10 ms·

Popcorn Time is back

181 points by galapago 12y ago

ghughes 12y ago
Editorialized title. I enjoyed the part where they berate the other fork for "ripping off" their UI, which exists solely to facilitate piracy.
- ekianjo 12y ago
  > which exists solely to facilitate piracy. Let's not use the words the big majors wants people to use. The right wording is copyright infringement and that's it.
  - 13hours 12y ago
    Piracy is a well known synonym for copyright infringement. I would agree with you that something like "theft" would not be a good term to use, but Piracy is spot-on.
    - DerpDerpDerp 12y ago
      "Piracy" is a term used specifically to attach the implication of theft to copyright infringement, because actual pirates steal things. The root of calling it "piracy" is no better than calling it "theft", even if it has become common to refer to it as such. It's completely reasonable to make an appeal to talk about it accurately.
    - Already__Taken 12y ago
      Piracy still exists and kills people. Using that word for downloading a movie just seems wrong.
    - ekianjo 12y ago
      Nope, Piracy can be used to mean a lot of things, including stealing physical goods IRL. It's certainly not the right expression to use if you ONLY mean copyright infringement.
    - rmc 12y ago
      And people who do copyright infringment have adopted the label. Just look at the Pirate Party and The Pirate Bay.
  - tzs 12y ago
    If you are a plaintiff writing a complaint, an interested party writing an amicus brief, a legal scholar writing a law review article, and so on, then indeed the right wording is copyright infringement and arguably "that's it". If you are speaking outside of a formal legal context, than it most certainly is not the case that "that's it". In ordinary English, we overload and generalize many criminal terms, such as "piracy", "theft", and "stealing" to apply to things that do not meet the precise legal definition of those words. For example, consider "steal" and its variants. Here are some common examples of usage that are not literally the crime of stealing. Many are not even crimes or torts. • Someone says they do not like cats and have no interest in having one as a pet. A cute stray kitten shows up on their doorstep, they take pity and feed it. They fall in love with it and keep it. They might say that the kitten "stole" their heart. • An actor playing a minor role in a play gives a performance that outshines the performance of the stars. Many would say that the actor "stole" the show. • An employee of a rival company poses as a janitor to gain access to your lab and takes a photo of a whiteboard containing the formula for a chemical that is a trade secret in your manufacturing process. It would be common to say that the rival company "stole" your secret formula. • When crackers gain access to a company's list of customer email addresses, passwords, or credit card numbers, it is commonly said that the data was "stolen". • Alice is Bob's fiancé. Mallory woos Alice without Bob's knowledge. Alice elopes with Mallory. Most would find it acceptable if Bob said that Mallory "stole" his fiancé. • A team that has been behind since the start of the game but wins on a last second improbable play is often said to have "stolen" the game. I could go on [1]. [1] I believe I once posted a longer list, but HN crashed shortly afterward and had to be restored from backup. My post was lost.
    - habitue 12y ago
      He's making a point to raise awareness of a propaganda term that's made it into the common lexicon, and saying its use should be discontinued when discussing copyright infringement. He's expressing a prescriptive statement, and you're replying with a descriptive statement.
- Springtime 12y ago
  > I enjoyed the part where they berate the other fork for "ripping off" their UI, which exists solely to facilitate piracy. I did find this amusing. The irony is strong with this one, although they have some valid points expanded on in the Reddit post linked. Comment from a contributor on the time4popcorn repo: I am also waiting for a reply. You guys just copy other people's work and don't even give them proper credits... if you decide to start coding I could put you back in. Not if you keep stealing though.
  - kluivers 12y ago
    Question is: what license is that work released under (GPL3?) and does that license require attribution?
    - mkesper 12y ago
      Almost all licenses require attribution, at least at the file level.
      - rmc 12y ago
        Not the GPL. GNU & RMS used to complain about the attribution requirement of the original BSD licences.
        nitrogen 12y ago
        The GPL does require attribution. It was the advertising clause of the older BSD licenses (similar to the one used by OpenSSL) that was problematic for the GPL, because it imposed restrictions on activities not directly connected to the software. You absolutely cannot remove copyright notices from GPL software and claim credit for it.
        dragonwriter 12y ago
        > You absolutely cannot remove copyright notices from GPL software and claim credit for it. There is nothing in the GPL that requires preserving upstream copyright notices in downstream modified versions of software, or any other form of attribution of the origin of modified versions; it does require "appropriate copyright notice", but since copyright on a derived work rests with the creator of the derivative, the modifiers copyright would appear to suffice for that for modified works. The GPL explicitly prohibits attributing modified works to the creators of the upstream work (as it requires you to include notification of your modification and a relevant date).
- bryan_rasmussen 12y ago
  They made something to facilitate piracy, most probably piracy not done for profit, but did not pirate something and then put it out as their own with the intention to make a profit.
  - peterhajas 12y ago
    They're making an enabling technology which can solely be used for stealing. Seems like piracy to me.
    - icebraining 12y ago
      It might be piracy, but it's definitively not stealing. The SCOTUS itself explained why.
- ekianjo 12y ago
  > I enjoyed the part where they berate the other fork for "ripping off" their UI, which exists solely to facilitate piracy. You missed their point. They are angry about the ripoff because they include malware in it and try to pass for the real thing. Popcorn time does not pretend to be Metflix or something in terms of branding, so what's where your analogy ends
- dspillett 12y ago
  I once, in a previous incarnation as a naughty law-breaking youngster, frequented a torrent tracker that specialised in games. You should have seen the vitriol thrown around if someone dare copy someone else's copy/keygen/what-ever without giving appropriate credit... I was thrown off the site for pointing out how amusing the hypocrisy was.
  - hnarn 12y ago
    Maybe you were thrown off because you failed to see the difference between simply copying copyrighted content without permission (filesharing), and copying something and claiming that you in fact created it yourself, explicitly (I made this!) or implicitly, by not attributing the original author (plagiarism).
    - dspillett 12y ago
      There is no difference. The content producer worked on the content and wants what they want in exchange for it (indirectly for the effort): money. The ripper worked on ripping the content and wants what they want for it (indirectly for the effort): recognition. One of the usual complains was their "internal rips" being posted elsewhere even when posted without any attribution being removed (or at least with no claim of creator-ship added). There were "rippers" who tried to take credit for the efforts of others, but re-distributing outside the group was the main complaint (either with "correct" attribution or with no attribution at all). I was thrown off because I refused to apologise for not seeing the difference between one person taking the attitude "great, I'll take this and do what-ever I want to do with it under my own terms and not your's because I can and fuck you if you don't like it" and a second person also taking the attitude "great, I'll take this and do what-ever I want to do with it under my own terms and not your's because I can and fuck you if you don't like it".
      - habitue 12y ago
        There is a difference. When movies are copied, nobody takes the credits out and adds their name into them. We're talking about attribution vs. copyright. They're completely separate issues, and it trips people up every time something like this gets posted.
fit2rule 12y ago
There's a missed opportunity here .. movie companies should be forking Popcorn Time, whacking a brand on there, and putting their own version out. What a pity the world is run by lawyers..
- tunnuz 12y ago
  Netflix does this (the service, not the fork), too bad it is still unavailable in many countries.
  - ekianjo 12y ago
    And its catalog is limited, too, even in the US.
    - sspiff 12y ago
      I have a Netflix US account (over VPN, since I live outside the US), and after all the coverage it had gotten, I was really disappointed with the catalog. A lot of the shows my girlfriend was hoping to watch are unavailable, and the movie catalog is also extremely restricted.
  - girvo 12y ago
    The lack of Netflix in Australia really frustrates me. Id pay for it gladly and happily, but I can't, despite living in a first world country that has a very high amount of discretional spending (consider we pay twice what everyone else does, taking into account exchange rates, for software) and the highest rate of copyright infringement in first world countries. Sigh.
- mehwoot 12y ago
  Why?
  - forrestthewoods 12y ago
    It's about volume. Sure the movie companies will be giving away their films for free. But if you give away enough films for free it becomes profitable!!
zarify 12y ago
The Doctor Who fan in me is lamenting that this domain isn't actually about a Popcorn Time-War.
- shankysingh 12y ago
  update: removed..
  - thedrei 12y ago
    Which let out little screams as they hit their target. This war seems on par with a marshmallow fight.
    - shankysingh 12y ago
      update : removed.
SchizoDuckie 12y ago
So they need a domain to tell us this? I'm calling shenanigans
mahyarm 12y ago
Next they could add chromecast support / transcoding and they have a pretty good competitor for plex. After that a couple of mobile clients?
- arianvanp 12y ago
  I'm working on a fork with Chromecast support. It works pretty well. Just a bit scared to open source it. Perhaps i will release it under a pseudonym or something. It's ridicioulous that people need to be afraid to release stuff but sadly enough this is the case.
  - espadrine 12y ago
    Why not submit your patch to one of the current maintainers privately? That way it won't link to you.
  - StavrosK 12y ago
    Please submit it upstream. It would be amazing.
  - k-mcgrady 12y ago
    >> It's ridicioulous that people need to be afraid to release stuff but sadly enough this is the case. I'm conflicted on this. The MPAA abuse their power regularly but it's hard to deny it's now easier and cheaper than ever to access and watch movies. That takes away a lot of the justification for piracy and creating tools that facilitate it. Edit: And here come the down votes. Don't down vote if you disagree with someone - reply. If they add nothing to the conversation then down vote.
    - Ntrails 12y ago
      Anecdotal evidence alert. I live in the UK. On Sunday I wanted to watch the new Fargo TV show. I do not own a Television. I went to watch it 'live' on the Channel 4 website. It kept saying my broadband wasn't good enough. Odd. Googled a bit, ah - adblock is causing issues. This needs a new whitelist compared to 4od - fine by me. Sit through 2 minutes of adverts specifically over the web player (bearing in mind the channel I am waiting to watch also has ads - so by watching online I am apparently getting extra, thanks). Miss the first minute of the show but never mind - I was setting up last minute. 30 seconds into the stream, player dies and shows "insufficient bandwidth" again. Hit refresh. Starts new ad cycle over player. Ctrl+W. Ctrl+T. "Eztv.it". Tab. "Fargo". Tab Enter Tab Tab Enter. Enter. Within 4 minutes my "too slow" broadband had got the show at what seemed like better quality than the official web player. I also had no ads so I even finished watching the episode before terrestrial viewers despite starting late. Content delivery still sucks. Maybe my tolerance is too low, but frankly maybe it's worth accommodating that and providing content in an easy and consistent fashion. I was so impressed by Joss Whedon releasing his movie on vimeo (although I would prefer DLs over streams) that I bought it just to support it.
jtreanor 12y ago
Popcorn Time previously just showed open domain films in the screen shots. The new one has pictures Game of Thrones and company. It looks like they have stopped pretending this is not for piracy. edit: clarification
- espadrine 12y ago
  Now, for morality to be on their side, they need to publicly advocate and work on a better way to remunerate the content creators. Of course, they could go rogue and act exclusively out of spite for big media, arguing parasitically that how the content creators make money is none of their business. But I really hope they don't.
  - pikachu_is_cool 12y ago
    Why?
    - espadrine 12y ago
      > Why? Why I hope they don't just stay rogue? Because having a self-sustainable, transparent industry that actually tries to protect users benefits everyone in the long-run. Creators would accept such an industry because they could do what they love for money, and users would accept it because they would obtain entertainment while knowing where the money they spend goes, and knowing that the work will go to the public domain after a reasonable amount of time. I know I sound like a fool; no need to tell me.
      - pikachu_is_cool 12y ago
        Sorry, I should have clarified. I meant this: "arguing parasitically that how the content creators make money is none of their business" I was just wondering your thought process here. It seems that you think piracy is a bad thing, when I see it as a good thing. Who cares about the industry? We have more and higher quality music, software, movies, and TV than ever because of piracy. And for free! Shouldn't that be celebrated? We can now focus on spending our money on more pressing things like food, shelter and health care. Sure, some people can't make money off of direct sales of copies but markets change. We can adapt. Just look at Chance the Rapper, he gave both albums out for free (never charged a dime) and he's rolling in dough because of features and concerts. Also I'm pretty sure he's not at the mercy of a record company, either.
antihero 12y ago
Someone posted a really good article on the being right vs being pragmatic - about it being a service problem as opposed to an ethical one, or something like that. It'd be really handy if someone could post it.
- rrreese 12y ago
  You're probably thinking of this article by Marco Arment: http://www.marco.org/2012/02/25/right-vs-pragmatic http://www.marco.org/2012/02/25/right-vs-pragmatic
  - mentos 12y ago
    I 100% agree with this approach but what does it imply for the TV/Movie industry? To me the problem is that they cannot control distribution. So one solution could be baking adverts into the tv/movie. Has the obvious flaw of poisoning art with advertising, but if done well might work? What does everyone else see as the pragmatic solution?
    - JonLim 12y ago
      They've definitely been baking advertisements into movies and television shows for years now. My ideal pragmatic solution would be a platform (or two, or five) that acts like a dumb pipe for content providers to license their content to, and receive some form of compensation every time it is watched, prorated into the amount of the episode/movie is actually watched. However, given the difficult licensing issues found for every country, that's probably not going to happen any time soon.
      - sbarre 12y ago
        Also the content production ecosystem is currently reliant on big successes making up for failures and/or niche content. That's why cable companies bundle channels together instead of letting you pick and choose the ones you want. If it wasn't for this, the industry would become even more risk-averse, and we would see a lot less diversity of content, or risky unproven ventures. In the end I believe this would be a net loss to everyone.
krisgenre 12y ago
I am beginning to think time4popcorn might be the NSA! :O
danra 12y ago
Does anyone have the specifics of what malware time4popcorn includes?
imikay 12y ago
They are using SEO tricks to get a better rank.
happywolf 12y ago
Some of the reactions here remind me of the time when mp3 starting to gain traction (circa ~1995). A lot of people were worried this new file format would mark the end of entertainment business: who would spend money to buy songs when they could download for free in mp3 format? I guess I don't need to point out how much money Apple has made through iTunes by selling unprotected audio tracks for the past years. In other words, I see similarities in concerns people are having on Popcorn Time and the introduction of mp3 10+ years ago. Businesses die not because of piracy, but because of lack of innovation and not meeting consumers' needs. period.
- baby 12y ago
  There is a difference between trying to find a mp3 to download and having the convenience of an application that works as well as netflix for movies but is completely free. (btw I started coding on a popcorn-like but for music. Think spotify for free. https://github.com/mimoo/nodster https://github.com/mimoo/nodster it's here. But I'm thinking about changing the code to just converting youtube videos to mp3 instead of looking for mp3 files on google)
  - dublinben 12y ago
    Do you not remember programs like Napster and Limewire? They were as convenient as iTunes (years before iTMS was launched) and offered every song you could imagine. It's just surprising that it's taken so long for similar services to mature for video content.
    - duaneb 12y ago
      > and offered every song you could imagine This is where I tend to disagree. Yes, popular songs were on there, but terribly tagged (or outright mislabeled), and half of it was porn. Not even varied porn, just the same damn videos replicated a million times.
      - aylons 12y ago
        I don't remember video at all in Napster and most Napster rooms were very nice. People actually catalogued their library in use and we could download from a specific user. I suppose you are talking about emule or Kazaa, but Napster was surely a very nice place to hang out. I have met even met people there, people I still talk to this day.
kwamenum86 12y ago
PS: On a sidenote, and as Torrent Freak has written about them, I must point that Time4Popcorn are pretending to be developing another version of Popcorn Time. The truth is that they are ripping some of our community work without crediting the authors. We would obviously have no concerns if they acknowledged the source of the work, as Popcorn Time is an open source project. The latest example being how they compiled in their app 5 days of our UI work. No words.
- coffeecodecouch 12y ago
  They're concerned about Time4Popcorn crediting the work as their own, which Popcorn Time (or any pirating platform I've ever seen) doesn't do.
  - abustamam 12y ago
    I can understand the logic, but no one using Popcorn time will credit the movie for being their own. No one thinks the star of Hunger Games was the developer of Popcorn Time, or the person pirating it, and no one is claiming as such. Secondly, from my cursory glance, it seems as if T4P can/will easily spread malware, but this could just be fearmongering on Popcorn Time's end.
butterfi 12y ago
"We are totally aware of the legal implications, and we're not afraid, because we care for the people." Personally I'd be interested in hearing more about how this is helping people. I suspect there are much better things you could be doing to help people then this project. A more accurate sentence might be: "We are totally aware of the legal implications, and we're not afraid, because we're doing it for the lolz and free movies"
- rkuykendall-com 12y ago
  The "lolz" might be more accurate, but I suspect that anybody developing for this project has no problems getting free movies without this app. It is marketed at people who find Bittorent complicated. The most 'defendable' use-case would be an elderly, poor, sick grandmother in a country with no copyright laws who just wants to watch movies with her grandchildren or something. This might sound laughable to you, but developers for apps like this think of that as their target demographic, not all the mid-20s middle class Americans mostly using the app.
  - runawaybottle 12y ago
    But here's the thing, people that know the most about getting stuff for free also automate the hell out of it. If you've got a usenet account, you've probably got the following setup: - https://couchpota.to/ https://couchpota.to/ - http://sickbeard.com/ http://sickbeard.com/ - https://github.com/rembo10/headphones https://github.com/rembo10/headphones People auto-download the latest episode of a tv show throughout the season, albums, etc.
spaznode 12y ago
Hey wait, http://www.time4popcorn.eu/ http://www.time4popcorn.eu/ app compared to one referenced in this article is much much more functionally complete for what you see right now today. Like tv series / playback torrent network seems to always work immediately. The get-popcorn app as it is now provides none of it. So "blah blah blah" about all the promises and project mission. If you just want to have some f-in popcorn time enjoyment. If get-popcorn ends up being better at some point great, til then ... http://www.time4popcorn.eu/ http://www.time4popcorn.eu/ is the only popcorn for me. =)
- computer 12y ago
  Your time4popcorn runs code with full access to your computer directly from a server controlled by unnamed individuals who are acting in completely mysterious ways. I.e. on every load of the app, it downloads code from a server controlled by the time4popcorn guys, and then executes it locally with access to your entire system. I would never trust such an app.
  - spaznode 12y ago
    Ohhh ..uhhh shit. Well, good point then. Glad I asked. =/
mwilkison 12y ago
How feasible would it be to build an alt coin on top of Popcorn-Time. Call it PopCoin or Popcorn-Coin or something :). You pay every time you watch a movie, you get paid for hosting torrents and some percentage of each transaction is routed to the content creator/whoever owns the rights to the content?
pennetti 12y ago
This is just another indication that video media is in need of a new medium. There is a need something like Steam or Spotify, but for TV Shows and movies. Netflix, Hulu, Crackle, etc. are all lacking in terms of the videos they offer and there's nothing to fill the void unless you want to go into the realm of physical media (and let's be honest, you don't). Torrents are easy, but managing a collection and getting good quality videos is still a pain. I'm in college now and I started torrenting music in the 8th grade - iTunes came and I realized that I would have had to spend thousands of dollars to get the collection I wanted - so I continued to torrent music. I would have missed out on a lot of music if I relied on iTunes (and be out $100k or so) but once I found Spotify and realized that I would no longer have to edit all the ID3 tags, find album work, and deal with poor audio quality for $5 a month, I instantly switched and haven't looked back (except for music they lack like The Beatles, AC/DC, and Def Leppard which I still torrent, oops). Game of Thrones recently broke a torrent record [1] and the CEO of HBO basically said they appreciate the publicity and thank their fans. IMO money is not as big of an issue for video as it is for music because the networks and actors aren't suffering the way musicians do (this is just my opinion based on observation). Yeah, Spotify has been called out for not compensating artists properly [2] but I think it's a step in the right direction in terms of service. I like the idea of something like Popcorn Time but I think it's just a wake-up call that there is a need for innovation in the realm of video media. The music and gaming industries have seen a shift in recent years, so maybe movies and tv shows are not far behind... [1] http://time.com/63331/game-of-thrones-torrent-record/ http://time.com/63331/game-of-thrones-torrent-record/ [2] http://www.businessinsider.com/thom-yorke-explains-why-he-hates-spotify-2013-10 http://www.businessinsider.com/thom-yorke-explains-why-he-ha...

181 points by galapago 12y ago

Editorialized title. I enjoyed the part where they berate the other fork for "ripping off" their UI, which exists solely to facilitate piracy.

ekianjo 12y ago
> which exists solely to facilitate piracy. Let's not use the words the big majors wants people to use. The right wording is copyright infringement and that's it.
- 13hours 12y ago
  Piracy is a well known synonym for copyright infringement. I would agree with you that something like "theft" would not be a good term to use, but Piracy is spot-on.
  - DerpDerpDerp 12y ago
    "Piracy" is a term used specifically to attach the implication of theft to copyright infringement, because actual pirates steal things. The root of calling it "piracy" is no better than calling it "theft", even if it has become common to refer to it as such. It's completely reasonable to make an appeal to talk about it accurately.
  - Already__Taken 12y ago
    Piracy still exists and kills people. Using that word for downloading a movie just seems wrong.
  - ekianjo 12y ago
    Nope, Piracy can be used to mean a lot of things, including stealing physical goods IRL. It's certainly not the right expression to use if you ONLY mean copyright infringement.
  - rmc 12y ago
    And people who do copyright infringment have adopted the label. Just look at the Pirate Party and The Pirate Bay.
- tzs 12y ago
  If you are a plaintiff writing a complaint, an interested party writing an amicus brief, a legal scholar writing a law review article, and so on, then indeed the right wording is copyright infringement and arguably "that's it". If you are speaking outside of a formal legal context, than it most certainly is not the case that "that's it". In ordinary English, we overload and generalize many criminal terms, such as "piracy", "theft", and "stealing" to apply to things that do not meet the precise legal definition of those words. For example, consider "steal" and its variants. Here are some common examples of usage that are not literally the crime of stealing. Many are not even crimes or torts. • Someone says they do not like cats and have no interest in having one as a pet. A cute stray kitten shows up on their doorstep, they take pity and feed it. They fall in love with it and keep it. They might say that the kitten "stole" their heart. • An actor playing a minor role in a play gives a performance that outshines the performance of the stars. Many would say that the actor "stole" the show. • An employee of a rival company poses as a janitor to gain access to your lab and takes a photo of a whiteboard containing the formula for a chemical that is a trade secret in your manufacturing process. It would be common to say that the rival company "stole" your secret formula. • When crackers gain access to a company's list of customer email addresses, passwords, or credit card numbers, it is commonly said that the data was "stolen". • Alice is Bob's fiancé. Mallory woos Alice without Bob's knowledge. Alice elopes with Mallory. Most would find it acceptable if Bob said that Mallory "stole" his fiancé. • A team that has been behind since the start of the game but wins on a last second improbable play is often said to have "stolen" the game. I could go on [1]. [1] I believe I once posted a longer list, but HN crashed shortly afterward and had to be restored from backup. My post was lost.
  - habitue 12y ago
    He's making a point to raise awareness of a propaganda term that's made it into the common lexicon, and saying its use should be discontinued when discussing copyright infringement. He's expressing a prescriptive statement, and you're replying with a descriptive statement.
Springtime 12y ago
> I enjoyed the part where they berate the other fork for "ripping off" their UI, which exists solely to facilitate piracy. I did find this amusing. The irony is strong with this one, although they have some valid points expanded on in the Reddit post linked. Comment from a contributor on the time4popcorn repo: I am also waiting for a reply. You guys just copy other people's work and don't even give them proper credits... if you decide to start coding I could put you back in. Not if you keep stealing though.
- kluivers 12y ago
  Question is: what license is that work released under (GPL3?) and does that license require attribution?
  - mkesper 12y ago
    Almost all licenses require attribution, at least at the file level.
    - rmc 12y ago
      Not the GPL. GNU & RMS used to complain about the attribution requirement of the original BSD licences.
      - nitrogen 12y ago
        The GPL does require attribution. It was the advertising clause of the older BSD licenses (similar to the one used by OpenSSL) that was problematic for the GPL, because it imposed restrictions on activities not directly connected to the software. You absolutely cannot remove copyright notices from GPL software and claim credit for it.
        dragonwriter 12y ago
        > You absolutely cannot remove copyright notices from GPL software and claim credit for it. There is nothing in the GPL that requires preserving upstream copyright notices in downstream modified versions of software, or any other form of attribution of the origin of modified versions; it does require "appropriate copyright notice", but since copyright on a derived work rests with the creator of the derivative, the modifiers copyright would appear to suffice for that for modified works. The GPL explicitly prohibits attributing modified works to the creators of the upstream work (as it requires you to include notification of your modification and a relevant date).
bryan_rasmussen 12y ago
They made something to facilitate piracy, most probably piracy not done for profit, but did not pirate something and then put it out as their own with the intention to make a profit.
- peterhajas 12y ago
  They're making an enabling technology which can solely be used for stealing. Seems like piracy to me.
  - icebraining 12y ago
    It might be piracy, but it's definitively not stealing. The SCOTUS itself explained why.
ekianjo 12y ago
> I enjoyed the part where they berate the other fork for "ripping off" their UI, which exists solely to facilitate piracy. You missed their point. They are angry about the ripoff because they include malware in it and try to pass for the real thing. Popcorn time does not pretend to be Metflix or something in terms of branding, so what's where your analogy ends
dspillett 12y ago
I once, in a previous incarnation as a naughty law-breaking youngster, frequented a torrent tracker that specialised in games. You should have seen the vitriol thrown around if someone dare copy someone else's copy/keygen/what-ever without giving appropriate credit... I was thrown off the site for pointing out how amusing the hypocrisy was.
- hnarn 12y ago
  Maybe you were thrown off because you failed to see the difference between simply copying copyrighted content without permission (filesharing), and copying something and claiming that you in fact created it yourself, explicitly (I made this!) or implicitly, by not attributing the original author (plagiarism).
  - dspillett 12y ago
    There is no difference. The content producer worked on the content and wants what they want in exchange for it (indirectly for the effort): money. The ripper worked on ripping the content and wants what they want for it (indirectly for the effort): recognition. One of the usual complains was their "internal rips" being posted elsewhere even when posted without any attribution being removed (or at least with no claim of creator-ship added). There were "rippers" who tried to take credit for the efforts of others, but re-distributing outside the group was the main complaint (either with "correct" attribution or with no attribution at all). I was thrown off because I refused to apologise for not seeing the difference between one person taking the attitude "great, I'll take this and do what-ever I want to do with it under my own terms and not your's because I can and fuck you if you don't like it" and a second person also taking the attitude "great, I'll take this and do what-ever I want to do with it under my own terms and not your's because I can and fuck you if you don't like it".
    - habitue 12y ago
      There is a difference. When movies are copied, nobody takes the credits out and adds their name into them. We're talking about attribution vs. copyright. They're completely separate issues, and it trips people up every time something like this gets posted.

fit2rule 12y ago

There's a missed opportunity here .. movie companies should be forking Popcorn Time, whacking a brand on there, and putting their own version out. What a pity the world is run by lawyers..

tunnuz 12y ago
Netflix does this (the service, not the fork), too bad it is still unavailable in many countries.
- ekianjo 12y ago
  And its catalog is limited, too, even in the US.
  - sspiff 12y ago
    I have a Netflix US account (over VPN, since I live outside the US), and after all the coverage it had gotten, I was really disappointed with the catalog. A lot of the shows my girlfriend was hoping to watch are unavailable, and the movie catalog is also extremely restricted.
- girvo 12y ago
  The lack of Netflix in Australia really frustrates me. Id pay for it gladly and happily, but I can't, despite living in a first world country that has a very high amount of discretional spending (consider we pay twice what everyone else does, taking into account exchange rates, for software) and the highest rate of copyright infringement in first world countries. Sigh.
mehwoot 12y ago
Why?
- forrestthewoods 12y ago
  It's about volume. Sure the movie companies will be giving away their films for free. But if you give away enough films for free it becomes profitable!!

zarify 12y ago

The Doctor Who fan in me is lamenting that this domain isn't actually about a Popcorn Time-War.

shankysingh 12y ago
update: removed..
- thedrei 12y ago
  Which let out little screams as they hit their target. This war seems on par with a marshmallow fight.
  - shankysingh 12y ago
    update : removed.

SchizoDuckie 12y ago

So they need a domain to tell us this? I'm calling shenanigans

mahyarm 12y ago

Next they could add chromecast support / transcoding and they have a pretty good competitor for plex. After that a couple of mobile clients?

arianvanp 12y ago
I'm working on a fork with Chromecast support. It works pretty well. Just a bit scared to open source it. Perhaps i will release it under a pseudonym or something. It's ridicioulous that people need to be afraid to release stuff but sadly enough this is the case.
- espadrine 12y ago
  Why not submit your patch to one of the current maintainers privately? That way it won't link to you.
- StavrosK 12y ago
  Please submit it upstream. It would be amazing.
- k-mcgrady 12y ago
  >> It's ridicioulous that people need to be afraid to release stuff but sadly enough this is the case. I'm conflicted on this. The MPAA abuse their power regularly but it's hard to deny it's now easier and cheaper than ever to access and watch movies. That takes away a lot of the justification for piracy and creating tools that facilitate it. Edit: And here come the down votes. Don't down vote if you disagree with someone - reply. If they add nothing to the conversation then down vote.
  - Ntrails 12y ago
    Anecdotal evidence alert. I live in the UK. On Sunday I wanted to watch the new Fargo TV show. I do not own a Television. I went to watch it 'live' on the Channel 4 website. It kept saying my broadband wasn't good enough. Odd. Googled a bit, ah - adblock is causing issues. This needs a new whitelist compared to 4od - fine by me. Sit through 2 minutes of adverts specifically over the web player (bearing in mind the channel I am waiting to watch also has ads - so by watching online I am apparently getting extra, thanks). Miss the first minute of the show but never mind - I was setting up last minute. 30 seconds into the stream, player dies and shows "insufficient bandwidth" again. Hit refresh. Starts new ad cycle over player. Ctrl+W. Ctrl+T. "Eztv.it". Tab. "Fargo". Tab Enter Tab Tab Enter. Enter. Within 4 minutes my "too slow" broadband had got the show at what seemed like better quality than the official web player. I also had no ads so I even finished watching the episode before terrestrial viewers despite starting late. Content delivery still sucks. Maybe my tolerance is too low, but frankly maybe it's worth accommodating that and providing content in an easy and consistent fashion. I was so impressed by Joss Whedon releasing his movie on vimeo (although I would prefer DLs over streams) that I bought it just to support it.

jtreanor 12y ago

Popcorn Time previously just showed open domain films in the screen shots. The new one has pictures Game of Thrones and company. It looks like they have stopped pretending this is not for piracy. edit: clarification

espadrine 12y ago
Now, for morality to be on their side, they need to publicly advocate and work on a better way to remunerate the content creators. Of course, they could go rogue and act exclusively out of spite for big media, arguing parasitically that how the content creators make money is none of their business. But I really hope they don't.
- pikachu_is_cool 12y ago
  Why?
  - espadrine 12y ago
    > Why? Why I hope they don't just stay rogue? Because having a self-sustainable, transparent industry that actually tries to protect users benefits everyone in the long-run. Creators would accept such an industry because they could do what they love for money, and users would accept it because they would obtain entertainment while knowing where the money they spend goes, and knowing that the work will go to the public domain after a reasonable amount of time. I know I sound like a fool; no need to tell me.
    - pikachu_is_cool 12y ago
      Sorry, I should have clarified. I meant this: "arguing parasitically that how the content creators make money is none of their business" I was just wondering your thought process here. It seems that you think piracy is a bad thing, when I see it as a good thing. Who cares about the industry? We have more and higher quality music, software, movies, and TV than ever because of piracy. And for free! Shouldn't that be celebrated? We can now focus on spending our money on more pressing things like food, shelter and health care. Sure, some people can't make money off of direct sales of copies but markets change. We can adapt. Just look at Chance the Rapper, he gave both albums out for free (never charged a dime) and he's rolling in dough because of features and concerts. Also I'm pretty sure he's not at the mercy of a record company, either.

antihero 12y ago

Someone posted a really good article on the being right vs being pragmatic - about it being a service problem as opposed to an ethical one, or something like that. It'd be really handy if someone could post it.

rrreese 12y ago
You're probably thinking of this article by Marco Arment: http://www.marco.org/2012/02/25/right-vs-pragmatic http://www.marco.org/2012/02/25/right-vs-pragmatic
- mentos 12y ago
  I 100% agree with this approach but what does it imply for the TV/Movie industry? To me the problem is that they cannot control distribution. So one solution could be baking adverts into the tv/movie. Has the obvious flaw of poisoning art with advertising, but if done well might work? What does everyone else see as the pragmatic solution?
  - JonLim 12y ago
    They've definitely been baking advertisements into movies and television shows for years now. My ideal pragmatic solution would be a platform (or two, or five) that acts like a dumb pipe for content providers to license their content to, and receive some form of compensation every time it is watched, prorated into the amount of the episode/movie is actually watched. However, given the difficult licensing issues found for every country, that's probably not going to happen any time soon.
    - sbarre 12y ago
      Also the content production ecosystem is currently reliant on big successes making up for failures and/or niche content. That's why cable companies bundle channels together instead of letting you pick and choose the ones you want. If it wasn't for this, the industry would become even more risk-averse, and we would see a lot less diversity of content, or risky unproven ventures. In the end I believe this would be a net loss to everyone.

krisgenre 12y ago

I am beginning to think time4popcorn might be the NSA! :O

danra 12y ago

Does anyone have the specifics of what malware time4popcorn includes?

imikay 12y ago

They are using SEO tricks to get a better rank.

happywolf 12y ago

Some of the reactions here remind me of the time when mp3 starting to gain traction (circa ~1995). A lot of people were worried this new file format would mark the end of entertainment business: who would spend money to buy songs when they could download for free in mp3 format? I guess I don't need to point out how much money Apple has made through iTunes by selling unprotected audio tracks for the past years. In other words, I see similarities in concerns people are having on Popcorn Time and the introduction of mp3 10+ years ago. Businesses die not because of piracy, but because of lack of innovation and not meeting consumers' needs. period.

baby 12y ago
There is a difference between trying to find a mp3 to download and having the convenience of an application that works as well as netflix for movies but is completely free. (btw I started coding on a popcorn-like but for music. Think spotify for free. https://github.com/mimoo/nodster https://github.com/mimoo/nodster it's here. But I'm thinking about changing the code to just converting youtube videos to mp3 instead of looking for mp3 files on google)
- dublinben 12y ago
  Do you not remember programs like Napster and Limewire? They were as convenient as iTunes (years before iTMS was launched) and offered every song you could imagine. It's just surprising that it's taken so long for similar services to mature for video content.
  - duaneb 12y ago
    > and offered every song you could imagine This is where I tend to disagree. Yes, popular songs were on there, but terribly tagged (or outright mislabeled), and half of it was porn. Not even varied porn, just the same damn videos replicated a million times.
    - aylons 12y ago
      I don't remember video at all in Napster and most Napster rooms were very nice. People actually catalogued their library in use and we could download from a specific user. I suppose you are talking about emule or Kazaa, but Napster was surely a very nice place to hang out. I have met even met people there, people I still talk to this day.

kwamenum86 12y ago

PS: On a sidenote, and as Torrent Freak has written about them, I must point that Time4Popcorn are pretending to be developing another version of Popcorn Time. The truth is that they are ripping some of our community work without crediting the authors. We would obviously have no concerns if they acknowledged the source of the work, as Popcorn Time is an open source project. The latest example being how they compiled in their app 5 days of our UI work. No words.

coffeecodecouch 12y ago
They're concerned about Time4Popcorn crediting the work as their own, which Popcorn Time (or any pirating platform I've ever seen) doesn't do.
- abustamam 12y ago
  I can understand the logic, but no one using Popcorn time will credit the movie for being their own. No one thinks the star of Hunger Games was the developer of Popcorn Time, or the person pirating it, and no one is claiming as such. Secondly, from my cursory glance, it seems as if T4P can/will easily spread malware, but this could just be fearmongering on Popcorn Time's end.

butterfi 12y ago

"We are totally aware of the legal implications, and we're not afraid, because we care for the people." Personally I'd be interested in hearing more about how this is helping people. I suspect there are much better things you could be doing to help people then this project. A more accurate sentence might be: "We are totally aware of the legal implications, and we're not afraid, because we're doing it for the lolz and free movies"

rkuykendall-com 12y ago
The "lolz" might be more accurate, but I suspect that anybody developing for this project has no problems getting free movies without this app. It is marketed at people who find Bittorent complicated. The most 'defendable' use-case would be an elderly, poor, sick grandmother in a country with no copyright laws who just wants to watch movies with her grandchildren or something. This might sound laughable to you, but developers for apps like this think of that as their target demographic, not all the mid-20s middle class Americans mostly using the app.
- runawaybottle 12y ago
  But here's the thing, people that know the most about getting stuff for free also automate the hell out of it. If you've got a usenet account, you've probably got the following setup: - https://couchpota.to/ https://couchpota.to/ - http://sickbeard.com/ http://sickbeard.com/ - https://github.com/rembo10/headphones https://github.com/rembo10/headphones People auto-download the latest episode of a tv show throughout the season, albums, etc.

spaznode 12y ago

Hey wait, http://www.time4popcorn.eu/ http://www.time4popcorn.eu/ app compared to one referenced in this article is much much more functionally complete for what you see right now today. Like tv series / playback torrent network seems to always work immediately. The get-popcorn app as it is now provides none of it. So "blah blah blah" about all the promises and project mission. If you just want to have some f-in popcorn time enjoyment. If get-popcorn ends up being better at some point great, til then ... http://www.time4popcorn.eu/ http://www.time4popcorn.eu/ is the only popcorn for me. =)

computer 12y ago
Your time4popcorn runs code with full access to your computer directly from a server controlled by unnamed individuals who are acting in completely mysterious ways. I.e. on every load of the app, it downloads code from a server controlled by the time4popcorn guys, and then executes it locally with access to your entire system. I would never trust such an app.
- spaznode 12y ago
  Ohhh ..uhhh shit. Well, good point then. Glad I asked. =/

mwilkison 12y ago

How feasible would it be to build an alt coin on top of Popcorn-Time. Call it PopCoin or Popcorn-Coin or something :). You pay every time you watch a movie, you get paid for hosting torrents and some percentage of each transaction is routed to the content creator/whoever owns the rights to the content?

pennetti 12y ago

This is just another indication that video media is in need of a new medium. There is a need something like Steam or Spotify, but for TV Shows and movies. Netflix, Hulu, Crackle, etc. are all lacking in terms of the videos they offer and there's nothing to fill the void unless you want to go into the realm of physical media (and let's be honest, you don't). Torrents are easy, but managing a collection and getting good quality videos is still a pain. I'm in college now and I started torrenting music in the 8th grade - iTunes came and I realized that I would have had to spend thousands of dollars to get the collection I wanted - so I continued to torrent music. I would have missed out on a lot of music if I relied on iTunes (and be out $100k or so) but once I found Spotify and realized that I would no longer have to edit all the ID3 tags, find album work, and deal with poor audio quality for $5 a month, I instantly switched and haven't looked back (except for music they lack like The Beatles, AC/DC, and Def Leppard which I still torrent, oops). Game of Thrones recently broke a torrent record [1] and the CEO of HBO basically said they appreciate the publicity and thank their fans. IMO money is not as big of an issue for video as it is for music because the networks and actors aren't suffering the way musicians do (this is just my opinion based on observation). Yeah, Spotify has been called out for not compensating artists properly [2] but I think it's a step in the right direction in terms of service. I like the idea of something like Popcorn Time but I think it's just a wake-up call that there is a need for innovation in the realm of video media. The music and gaming industries have seen a shift in recent years, so maybe movies and tv shows are not far behind... [1] http://time.com/63331/game-of-thrones-torrent-record/ http://time.com/63331/game-of-thrones-torrent-record/ [2] http://www.businessinsider.com/thom-yorke-explains-why-he-hates-spotify-2013-10 http://www.businessinsider.com/thom-yorke-explains-why-he-ha...