5 ms·

Nobody lets me pay for content. They're all tying themselves in contractual knots trying to find the most lucrative deal, and meanwhile it's impossible to just

by strken 4y ago

Nobody lets me pay for content. They're all tying themselves in contractual knots trying to find the most lucrative deal, and meanwhile it's impossible to just buy a movie or a TV show without shipping a physical disc. I go to e.g. the South Park website, and I'm greeted by an error message saying they're "working hard to resolve [their] pre-existing contractual obligations," which is the same message they've shown for years. Thanks for trying, I guess, but if I pirated it then I'd just...watch the show, from start to finish, with all seasons and all episodes, no wasteful physical media, no subscription, no data collection, and no ads. That sounds good. I want to be able to pay money, maybe even quite a lot of money, and do that.

rr808 4y ago
Is it really so hard to watch something else?
hotpotamus 4y ago
When I see all the justifications I wonder who are they for? If you feel the need to justify it to semi-anonymous people on the internet, then you're probably trying to justify it to yourself which means you think what you're doing is wrong.
- pirate-Loo6uoDu 4y ago
  It's not a justification, just an explanation of what needs to change if people want me to pay for that content. Like I say I pretty much never pirate things if they're on steam, I've probably paid tens of thousands out to steam over the years. (That being said, I do have access to cable television, netflix, and amazon prime streaming as well as the piracy setup, so people are getting paid. I'm not going to go buy a bunch of old red-dwarf and dilbert DVDs though, they just take up too much space)
  - hotpotamus 4y ago
    You started the post with "I have a confession". I felt that guilt was implied.
    - pirate-Loo6uoDu 4y ago
      Ahh, fair enough. I meant it more as just a turn of phrase, implying that it's a sordid affair. A little bit implying that I was going again church heterodoxy, that there were pressures to feel guilty. More "gay in the 70's" than "burn down an orphanage".
      - ask_b123 4y ago
        * against church orthodoxy
- mlyle 4y ago
  Man-- I don't steal content, because I've made a lot of money from IP and I think other people deserve for their work to be rewarded. But I'm so jealous of the user experience for people who buy into a $5/mo plex and get better service than I'm paying for. IMO, that's broken. So much time wasted, figuring out what service to watch something on, dealing with content ads, bad user interfaces... having content vanish and become unavailable, etc. I don't even watch much video, but it's still way too much of a sink on my time.
- strken 4y ago
  I don't have to justify myself to you and do not intend to. I don't actually pirate anything, regardless. My intent is that someone somewhere reads this and decides to let me buy their damn content. It's not a justification, it's an appeal. Put your album on bandcamp. Put your game on itch/gog/your own website/humble bundle, preferable without intrusive DRM. I have no idea where you'd put a movie or TV show, but there's probably some place. Please.
wollsmoth 4y ago
Uh, you can actually buy south park from any number of providers. Amazon and iTunes both list Season 1 for $25. You don't need to only watch things on monthly streaming platforms.
- kgwxd 4y ago
  Can you play the media without going through Amazon or Apple to do it? Is the quality guaranteed to be good when I choose to watch it? What kind of ads am I going to get when I click play? Even if there are no ads now, is that guaranteed to be the case forever? Downloadable, ad free, and DRM free. Music has been selling that way for decades. I've spent thousands on that kind of media, I'd have spent 10 times as much if it had been made available that way. Some people purchase a controlled versions to atone for their pirating sins but that just rewards consumer-hostile business models, and most of the money goes to middle-men that only add negative value to the product they're selling.
  - wollsmoth 4y ago
    It sounds like you have a lot of concerns about this that all kind of conveniently put you in a place to pirate whatever you want. Most of the time I watch things once, so I rent it if it's not on a platform I subscribe to. Generally then I can watch it on my tv, ps4, phone, computer, whatever. Consider that money spent on these products are an indication to studios about what people like. Movie studios, production companies, they make stuff they think they can sell for a profit. I suggest that you try renting movies or buying ones you like. If you run into a situation where one of your concerns comes to life, I think it would be very reasonable to pirate something you've made a good faith effort to pay for. This is kind of how I started and now for the most part I rent/buy with some exceptions. Still downloading some trash tv shows.
    - kgwxd 4y ago
      I don't need any excuses to download whatever I want. It doesn't cost anyone anything, and no suffering of any kind is introduced into the world for anyone. Most, if not all, things I've downloaded, which isn't much, I've either rented before, seen on TV or in a theater, or have been on one of the streaming services I pay for at some point. Does that cover me ethically? Some people seem to think so. I personally don't care either way and not a single person on this planet is any worse off for my lack of concern.

by strken 4y ago

rr808 4y ago

Is it really so hard to watch something else?

hotpotamus 4y ago

When I see all the justifications I wonder who are they for? If you feel the need to justify it to semi-anonymous people on the internet, then you're probably trying to justify it to yourself which means you think what you're doing is wrong.

pirate-Loo6uoDu 4y ago
It's not a justification, just an explanation of what needs to change if people want me to pay for that content. Like I say I pretty much never pirate things if they're on steam, I've probably paid tens of thousands out to steam over the years. (That being said, I do have access to cable television, netflix, and amazon prime streaming as well as the piracy setup, so people are getting paid. I'm not going to go buy a bunch of old red-dwarf and dilbert DVDs though, they just take up too much space)
- hotpotamus 4y ago
  You started the post with "I have a confession". I felt that guilt was implied.
  - pirate-Loo6uoDu 4y ago
    Ahh, fair enough. I meant it more as just a turn of phrase, implying that it's a sordid affair. A little bit implying that I was going again church heterodoxy, that there were pressures to feel guilty. More "gay in the 70's" than "burn down an orphanage".
    - ask_b123 4y ago
      * against church orthodoxy
mlyle 4y ago
Man-- I don't steal content, because I've made a lot of money from IP and I think other people deserve for their work to be rewarded. But I'm so jealous of the user experience for people who buy into a $5/mo plex and get better service than I'm paying for. IMO, that's broken. So much time wasted, figuring out what service to watch something on, dealing with content ads, bad user interfaces... having content vanish and become unavailable, etc. I don't even watch much video, but it's still way too much of a sink on my time.
strken 4y ago
I don't have to justify myself to you and do not intend to. I don't actually pirate anything, regardless. My intent is that someone somewhere reads this and decides to let me buy their damn content. It's not a justification, it's an appeal. Put your album on bandcamp. Put your game on itch/gog/your own website/humble bundle, preferable without intrusive DRM. I have no idea where you'd put a movie or TV show, but there's probably some place. Please.

wollsmoth 4y ago

Uh, you can actually buy south park from any number of providers. Amazon and iTunes both list Season 1 for $25. You don't need to only watch things on monthly streaming platforms.

kgwxd 4y ago
Can you play the media without going through Amazon or Apple to do it? Is the quality guaranteed to be good when I choose to watch it? What kind of ads am I going to get when I click play? Even if there are no ads now, is that guaranteed to be the case forever? Downloadable, ad free, and DRM free. Music has been selling that way for decades. I've spent thousands on that kind of media, I'd have spent 10 times as much if it had been made available that way. Some people purchase a controlled versions to atone for their pirating sins but that just rewards consumer-hostile business models, and most of the money goes to middle-men that only add negative value to the product they're selling.
- wollsmoth 4y ago
  It sounds like you have a lot of concerns about this that all kind of conveniently put you in a place to pirate whatever you want. Most of the time I watch things once, so I rent it if it's not on a platform I subscribe to. Generally then I can watch it on my tv, ps4, phone, computer, whatever. Consider that money spent on these products are an indication to studios about what people like. Movie studios, production companies, they make stuff they think they can sell for a profit. I suggest that you try renting movies or buying ones you like. If you run into a situation where one of your concerns comes to life, I think it would be very reasonable to pirate something you've made a good faith effort to pay for. This is kind of how I started and now for the most part I rent/buy with some exceptions. Still downloading some trash tv shows.
  - kgwxd 4y ago
    I don't need any excuses to download whatever I want. It doesn't cost anyone anything, and no suffering of any kind is introduced into the world for anyone. Most, if not all, things I've downloaded, which isn't much, I've either rented before, seen on TV or in a theater, or have been on one of the streaming services I pay for at some point. Does that cover me ethically? Some people seem to think so. I personally don't care either way and not a single person on this planet is any worse off for my lack of concern.