4 ms·

Netflix for Documentaries for $15/Year

18 points by devops000 5y ago

steveylang 5y ago
Believe it or not, Amazon Prime Video has a pretty large selection of documentaries. They are just hidden behind all the banners they throw at you for the mainstream content.
pettycashstash2 5y ago
very nice. some interesting content here for downtime perusing.
aloisdg 5y ago
Is this an ad?
- bberenberg 5y ago
  It feels like yes, but I find their pricing to be really interesting. $15 a year for HD and $52 a year for 4k. It feels like they're tying pricing to bandwidth cost rather than content value or something.
  - sokoloff 5y ago
    Documentaries also seem like a category where I care the very least about the difference in picture quality between 1080p and 4K.
    - mohanmcgeek 5y ago
      Most of these are old documentaries that are not really 4K.
  - jtsiskin 5y ago
    I doubt that it’s related to bandwidth costs; those are likely minimal compared to the price of acquiring content. It’s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_discrimination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_discrimination - a way to capture more money from those who get more value from the product. It might also be a little bit of https://www.economicshelp.org/blog/glossary/premium-decoy-pricing/ https://www.economicshelp.org/blog/glossary/premium-decoy-pr...
- devops000 5y ago
  No I’ve just founded it casually and I thought worth sharing it.
  - aloisdg 5y ago
    Some youtubers are sponsored by this brand.
tasubotadas 5y ago
I subscribed to this the last year, just to support something that's non-Youtube.
Mistletoe 5y ago
Wow I need to do this. Documentaries are basically all I ever watch and it is getting increasingly hard to find anything worth watching. I guess I thought Curiosity Stream was $15 a month like other streaming services.
- mohanmcgeek 5y ago
  I love documentaries. I have subscription to curiositystream but I wouldn't recommend this. Most are very old, low quality documentaries. I won't be renewing my sub
sokoloff 5y ago
Looks like interesting content and even the regular, undiscounted HD price is reasonable. If any of the curiositystream folks are here, I’d add a “What devices does this work on?” question right below “want to peek at our catalog?” It took me more clicks than I’d have liked to find it in help and that seems like a common concern between “I’m interested!” and “I’m buying this!” (The answer I found was a good one. https://help.curiositystream.com/hc/en-us/articles/209260738-What-platforms-and-devices-do-you-currently-support- https://help.curiositystream.com/hc/en-us/articles/209260738... )
maratc 5y ago
One difference from Netflix is that this only has subtitles in English (as far as I looked).
caymanjim 5y ago
Curiosity Stream is ok. The price is great, but the content is hit-or-miss, and it's really hard to separate the wheat from the chaff. Everything is rated 90%+ regardless of actual quality; the "staff picks" were almost certainly picked by a [bad] algorithm; the "collections" have very limited on-topic content mixed with tons of off-topic content. A lot of the videos are short; like 15-20 minutes. A bunch of them have synthetic voices, possibly using automatic translations from the original language (this is even worse on Amazon Prime); the effect is a creepy uncanny valley unease that isn't immediately apparent. If you know something specific to search for and watch, it's a bargain, but if you just want to browse around, it can be frustrating. More often than not, I spend half an hour or so viewing the first minute of a bunch of videos, and then give up in frustration. New genuinely high-quality content doesn't seem to come around very often. About the only reason I keep it is to re-watch the good videos I can find by searching for specific people (like my favorite physics presenter, Jim Al-Khalili). That and the fact that I forget I'm subscribed until the annual charge hits, and then it's not worth my time to figure out how to cancel.
- nickthegreek 5y ago
  I picked it up to get Nebula for free just to watch The Patrick H Willems videos and $15 is cheap enough that maybe my subscription can actually help them make a difference and create better content. I think Animalogic vids might be on CS too.
  - mohanmcgeek 5y ago
    Same. Got CS for nebula. Mostly for Sam's videos. Nebula is worth paying for but the mobile app needs serious improvement.
- lesterzone 5y ago
  got curiosity + nebula, now I can enjoy 'Not just bikes' without ads also up and atom, MKBHD, the Friday checkout, city beautiful.
weinerdog 5y ago
https://www.trustpilot.com/review/curiositystream.com https://www.trustpilot.com/review/curiositystream.com 56% bad reviews. The reviewer comments are detailed and scathing.

18 points by devops000 5y ago

Believe it or not, Amazon Prime Video has a pretty large selection of documentaries. They are just hidden behind all the banners they throw at you for the mainstream content.

pettycashstash2 5y ago

very nice. some interesting content here for downtime perusing.

aloisdg 5y ago

Is this an ad?

bberenberg 5y ago
It feels like yes, but I find their pricing to be really interesting. $15 a year for HD and $52 a year for 4k. It feels like they're tying pricing to bandwidth cost rather than content value or something.
- sokoloff 5y ago
  Documentaries also seem like a category where I care the very least about the difference in picture quality between 1080p and 4K.
  - mohanmcgeek 5y ago
    Most of these are old documentaries that are not really 4K.
- jtsiskin 5y ago
  I doubt that it’s related to bandwidth costs; those are likely minimal compared to the price of acquiring content. It’s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_discrimination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_discrimination - a way to capture more money from those who get more value from the product. It might also be a little bit of https://www.economicshelp.org/blog/glossary/premium-decoy-pricing/ https://www.economicshelp.org/blog/glossary/premium-decoy-pr...
devops000 5y ago
No I’ve just founded it casually and I thought worth sharing it.
- aloisdg 5y ago
  Some youtubers are sponsored by this brand.

tasubotadas 5y ago

I subscribed to this the last year, just to support something that's non-Youtube.

Mistletoe 5y ago

Wow I need to do this. Documentaries are basically all I ever watch and it is getting increasingly hard to find anything worth watching. I guess I thought Curiosity Stream was $15 a month like other streaming services.

mohanmcgeek 5y ago
I love documentaries. I have subscription to curiositystream but I wouldn't recommend this. Most are very old, low quality documentaries. I won't be renewing my sub

sokoloff 5y ago

Looks like interesting content and even the regular, undiscounted HD price is reasonable. If any of the curiositystream folks are here, I’d add a “What devices does this work on?” question right below “want to peek at our catalog?” It took me more clicks than I’d have liked to find it in help and that seems like a common concern between “I’m interested!” and “I’m buying this!” (The answer I found was a good one. https://help.curiositystream.com/hc/en-us/articles/209260738-What-platforms-and-devices-do-you-currently-support- https://help.curiositystream.com/hc/en-us/articles/209260738... )

maratc 5y ago

One difference from Netflix is that this only has subtitles in English (as far as I looked).

caymanjim 5y ago

Curiosity Stream is ok. The price is great, but the content is hit-or-miss, and it's really hard to separate the wheat from the chaff. Everything is rated 90%+ regardless of actual quality; the "staff picks" were almost certainly picked by a [bad] algorithm; the "collections" have very limited on-topic content mixed with tons of off-topic content. A lot of the videos are short; like 15-20 minutes. A bunch of them have synthetic voices, possibly using automatic translations from the original language (this is even worse on Amazon Prime); the effect is a creepy uncanny valley unease that isn't immediately apparent. If you know something specific to search for and watch, it's a bargain, but if you just want to browse around, it can be frustrating. More often than not, I spend half an hour or so viewing the first minute of a bunch of videos, and then give up in frustration. New genuinely high-quality content doesn't seem to come around very often. About the only reason I keep it is to re-watch the good videos I can find by searching for specific people (like my favorite physics presenter, Jim Al-Khalili). That and the fact that I forget I'm subscribed until the annual charge hits, and then it's not worth my time to figure out how to cancel.

nickthegreek 5y ago
I picked it up to get Nebula for free just to watch The Patrick H Willems videos and $15 is cheap enough that maybe my subscription can actually help them make a difference and create better content. I think Animalogic vids might be on CS too.
- mohanmcgeek 5y ago
  Same. Got CS for nebula. Mostly for Sam's videos. Nebula is worth paying for but the mobile app needs serious improvement.
lesterzone 5y ago
got curiosity + nebula, now I can enjoy 'Not just bikes' without ads also up and atom, MKBHD, the Friday checkout, city beautiful.

weinerdog 5y ago

https://www.trustpilot.com/review/curiositystream.com https://www.trustpilot.com/review/curiositystream.com 56% bad reviews. The reviewer comments are detailed and scathing.