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> The success of p2p file sharing platforms rested on the fact that people like piracy and free stuff, it didn't compete on service quality. Which became eviden
by ZaoLahma 3y ago
> The success of p2p file sharing platforms rested on the fact that people like piracy and free stuff, it didn't compete on service quality. Which became evident when most content became cheap and people switched.
Nah, it was absolutely about service quality. Absodefinitelutely.
Back in the day it was either buying things on physical media and adjusting your living situation accordingly (having meters of shelves just to store it and media player(s) set up to play the media), OR sail the seas and have "your" entire media library stored away on a media server in the closet, easily accessible from the media center PC connected to your TV. Netflix before Netflix was a thing, essentially.
Now, finally, they caught on and do provide a similar (in some ways higher) level of service as the "homebrew Netflix" solution from "þe aulde" days, and people are prepared to pay for it. I gladly pay the price for the different streaming services because of the convenience of having everything easily accessible in a format that doesn't take up all the space at my home. If that disappears though, I'll grumpily re-build the server in the closet and expand the sails again.
- creshal 3y agoThere's still plenty of people who don't want or can't pay for the official service... but these days, >90% use illegal streaming portals instead of p2p services, because the service quality is so much higher. No need for a server closet, when these sites are basically "netflix but you don't need to log in and they actually have what you want".
- ZaoLahma 3y agoHuh I see. That makes me happy even though I'll still choose to pay, since I guess it will make it harder for the legal streaming providers to suddenly downgrade the experience. It's sad that we need piracy to drive innovation and keep quality expectations up.