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'Expensive' Streaming Services Are a Key Reason for Americans to 'Pirate'
- ggm 3y agoNormally economists say competition leads to price reduction. There is obviously pretty aggressive competition in streaming, with at least 5 global players. I don't believe they have formed a cartel or collude to set price but its pretty clear that they aren't competing on price. If they are colluding the FTC can act. Where's the evidence? The lack of FCC oversight is a problem but they lobbying has apparently been extreme. No politicians want the headaches. I think the IPR rules mean that because "house" is non substitutable, there actually isn't as much competition as people want: if you want to watch Hugh Laurie in "house" you have to pay whatever the IPR holders want. It's not surprising people pirate content. I happen to think we were better off with FTA television.
- unnamed76ri 3y agoEach streaming service has unique content. So each one is completely different. It isn’t like which grocery store has the better price for bananas. There’s no need for streaming services to compete on price because no one else has the same product.
- gonzo41 3y agoI would also add that people actually like movies and shows. But Netflix and the finance bro's who run Hollywood now seem hell bent on just taking quick speculative punts on shows and then running away after 1 season and no advertisement. Personally, I'd be happier if there wasn't multiple streamers and just one big marketplace I could access. And for a lot of people that's bit torrent.
- usrusr 3y agoAmazon seems to be the closest thing, with its studio channel subscription modules. If only it wasn't world-eating Amazon! (and if only the implementation did not suck: there are shows on "BBC player", of all things, that I can't get with an English audio track, only an atrocious German dub. Some even start perfectly fine and then surprise-switch to dub only in some later season)
- nicolas_t 3y agoAnd the practice of cancelling shows from Netflix is why I keep cancelling my subscription and waiting for them to have a show I actually like that has more than 1 season before I resubscribe. I have apple tv (because I like For all mankind, Acapulco, Trying, Severance and liked Ted Lasso) and I keep my subscription because they haven't casually cancelled something I liked immediately after engaging my interest. I have Disney plus because we want our son to speak Cantonese and Disney has actually invested in dubbing their cartoons in Cantonese despite the relatively small size of the market. Netflix just pisses me off and doesn't make me want to keep paying. I have bittorrent for things that are not available by streaming (and it amazes me how much content is available thanks to private trackers like PTP) but if a company invests money in providing me with a show I like (Apple TV, amazon occasionally) or preserving a language I care about, I'm going to vote with my wallet for this behavior.
- nemomarx 3y agoWhy is this the case, anyway? Music streaming services and ebook stores generally do compete on price or convenience and mostly all have the same content, and they have similar licensing agreements to movies and tv, right?
- Mindwipe 3y ago> Music streaming services and ebook stores generally do compete on price or convenience and mostly all have the same content, and they have similar licensing agreements to movies and tv, right? Broadly music licensing was dealt with by collective management because a) music is cheaper and has fewer rightsowners as they are simpler works and b) because radio was the primary means of consumption rather than single asset sales. And such collective schemes generally had legal backing. And ultimately the music model doesn't work - Spotify is slowly drowning financially, which is why they are so desperate to try and do other things where they can get exclusivity - first their push for exclusive podcasts and now their push for exclusive training courses and audiobooks.
- AlexandrB 3y agoBecause book and music publishers generally don't run their own streaming services. We're back to the equivalent of when movie studios owned their own theatre chains. Something that was eventually found to be a violation of antitrust law[1]. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Paramount_Pictures,_Inc https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Paramount_P....
- jasode 3y ago>Why is this the case, anyway? Music streaming services [...] mostly all have the same content, Producing song tracks or books is "cheap" compared to tv & films. Because tv series episodes cost more than $1 million each and movies productions can cost over $300 million, the studios are more tightfisted and financially incentivized to hold on to them exclusively for their own networks & streaming platforms instead of licensing it out to all the other streaming services. Right now, the studios believe they can get more $$$ by using their exclusives to attract more subscribers rather than the sum of licensing money they could realistically negotiate from all their competitors. (The streaming competitors all want to underpay for licenses which contradicts the ip owners wanting max dollars.) E.g. Disney thought the old Netflix license contract was too much in favor of Netflix so Disney pulled their content and used it as "exclusives" on their own streaming service to attract subscription revenue. In other words, the early years of Netflix streaming where they seemingly had "everything" (that consumers look back on with fondness) ... was also the time period where Disney/HBO/etc thought they were getting financially shafted by Netflix. Music doesn't have the same economics so the content owners are more willing to syndicate across all music streaming platforms. Nevertheless, there are a few "exclusive" arrangements such as Garth Brooks only offering his studio albums on Amazon Music and rejecting Spotify and Apple Music. It's definitely not the norm compared to tv & movies.
- WithinReason 3y agoCurrently only Netflix is profitable, e.g. Disney lost more than a billion on Disney+. Not sure how they can keep this up if people keep moving to piracy.
- draugadrotten 3y agoHollywood accounting makes it very hard to trust tales of "losses". The money has just been siphoned away to a tax haven somewhere through overpaying for e.g. renting a property or licensing some IP. The money wasn't really "lost", it was just not taxed.
- CoastalCoder 3y agoAre you certain of this? I know Hollywood Accounting is a thing for movie production, but I haven't heard any evidence that it's being used for streaming services. If nothing else, I'd expect a risk of this being treated as securities fraud if streaming service P&L is broken out in public-company reports.
- exe34 3y agoI'll believe the poor rich people who are struggling to buy their third yacht when they open up their accounts books and show where all the money comes from and where it goes to. As long as they keep it secret, I'll assume it's because they don't like paying taxes.
- c0wb0yc0d3r 3y agoThis article[0] indicates that Disney removed shows to write them off. [0]: https://gizmodo.com/disney-streaming-cuts-tax-writeoffs-1850502594 https://gizmodo.com/disney-streaming-cuts-tax-writeoffs-1850...
- Mindwipe 3y ago> Hollywood accounting makes it very hard to trust tales of "losses". Hollywood accounting applies to individual titles. It doesn't apply to entire services - why would you tell your shareholders that you are making a loss to depress the stock price?
- tichiian 3y agoThere is no or very limited competition of streaming services because they do not share content. Almost everything is unique to each streaming service. And big copyright holders even carve out their content and create their own services ala Disney. We would need compulsory licensing to get even a modicum of competition, and even then the licensing deals will work as a pricing cartel. There can be no competition if there is copyright involved.
- bzzzt 3y agoSee the big difference between TV and music streaming. I can switch from Spotify to Apple Music without losing access to most of my songs, but Amazon can't show 'Netflix original' series. I get that movie studio's don't want to 'flat rate' their premium content. Online movie "purchases" seem to be better covered. You can buy/rent about the same movies from Apple, Amazon and some others but they cover a very small number of popular movies. Older movies like the Criterion collection needs yet another subscription which isn't even available in big parts of the world, especially in the EU there seems to be a copyright clusterf*ck of epic proportions where every member state has it's own rule, regulations and small time film licensing companies making it totally impossible to release niche content. Combined with the demise of disc-based movies (I give it about 10 years before major movies are only streamable) I fully expect an increase in enthusiasts resorting to piracy. It really is a service problem...
- izacus 3y agoThis is just big studios trying to avoid the 1948 Paramount vs. USA situation, where they were banned from owning cinemas and thus creating market competition. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Paramount_Pictures,_Inc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Paramount_Pic.... They're trying to not make that mistake again and being forced to actually... compete!
- littlestymaar 3y ago> There can be no competition if there is copyright involved. Truth is there can almost never be real competition on any market that isn't raw materials, because there's IP (not just copyright, but patents and trademarks as well) almost everywhere else.
- Mindwipe 3y ago> I don't believe they have formed a cartel or collude to set price but its pretty clear that they aren't competing on price. Sure they are. It's just that they were competing on price so much that every service was operating on a loss making basis until interest rates went up and that became unsustainable. You don't need collusion for interest rates skyrocketing to lead to unprofitable services needing to raise pricing at the same time.
- sylware 3y agoThere is another major reason why bittorrent shoud be used: interop. "Streaming services" broke noscript/basic (x)html interoperability.
- codegrappler 3y agoI think it’s also helpful to point out that the pirating interfaces have gotten _really_ good. Using Overseer, Radaar, and Sonaar together with Plex created such a seamless experience I was blown away the first time I saw it. Any movie or show across any service at the push of a button. It doesn’t even feel like pirating. It feels like any other service.
- Arn_Thor 3y agoThe interfaces are great but the setup process is still far beyond “plug and play” so the mainstream pirate probably still do it the cumbersome but simple way
- wasteduniverse 3y agoI think the clunkyness of getting into torrenting media is a necessary evil to keep it from getting cracked down on. It's like antibiotics: the more people use them, the less effective they become.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- thatcat 3y agoThat's not a great metaphor since they become technically more effective since p2p performance improves as the network grows assuming a minimum seed/leech ratio
- hanniabu 3y agoSyncler is pretty plug and play, just need to enter your subscription code ($2/month) and your torrent streaming service (realdebris/premiumize, $5/month)
- utensil4778 3y agoIt really isn't that bad either, though. The key part is that after I spent a couple of days getting the servers stood up, my tech illiterate husband can just go to this website, search for a movie, and it pops up in his jellyfin app after an hour or so. I have a fairly complex system. I have a VM that tunnels traffic between my local network and my VPN. A second VM hosts all my radarr and torrent servers, which only has network access through the router VM. Files get stored on a shared zvol and jellyfin just automatically detects the new files. The hardest part was the VPN routing. Setting up all the servarrs is basically plug and play. You run the installer script and then copy a key into all the instances you want talking to each other. It really couldn't get much simpler.
- Veuxdo 3y agoNever change, torrentfreak, never change
- roody15 3y agoStreaming services are too pricey and the addition to an ad tier model has pushed me back into limited piracy. Whether it’s Netflix asking if I want to register this device or if I am traveling , to max streaming and ad for its own service I already pay before each show … old school Kodi loaded up is more and more appealing.
- timbaboon 3y agoWhen I started working and was no longer a broke student, I started streaming or renting content. I guess I’m a bit of an outlier in that I rarely buy (or want to buy any content). However, when I can’t find the content on any platforms… what to do? Tbp is my next port of call. I was trying to find Harold and Kumar last week and it actually wasn’t available on any platforms available in my country :(
- yakshaving_jgt 3y agoThe reason why I pirate stuff even while paying for streaming services is because it's too often that I find something I want on Amazon Prime, only for it to then say "This video is unavailable".
- Neil44 3y agoIt's not that the individual services are expecsive per se it's just that theres too many of them. I don't want to sub to yet another service just for one show.
- ies7 3y agoExpensive? How about complexity. https://www.pokemon.com/us/animation/where-to-watch-pokemon-episodes-movies https://www.pokemon.com/us/animation/where-to-watch-pokemon-...
- anArbitraryOne 3y agoCan they have more grades of subscriptions? I don't want to pay for a full month of unlimited streaming when I only want to watch a few hours
- sphars 3y agoOn top of this, I'd like more options to stream in 4K, but without the concurrent streams option. I don't need 4 streams if I'm the only one using my account
- anArbitraryOne 3y agoAgreed
- rascul 3y agoNot just pricing, but that's a big part of it. Streaming services tend to have garbage UI's, content that gets removed after x amount of time, and filled with ads (sometimes unskippable). The user experience can be so much better with pirating.
- TeMPOraL 3y agoThis, too, though I imagine most people learned to endure garbage UI. But seriously, Netflix with its minimally functional, feature-less UI is the golden standard of streaming services. It seems that the bigger the company behind the service, the worse it gets. Like, you could hardly find a porn site with worse players than Disney+, and the thing is less snappy than a pirate streaming service with a cryptominer running in the background. I sometimes wonder how it's even possible to do such a bad job - even modern web software isn't that unperformant by default, someone had to put in extra work to make it this bad.
- definitelyauser 3y ago> Streaming services tend to have garbage UI's, content that gets removed after x amount of time, and filled with ads And forced mandatory subtitles in the wrong language. (Netflix) Actually had to install a chrome plugin to remove subtitles.
- not_the_fda 3y agoI used to never pirate, paid for everything. I was dumb and bought Mythbusters on a PS4 many years ago. Can no longer watch it, they removed the content. Have HBO Max, they had Mythbusters on it, started watching it again. Midway through they started to remove content. I bought a show, and can no longer watch it, can't even watch it on a streaming service, that I pay for, that owns the rights to the content. I'm full on pirate now. I gave them money and they removed my ability to watch the content I paid for.
- xattt 3y agoIs it piracy if it’s content you purchased in the past but access was removed? In my mind, it’s absolutely not. This is just plain double-dipping bullshit.
- kevin_thibedeau 3y agoIf you bought a VHS you don't have automatic rights to a BluRay copy.
- chii 3y agoBut you do have the right to transcribe your VHS copy to bluray yourself. Format conversion is not illegal.
- wil421 3y agoFor VHS yes but breaking DRM on Blu Rays is illegal and you have to do it to copy them. However, to my knowledge no one has ever been prosecuted for breaking the DRM on a blu ray. Unless they shared the copy online.
- etrautmann 3y agoIsn’t this discussion about that’s ethical and moral, rather that what’s legal?
- 3y ago
- kaetemi 3y agoAlso random episodes disappearing for reasons. And series disappearing halfway while you're watching them.
- elif 3y agoIt's not about the price for me, it's about the bullshit content deals. For instance, between my paramount and Amazon subscriptions, I get to watch NFL maybe 60% of days there are games. They expect me to buy a third (massive) subscription to close the remaining gap? No thank you, I'll just watch in lower resolution/frames for free. F1, on the other hand, absolutely nailed the content deal and get $85/yr from me.. even though previously I'd been pirating every race for over a decade. As soon as they make a good offer I take it. Simple as.
- zeeZ 3y agoExcept for Germany, where Sky got an exclusive deal and expect you to pay 28€ per month for the privilege. I'm grandfathered in the yearly 65€ subscription of F1TV and as soon as I am no longer allowed to renew I'll probably forget that the sport exists.
- draw_down 3y agoI wouldn’t say they are too expensive but they are capricious. Just because you pay doesn’t mean you can watch something. Content is always appearing and disappearing.
- limapedro 3y agoI think one of the reasons as well is that it's easier to find that content that you wanna watch, sometimes tracking which streaming service has a movie or show that you looking for is almost impossible.
- _xerces_ 3y agoGoogle has a useful "Where to watch" feature in their results for a lot of TV shows.
- einsteinx2 2y agoThere are sites [1] dedicated just to searching all the streaming services for you to find the thing you’re looking for that I’ve used and work pretty well, but it’s kind of ridiculous that they even need to exist. 1. justwatch.com (perfect name for the frustration)
- mdtrooper 3y agoFor me, the reason is not found the films in the streaming platforms. And another problem (for people foreign languages, non-english) the original dubbing of the film is lost (for copyrights or the original dub audio film was in low quality (VHS or something)) and the film in the streaming platform is with a new dubbing (and normaly it does not give old high spirits).
- mdtrooper 3y agoAlthough off-topic because it is in the computer games, not films, the worst example of lost dubbing is the spanish voices of old edition Baldurs Gate 2. The new version of this game for GNU/Linux, Android has a new spanish dubbing and it is bloody worst.
- dguest 3y agoEven streaming a film in the original language can be hard. If you want to stream the English version of a Hollywood movie, you often can't do it from your country. It might only be distributed in e.g. German or Italian.
- musha68k 3y agoTotally relatable as streaming issues often are kafkaesque due to licensing, shoddy platform maintenance etc. I can really see a resurgence of physical media at some point. Personally I'd be collecting UHD BDs even more if it weren't for "4K remasters" which rely on AI image reconstruction way too heavily.
- nerdjon 3y agoFor me it isnt about price, I happily pay for Disney+ and Hulu bundle. And Apple TV+ but that is part of my Apple One subscription. My problem is where things are, I don't subscribe to Netflix because they seem determined to not work with the Apple TV app which is my primary way of watching things. Most of my content is in there. I want all of my stuff to be together and we have a solution but Netflix refuses to support it. Now annoyingly, this problem is not actually fixed by pirating. But I am at least not supporting their behavior.
- geodel 3y agoWell plain reason seems to me is because they can. I mean I don’t see people grabbing apartments because rent is expensive or leaving restaurants without paying after meals beach food is expensive. Same for school/ college fees and that’s really expensive. In most cases people will do all sorts of unsanctioned things if they can get away with it.
- TeMPOraL 3y agoYes, but then why can they get away with it? Perhaps because there's an unspoken general understanding among people, legislation and law enforcement, that individual-level IP rights enforcement is mostly bullshit, and IP is in large part just a necessary evil to keep the status quo from breaking too fast. Artificial scarcity is not exactly morally defensible in the first place.
- yashg 3y agoWho would have thunk?
- bilekas 3y agoHonestly I find it impossible to find a consistently good library of content in one place. Netflix might have a few good old movies for example, and then 1 show, Amazon prime will have other exclusives Disney etc. It's insane to expect people to pay for them all just for a few. They are using the Game console distribution model. Console exclusives / Content exclusives.. It's a bad model from the start, looking at spotify on the other hand and even podcasts are a great example of the shared distributed model. the latest expression for game studios at least is : "If buying it means I don't own it, then pirating it means I didn't steal it."
- costanzaDynasty 3y agoBefore the streaming boom I would've gone through the ripping and having a library to maintain, but after streaming I feel stuffed and don't care anymore. Nothing that is being made now or for the last couple of years I care about. You destroyed and watered down every IP and you're back to your dirty tricks again. It's too bad, but for a while there was peace. Me personally, I've moved on with my life.
- joshstrange 3y agoExpense doesn't factor in for some people. Running Plex/Jellyfin/Emby/etc + arr's can be many times more expensive (even in the long run) than just paying monthly. The UI/UX is a huge reason. With a home media server you get: Consistent UI/controls * All content in one app * Download content to any device without restriction for offline viewing * Instant, full quality playback on LAN * Ability to screen capture/record segments of a show to share (not for pirating but for memes and the like) * * Old/unpopular/"censored" content is always available. ** * I maintain that blacking out screen capture by streaming services is one of the stupidest and most self-sabotaging things they could do. Why these services don't build in meme/annotation tools or clip export is beyond me. You have people ready and willing to advertise your show _for free_ and you cut off your nose to spite your face. ** No I don't think blackface is ok to do but anyone who can't see that 30 Rock is making fun of people doing blackface is missing the point completely. Also covering up what was said/done in the past does not prevent us from making the same mistakes again. It's a white-washing (sometimes quite literally) that benefits no one. I'm sure I'm missing a few other points but for some people it's _never_ really been about price or if it was initially about price it's not anymore, or so I've heard...