several unauthorized plugins for our music streaming services, but do not download/keep anything we haven't purchased. We absolutely do not "preview" stuff. If we want to "preview", we rent the movies and watch them there. If we choose to purchase, we may torrent, but generally just wait to rip. No doubt we're in a minority, but Kodi is an invaluable way for us to consume our ethically-sourced content. (Even our children's friends seem to have ethics with this stuff, i.e. if they "gift" some MP3s to a peer, they'll also give them a gift card so they can purchase that content. Not sure how common it is, but I certainly don't remember doing this during the early days of CD ripping and Napster.) I don't have a huge problem with some people fudging a little more than we do, but take great offense at people who use it simply for the pirating plugins. I don't, for example, take much issue with people geo-shifting stuff they can't otherwise obtain. (The content creator is still in the same $0 profit situation their publisher put them in.) But stuff like Popcorn Time is really not cool for pretty much anyone except people who can't obtain the content for whatever reason. Make of it what you will. But guns don't kill people; people kill people.

6y ago

Bayart 6y ago

There's a surprising number of people who archive and read from NAS/server their physical media. I've always been tempted to believe it was nothing more than a cope-out to justify the existence of software that facilitates mass piracy (because I myself don't see the point of it for anything else than analog media), but it seems to be at least a very active niche.

noja 6y ago

It's a video player.

jokethrowaway 6y ago

Mainly use it to watch YouTube

parrellel 6y ago

It's a nice interface for a media pc / diy dvr, and having searchable metadata is nice. I'd have it set up right now but they are terrible with plugin compatibility between versions, and the hacks various people have done to provide front-ends for legitimate streaming services are touch-and-go. The blatant piracy angle does seem to be the bigger market at this point.

mopsi 6y ago

I use it as a media player for screens in a retail store. Runs nicely off a Raspberry PI.

r_singh 6y ago

I tried to use it to build a dynamic digital signage solution for the medical industry and it was a nightmare. I persisted and wrote a plug-in that pulled data from a file that was updated with an API. I was impressed at first, but soon, the inconsistency of the experience on different platforms killed it for me. Ultimately it was easier to run Android on an Odroid and use React Native to build an app. I got the use-case all wrong though. A good use case is running Netflix on a Pi.

yannovitch 6y ago

I, for one, use it mostly with legal extensions to watch public videos and listen to internet radios, because I have an old TV without smart features, and it does the job well. I use it too to "cast" Youtube videos to the TV (very easy to do with the "Kore" app (or "Send2Kodi" for iOS users)), as I don't want to use Chromecast.