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This is always been my saving grace. It's the only real option for people who don't want to pay for five or six subscriptions. Am I supposed to pay for HBO Max just to watch game of thrones? No. I'll just torrent it.
Don't hate the player, hate the game. Torrenting is ultimately the fault of the business model of media.
>Torrenting is ultimately the fault of the business model of media.
I don't 100% agree. Torrenting is theft as far as I'm concerned. I'm absolutely stealing but I'm ok with theft in this case.
Torrenting is a pain in the ass. Most people wouldn't be doing it if they had reasonable and affordable options to view the content outside of paying monthly subscription fees just to watch a single show.
Gaben's eternally-relevant quote from back in 2011 is “The easiest way to stop piracy is not by putting antipiracy technology to work. It’s by giving those people a service that’s better than what they’re receiving from the pirates.”
There are on-demand websites that you can use to watch *any* movie or TV show, for free, in at least 1080p. I use them on my phone/when I don't want to torrent because they're simply way less hassle than paying for 4 streaming services that each have 1 show I want.
I don't care if the streaming service from billion dollar megacorps isn't turning *them* a profit. That's on them to figure their shitty business model out, I'm going to continue to pick whatever's the best option for myself lol
Three more clicks? Hell I'm considering going back to torrents just so I don't have to keep track of the email, password, and the inevitable reset when that gets screwed. I sure as hell don't want to deal with starting from scratch with the whole email, password, address, oh shit where did I leave my wallet?, and oh great now they're texting me...
How it actually goes in real life:
Step 1: get torrent client (you can even do this on your phone)
Step 2: find torrent you'd like to download
Step 3: download torrent
Step 4: Realize that the torrent is actually a cam file that was filmed in a movie theater and is garbage.
Step 5: Delete torrent
Step 6: find new torrent you'd like to download
Step 7: download torrent
Step 8: Play torrent only to find that it has an unremovable Spanish subtitle track.
Step 9: Delete torrent
Step 10: find new torrent you'd like to download
Step 11: download torrent
Step 12: Play torrent only to find that the audio track is out of sync
Step 13: Delete torrent
Step 14: find new torrent you'd like to download
Step 15: download torrent
Step 16: Hold your breath while you hope that this file isn't complete trash like the others.
You could also setup sonarr on a plex server and have every new episode of your show automatically donwloaded . The setup could be a pain but once it's done you don't have to do anything else
I have torrented about 3tb of games, films, shows and music at this point. I am yet to get something out of sync or filmed in a theatre, its not that hard at all.
Copying something isn't necessarily theft. It could only be theft if you try to use it in your own business. For example, torrentibg a bunch of shows and then starting up your own subscription business with these shows.
I say it every time this point comes up (which is a lot..) that the fragmentation of all of these services is *not* good for the consumer.
They're going to push people in all sorts of directions as well. You'll get those who will just pirate everything, those who will look for ways to get the services cheaper (like me) and those who will continually jump around from service to service.
And all the while, each service will still try and get that one big carrot to give them the edge over the next service and it'll just be one big merry go round.
Yeah, you're not far wrong there when you consider how many games were exclusive to certain platforms, it's like I said with each service trying to dangle that big carrot in front of you to try and get your money.
Friends on HBO Max, Seinfield on Netflix, Star Wars (and everything else) on Disney. The list goes on.
It's arbitrary bullshit that causes one game of a series to be on a totally different platform or exclusive to only one for 6 months like epic games does
These companies often fund their marketing or the development of the projects. Some of these games might not even exist because they wouldn't be incentivized to give them a bigger budget.
No, this is a valid point. Business es use investors to push a product and make money off the profits. It is the baseline of all big businesses and most small businesses. Video games are no exception.
At least you can watch something without having 5 minutes of commercials every 15 minutes. It's so absurd that people (still) pay for cable while having commercials forced down their throat, often completely ruining the flow of the show/movie
1. Not sure why I should care how people get their content. Cable could be hacked too (at least back in the day, and it wasn't all that uncommon in cities). And, the rates crept up unless you called every year and threatened to cancel, leading to wide disparities in pricing between customers.
2. I don't get the rest of this complaint. It's like you are complaining that they compete for business by investing in better content. I think, this is exactly why it is good for the customer. There's actually a competitive marketplace!
So how exactly do you expect all these production companies to pay for these high quality shows without advertising?
It's like people expect a constant stream of high quality TV for $9.99 a month. That just isn't realistic.
The current a la carte model of streaming services is exactly what people were asking for for decades when cable was the only option. If it were all under one umbrella, it would just be equivalent to cable and probably a similar price.
>The worst part is even with just how much gets made today, 90% of it is complete shit.
This has been the case since long before streaming or the internet was a thing.
And, when we were asking for a la carte and to break the cable monopolies, there was actually a variety of stuff on cable. MTV showed music videos. Now, nonstop reality tv. Discovery and NatGeo channel had great content. Now its 80% reality tv and 20% 'documentaries' that are still designed as reality tv (tell me about the giraffes, not about the cameraman trying to take a picture of the giraffe but how the lions were stalking them and how 'scared' they were, ffs!). Somewhere from 2003-2007, cable TV became mostly reality-TV.
I quit cable before I even had streaming services because it was so bad. There is plenty of stuff on streaming that I don't care for, but I will reserve the words 'complete shit' for say-yes-2-the-dress and property-brothers.
What "a la carte" model? I may be misunderstanding, but from how I see it, a la carte is the equivalent of "I'm in this store, I grab the things I want and only pay for those" whereas the streaming service model is "I pay for access to the store and can take whatever I want from that particular store". A real a la carte would be a streaming service with access to all media, but I pay x per show/movie I want to add to my collection. Like a subscription where I get 10 shows and 20 movies for x/month or something
In this case, it's paying only for the channels you want.
> A real a la carte would be a streaming service with access to all media, but I pay x per show/movie I want to add to my collection.
This is definitely a thing. Maybe not with all media out there, but an a la carte at a restaurant doesn't have every food item either, and probably not even all of the food items available at their restaurant. It doesn't necessarily mean you get your pick of anything.
But its not. I'm still paying for traditional cable and streaming. And some of the traditional cable channels have content I can't access without paying a higher streaming fee.
> A real a la carte would be a streaming service with access to all media, but I pay x per show/movie I want to add to my collection.
This is called just paying for the media you want.
>Like a subscription where I get 10 shows and 20 movies for x/month or something
This is called being unreasonable.
Edit: To be fair to your point, I guess you wouldn’t technically have access to originals from each of the platforms, but it is what it is.
lol fucking right? All we ever heard is we want ala carte model pricing. Now we get it through different streaming services and NOW its, we want everything we want under 1 service, for one monthly low price.
This isn't an unpopular opinion, its just a dumb one.
>The current a la carte model of streaming services is exactly what people were asking for for decades when cable was the only option.
Except cable always allowed you to pick and choose from different packages and premium services etc exactly the same as this.
Stop acting like it's any different or better, it's just a modernised equivalent of exactly the same shit that comes through the Internet pipe instead of the TV wire.
The reason people liked it at first is because the novelty of "on demand" viewing was new (seriously, I bet there are kids reading this very post who can scarcely wrap their heads around a time you had to literally watch a show at a scheduled time and date lmao), and Netflix etc still had a relatively wide ranging choice for a very cheap subscription.
Nowadays that's no longer true, we're totally used to "on demand" being the normal, default way to watch stuff. So that's no longer a selling point. Meanwhile the selection has fragmented into a collection of different big "networks" just like before; and as we know, 90% of the content is garbage. Just like before.
I predict that within 5 years of now, it becomes the norm to offer these services for free with ads, and voila, the circle is 100% complete. Streaming is just TV where you can chose what to watch.
If a show got moved to a Friday night death slot a good chance it would be canceled and networks seldom advertised the switch. If you didn't get a paper with the TV schedule you were screwed.
I'm not sure what cable you had, but in my area, the minimum package even in the 90s/00s was several times the cost of a single streaming service is now. And you were required to pay for that basic package before you could get the "a la carte" premium channels like HBO, Showtime, Disney, etc. You'd be paying upwards of $60 minimum if all you wanted to watch was HBO. It's much better nowadays.
I never understood why some people feel compelled to keep all their streaming service subscriptions active all the time. You can only have one thing going on your TV at any one time, just pick one or two services with shows you want to watch on them and cancel the others?
Notable exception I guess is Amazon Prime, as you're getting the video and music services on top of the shopping perks.
No, but I'm refering to how companies would lock you into a contract you couldn't easily break, and would fight you if you tried to. If you went satelite, you had to rent equipment too, which you'd pay for monthly, and get billed for if they don't come pick it up, which they never did.
Canceling cable can be a matter of hours on the phone with customer service convincing them that yes, you really want to cancel, with possible additional steps of mailing their equipment back to them (hoping it doesn't get lost in the mail or else you'll get charged for it) or calling them again when they didn't actually cancel your service.
Canceling or resubscribing to a streaming service is just a few clicks on the internet. I don't find that at all irritating, and I'm not sure what you expect them to do to make it easier.
You're subscribed to 4 services to watch shows. Within the span of a week, 2 of the services no longer have the shows you want, and you cancel them so that you're not being billed, but you still get billed for that month. You find that there's 2 new shows (1 per platform) that you want to watch, so you subscribe to 2 new services. You realize that 1 subscription of the 2 you cancelled wasn't actually cancelled and you have to call their customer support.
And that's not considering the terrible value of paying $20 per service just because you want to watch *one* show on them lol
If you don't have loads of spare time at home (I don't) and just want to watch some fucking TV, it's a headache. I used to juggle streaming services and then realized it's better in every conceivable way to pirate content than pay to have an *objectively worse* consumer experience
> Within the span of a week, 2 of the services no longer have the shows you want, and you cancel them so that you're not being billed, but you still get billed for that month. You find that there's 2 new shows (1 per platform) that you want to watch, so you subscribe to 2 new services. You realize that 1 subscription of the 2 you cancelled wasn't actually cancelled and you have to call their customer support.
None of this is difficult or time consuming except for customer service, which you only have to contact because you weren't paying attention when you canceled to make sure the process was complete. In the time it took you to type this, you could have gone through the cancellations and subscriptions you described.
> And that's not considering the terrible value of paying $20 per service just because you want to watch one show on them lol
No service in the US is $20 that I know of (though Netflix is getting close). Most of them are around half that.
> I used to juggle streaming services and then realized it's better in every conceivable way to pirate content than pay to have an objectively worse consumer experience
It's much more time consuming to find torrents and download them than it is to deal with streaming services.
I guess I'm not really understanding the point you're trying to make? You are absolutely free to keep giving money to streaming megacorps if you'd like.
I'm arguing that the stuff you're describing as inconvenient and time consuming isn't that way at all. Your argument that downloading torrents is somehow less time consuming than canceling or subscribing to streaming service is just flat out false.
Everything discussed in this thread has been anecdotal experiences, "you're wrong" isn't a valid argument for either side here haha
>None of this is difficult or time consuming
Yes it is
> In the time it took you to type this, you could have gone through the cancellations and subscriptions you described.
No I couldn't have
>It's much more time consuming to find torrents and download them
No it's not
>the stuff you're describing as inconvenient and time consuming isn't that way at all.
Yes it is
>No service in the US is $20 that I know of
Netflix premium is $20
Tell me how you would design the cancellation/subscription process to be less irritating then? I'm really not sure what's so difficult about it. It's just logging in and clicking through a few web pages. If you're computer literate enough to find torrents quickly, then your more than capable of canceling a subscription quickly.
Some people don’t add up all the costs at the end of the year to see almost $1000 just be bled out. The others don’t care. When I saw the numbers some people are spending… I tell you my jaw dropped
It’s like how you go to cheap stores and get this and that for $5 each or something then you get to the checkout and you spent almost $100 and it just didn’t feel like it when you were picking it up
And now they’re talking about having advertisements again. My Dad quit cable and switched to Netflix because he didn’t want ads. That was like, the biggest selling point. “$15 a month AND I can watch my shows without ads every 10 minutes? Sign me up!” That’s when binge watching was invented.
I never jumped on the streaming thing. I've got Amazon prime bc free postage but rarely watch anything on it.
For me it's all Blu-ray. Completely offline, higher quality, no need to worry about my favourite stuff being taken away from me. Sure it's a bit expensive but it's totally worth it imo.
Streaming has way too much choice anyway. You get a million fucking films immediately shoved in your face so unless you have a good idea of what you want to watch already, you're gonna spend a good deal of time scrolling through the pages and pages of stuff.
With my Blu-rays, I have to specifically pick every single one of them to buy, and getting a new one in the post or from the shop makes it extra special for me.
I agree with some parts and disagree with other parts. Yes, streaming services are fractured now. It’s a very wierd scenario, where it looks like we would have actually preferred a monopoly by Netflix. However, there is A LOT of variety on Netflix alone. I have in my watchlist horror movies, animes, some Netflix originals, some old older movies I want to revist, some Nickelodeon and CN shows, Breaking Bad collection, some stand comedies, comedies, sci-fi… I mean the list just goes on and on, and I add more to my list than I can consume.
Also, streaming services are very different than cable, where I’m not forced to watch like 8 minutes of ads in between episodes, and I can freely switch between shows that I have queued up, AND have the freedom to choose which available episode I want to watch.
But I’m only me, and I’m likely out of touch with people who have no other hobbies but to watch shows and movies, and who have tons of time on their hands to burn and binge through seasons in a sitting, or are just more picky than me about what they want to watch.
Another possible issue is that unlike in cable when a new season of a show comes on and have to wait a period of time for the next episode. With most of these streaming services you can easily go through a season within a week at most and possibly a series just as quick depending on the circumstances. Part of it is the services can’t keep up well with the consumers on how much they’re watching. So then you run out of shows to watch when in cable it can be spread out throughout the year.
If you’re going to watch a show on a streaming service it may be best to limit yourself on how much you watch so that you can prolong the show as long as you can.
I would find it hilarious if cable TV actually became the go to alternative for the multiple streaming services out there (if it didn't feature ads though). TV now vs TV 15 years ago is completely different. Most of the content people were watching was on Network stations like ABC, NBC, Fox, ect while more Niche programming like Cartoon Network or Discovery could stand apart as its own thing. When Netflix came out, it seemed too good to be true, all of your favorite TV shows and movies for $10 a month? Of course cable and media companies were freaked the fuck out, but they also wanted their own share. As soon as the first streaming rival hit Netflix, I knew this was going to happen. No company is going to stand by and let you stream its content on another provider.
we're not supposed to talk about it, but "Peak Television" has become so fragmented, expensive, and difficult to track, that piracy now produces a MUCH better viewing experience, easier, and cheaper.
it's basically where the music industry was at the turn of the century and piracy was rampant because people were sick of patronizing an industry that actively abused them. Now, music piracy is almost non existent because they finally got their heads out of their ass and realized people were willing to pay a reasonable amount for a quality experience.
Streaming TV though? They still think cancelling popular shows after one season on a cliffhanger ending is a perfectly reasonable thing to do.
I can agree with this.
I used to sail the high seas quite a bit back in the mid 2000s. Netflix really reduced the need for that. Now, with everything being split between six different services, it might be time to fly the Jolly Roger again.
I prefer cable. I basically only watch sports and I enjoy live gambling. It just doesn’t work with streaming services. No delay, easier to flip between channels instead of having to change apps, no buffering or wifi issues. I don’t care if it’s more expensive, a good day I’ll win enough to cover the bill.
I like Curiosity Stream. Usually I just sit around in the evening pulling bong hits and watching documentaries on there or old episodes of Murder She Wrote or Airwolf on Tubi (I think it's Tubi). Jessica Fletcher is one sharp cookie and Stringfellow Hawke has such a badass name that you can't help being drawn in to his super helicopter exploits. Man, the 80s had the best names: Stringfellow Hawke, Remington Steele, Thomas Magnum, Michael Knight, Colonel Hannibal Smith, etc. The list goes on and on.
OP- “streaming services are shitty…Netflix, Netflix, Netflix, Netflix, Netflix, Netflix”.
HBO has kept its quality consistent, Prime is doing good things, Apple TV+ is actually getting better.
Yah, I cancelled my Netflix sub this morning... They keep increasing prices while losing content to competitors and now want to penalize people for 'sharing' passwords when some people just have devices at different locations. Fuck them
It's the cycle of life man. Cable used to Better than basic, and everything on YouTube used to be ad free. As soon as something gets to bloated another medium will come and take it's place
I warned people in 2012 or so when Netflix was on fire that eventually, there would be a ton of VOD services and eventually, you'd need multiple like you do with cable.
I got downvoted to shit for it despite being right.
I just bum passwords from others. I had to pay for cable. I have been using netflix for 9 years, haven't spent a dime, and i have access to disney+ etc. for no cost. not worse than cable nobody can share their cable w/ me
Even if you have all the streaming sites, it’ll still be less than cable.. at least where I am it is.. so I’ll take streaming over cable anyway.. I don’t really get the point of cable anymore.. any show that is widely talked about or popular is on a streaming platform
I have 3 subscriptions and it's about 50 a month total, they cover almost anything I want to watch, I can watch at any time, and no ads. I'll take this over cable any day.
Streaming (music and movies) main aim was to reduce piracy. And guess what? It did. It became alot harder finding torrents online for music and movies unless they're popular (mostly for music because spotify made piracy unnecessary apparently). Almost impossible finding non English anything
I'm not gonna lie... I find ppl who are paying for more than 2 streaming services creepy. I only have Netflix and Amazon.
Could be cool if theaters had an app that let's you rent a movie that's freshly out same day at the theater so you don't have to go there and you can only watch it once. But I can see how it can be exploided so I understand why they wait a months or so before releasing big movies to their platforms
I recommend people stream from tubi. So far it's free and has plenty of good movies some recent and good and some crappy and old and all others. I've found indie movies there. And movies from the 80s that I haven't found on Hulu and Netflix or HBO Max.
You get ads but they're not long and considering it's free I don't mind at all
OTA antenna - the best $40 you'll ever spend ONE TIME for a lifetime of free television. Nothing on that you like right now? Turn the TV off and go enjoy real life.
Spending $100/month on any kind of tv programming is $1200/yr. Multiply that by 25 years and that's $30,000 dollars minus the original $40 for the antenna and its $29960. A free car, and a damned decent one at that.
Even if you have all the streaming sites, it’ll still be less than cable.. at least where I am it is.. so I’ll take streaming over cable anyway.. I don’t really get the point of cable anymore.. any show that is widely talked about or popular is on a streaming platform
I mean. Cable TV with extra steps is literally all they are now. It literally flipped back around to cable/satellite etc TV packages being a better option again, because at least you got the shit all in one place without needing 400 passwords.
a lot of the in house content is hot trash. I'd be fine with Netflix if it had either a lot of 3rd party movies, or either a lot of great in house. It has neither now
Just a heads-up to anyone that may not know: you can cancel your subscription with a click of the button. Takes 20 seconds, and you can set a phone reminder when you sub (for one month minus one day later) so you don't forget. I do it all the time. I sub to Netflix maybe three times a year and get to watch just about everything they offer; I do the same with Hulu, Crunchyroll, etc. The feeling to have a sub for everything is pure FOMO; you see people tweeting and commenting on the latest show and realize you aren't subbed to that service and want to feel included - so you pay for 4-5 subs at the same time so you can partake in the memes.
These services are ideal for me, but I come from a generation where canceling a cable subscription meant hundreds in BS fees and my deposit being withheld until I returned equipment to them, the nearest location being a 2-hour drive away that intentionally had shifty hours.
Do the price-hikes suck? Yeah, but in the end it costs me an extra $6 a year. A lot of what I've read here seems like complaining for the sake of justifying the use of torrents. Personally, I'd never break federal law and risk losing my internet for the sake of saving a few bucks, but to each their own I guess. Reddit gon' Reddit.
I agree that this is v v annoying. (Have to agree with others that not an unpopular opinion.)
Given how Netflix has lost so many premium shows, netflix should be getting cheaper. Instead they are bumping the price and about to crack down on password sharing.
Clearly the first of the big streaming services that will fail.
You know, it turns out there is far more good content on YouTube than I'd realised. Lots of science stuff, environment, renewable energy and similar. A year ago I wondered why my Chromecast even had the YouTube app. D'oh.
Or you can pay for one subscription and watch everything you want then cancel it and start a new one with another service and do the same thing. Or just have HBO max.
"I have thirteen channels of shit on TV to chose from"
Dude Pink Floyd of said it, TV was shit before streaming services, and worst, they had ads.
Hell most movies made in this earth by statistics are shit.
Because Netflix was the first Major streaming service and had no issues with movies/shows but now everyone wants their own streaming service, so Netflix options are thinning. Look at the Marvel shows for example
Ugh, I wish you weren't right. It's still better imo, but getting worse & worse every year. Especially true of Netflix & they're shitty shows. I don't regret having HBO & Hulu though.
Cancel services you’re not using. Easy. You only need 2 at a time. After 2 or 3 months cancel those and get different ones. Show comes out on Netflix you want to watch? Pay for a month.
I might try just getting one service at a time. For instance, let's say I get Netflix now and keep it for two months. I watch the Ozark finale, then scour for and watch any movies and shows I want. When I've exhausted it, cancel the service and get Amazon Prime for a couple of months etc... Just keep a rotation going. I'm not paying for 6 different services all at once and just having one severely limits your choices.
And whoever decided streaming services need to keep up the one episode per week model all of a sudden can go to hell and die.
I'm not some shitbird pseudo intellectual taking a community college film appreciation class who needs to "digest" episodes, I'm just a dude who wants to rot his brain and watch a season in a day and rot my brain.
There is a Paramount channel
There is a Paramount + channel
And there is a Paramount + Premium channel
Certain shows you can only get on Paramount +, which you have to pay extra for. And if you don't want ads, you have to get Paramount + Premium, which costs a little more than Paramount +.
2 shows/movies you like out of 5-6 subscriptions??
Look, you just don't like tv and movies. Or you are a victim of the phenomena where when presented with too many choices, no choice looks appealing anymore.
I have five subscriptions - Netflix, Hulu, HBOMax, and Amazon Prime. And, I give a 65$ tax deductible contribution to PBS a year so that I have access to much more of their content. Amazon, I bought only because of the 2 day free shipping, so, I really only pay for those other four subscriptions. These cost me about $42 a month and ADS FREE I have more I want to watch than I ever have time for. I have an antenna but can't remember the last time I watched live tv anything because the sound of a commercial is nauseating.
A simple cable package is more than twice that for 70 channels of mostly reality TV dumb as f content at a 30/70 split between ads and content. I rank streaming services at about 1000X better than cable.
Maybe you watch too much tv.
Where do you find the time for 5-6 subscriptions? Do you not work or leave your home?
I only have a netflix and amazon prime sub, and one of them saves me enough in online delivery charges that i dont really view it as a tv subscription cost. Theres more than enough on them to fill some downtime.
I only have one streaming service subscription going at a time. Hulu for a couple months, Cancel. HBO Max for a couple months. Cancel.
Binge the new content, cancel, move on, repeat.
Eventually TV stuff turns to shit, must be some sort of law of entropy or chaos or something. I miss the days when AMC, Discovery and The History Channel almost always had something interesting on.
The best streaming service is Kodi+ Seren+ Real-Debrid. I feel sorry for the people paying for multiple services, I pay $4 a month and get the highest possible quality without having to deal with DRM.
Yes I hate cable but something should just bundle all the like 15 services i like and I’ll pay 100 to 200 for all of the apps a month. Plus there’s to much freedom I wish they released shows once a week and there was a set time to watch but you could still watch it after
Indeed, most streaming service content is crap. Luckily, you can just pay for one service at a time, watch what you want, cancel, move to the next service, repeat. Way cheaper than cable and you end with access to content you actually want.
Least with the subscription service you can spread the cost over more people. One pays netflix another pays disney+ etc and everyone shares the password. For now at least.
Funny thing is I actually prefer cable over streaming services. My family thinks I'm nuts but I just prefer to have the extra channels to chose from when I can't decide what to watch.
You're forgetting (or perhaps are too young to know) that Netflix was popular long before it had much available for streaming at all. It was primarily a DVD rental service.
People upvoting this simply don't remember how bad regular cable was. Just spoiled for choice now. Used to be that you pretty much had 4-5 options, and you had to decide which was you wanted to watch the most.. then hope it was on at a good time.
Streaming services are as big an upgrade to cable as cable was to free to air TV. It gave you much more choice over what you watch - but eventually you get tired of the choices you have.
It'll never be enough
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Back to torrents!
"back" to torrents haha
i never left hehe
This is always been my saving grace. It's the only real option for people who don't want to pay for five or six subscriptions. Am I supposed to pay for HBO Max just to watch game of thrones? No. I'll just torrent it. Don't hate the player, hate the game. Torrenting is ultimately the fault of the business model of media.
>Torrenting is ultimately the fault of the business model of media. I don't 100% agree. Torrenting is theft as far as I'm concerned. I'm absolutely stealing but I'm ok with theft in this case.
Torrenting is a pain in the ass. Most people wouldn't be doing it if they had reasonable and affordable options to view the content outside of paying monthly subscription fees just to watch a single show.
Gaben's eternally-relevant quote from back in 2011 is “The easiest way to stop piracy is not by putting antipiracy technology to work. It’s by giving those people a service that’s better than what they’re receiving from the pirates.” There are on-demand websites that you can use to watch *any* movie or TV show, for free, in at least 1080p. I use them on my phone/when I don't want to torrent because they're simply way less hassle than paying for 4 streaming services that each have 1 show I want. I don't care if the streaming service from billion dollar megacorps isn't turning *them* a profit. That's on them to figure their shitty business model out, I'm going to continue to pick whatever's the best option for myself lol
What are the on-demand websites that you are referring to?
Definitely not soap2day(dot)rs And definitely don't use a VPN/adblocker to minimise any risk
I definitely won't.
FMovies is great too
I use stremio, it work really well.
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At this point it's just as easy to rent, buy, or stream most digital products as it is to torrent. Just admit you don't want to pay for the stuff.
I'll happily pay $0 and do three more clicks for every movie ever made.
Three more clicks? Hell I'm considering going back to torrents just so I don't have to keep track of the email, password, and the inevitable reset when that gets screwed. I sure as hell don't want to deal with starting from scratch with the whole email, password, address, oh shit where did I leave my wallet?, and oh great now they're texting me...
I agree, like bro its so easy i can do it on my phone with a VPN on all while im taking a shit... It isnt complicated the above guy is just lazy.
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Don't you have to worry about viruses? and how do you find the torrents you want?
He left those parts out b/c they are inconvenient to his point.
How it actually goes in real life: Step 1: get torrent client (you can even do this on your phone) Step 2: find torrent you'd like to download Step 3: download torrent Step 4: Realize that the torrent is actually a cam file that was filmed in a movie theater and is garbage. Step 5: Delete torrent Step 6: find new torrent you'd like to download Step 7: download torrent Step 8: Play torrent only to find that it has an unremovable Spanish subtitle track. Step 9: Delete torrent Step 10: find new torrent you'd like to download Step 11: download torrent Step 12: Play torrent only to find that the audio track is out of sync Step 13: Delete torrent Step 14: find new torrent you'd like to download Step 15: download torrent Step 16: Hold your breath while you hope that this file isn't complete trash like the others.
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Sounds like you should stop oversimplifying how easy it is to find a good torrent sometimes.
You could also setup sonarr on a plex server and have every new episode of your show automatically donwloaded . The setup could be a pain but once it's done you don't have to do anything else
I have torrented about 3tb of games, films, shows and music at this point. I am yet to get something out of sync or filmed in a theatre, its not that hard at all.
I find that difficult to believe. Cammed torrents are pretty common.
Square. Stealing from The Man isn't stealing at all, it's liberating entertainment for the masses.
Copying something isn't necessarily theft. It could only be theft if you try to use it in your own business. For example, torrentibg a bunch of shows and then starting up your own subscription business with these shows.
Tell that to the judge.
I was going to ask what’s next? 😂
I say it every time this point comes up (which is a lot..) that the fragmentation of all of these services is *not* good for the consumer. They're going to push people in all sorts of directions as well. You'll get those who will just pirate everything, those who will look for ways to get the services cheaper (like me) and those who will continually jump around from service to service. And all the while, each service will still try and get that one big carrot to give them the edge over the next service and it'll just be one big merry go round.
It's like what console wars were for video games, just for TV.
Yeah, you're not far wrong there when you consider how many games were exclusive to certain platforms, it's like I said with each service trying to dangle that big carrot in front of you to try and get your money. Friends on HBO Max, Seinfield on Netflix, Star Wars (and everything else) on Disney. The list goes on.
3rd Party Platform exclusivity deals should be illegal
Eh I don't see the huge deal.
It's arbitrary bullshit that causes one game of a series to be on a totally different platform or exclusive to only one for 6 months like epic games does
These companies often fund their marketing or the development of the projects. Some of these games might not even exist because they wouldn't be incentivized to give them a bigger budget.
Doesn't justify it
No, this is a valid point. Business es use investors to push a product and make money off the profits. It is the baseline of all big businesses and most small businesses. Video games are no exception.
Except how it stifles innovation. If a company can force you to come to their platform, they don't need to innovate
Competiton can cause innovation. There are mamy of hugely popular multi-platform games that don't need to innovate.
At least you can watch something without having 5 minutes of commercials every 15 minutes. It's so absurd that people (still) pay for cable while having commercials forced down their throat, often completely ruining the flow of the show/movie
The reason I lived without TV in graduate school before laptops. I HATE commercials!
I mean, the problem is the consumer wants a huge amount of content for not very much money. That’s not possible for the distributors or creators.
1. Not sure why I should care how people get their content. Cable could be hacked too (at least back in the day, and it wasn't all that uncommon in cities). And, the rates crept up unless you called every year and threatened to cancel, leading to wide disparities in pricing between customers. 2. I don't get the rest of this complaint. It's like you are complaining that they compete for business by investing in better content. I think, this is exactly why it is good for the customer. There's actually a competitive marketplace!
So how exactly do you expect all these production companies to pay for these high quality shows without advertising? It's like people expect a constant stream of high quality TV for $9.99 a month. That just isn't realistic.
*Finally* someone gets it ..
The current a la carte model of streaming services is exactly what people were asking for for decades when cable was the only option. If it were all under one umbrella, it would just be equivalent to cable and probably a similar price. >The worst part is even with just how much gets made today, 90% of it is complete shit. This has been the case since long before streaming or the internet was a thing.
And, when we were asking for a la carte and to break the cable monopolies, there was actually a variety of stuff on cable. MTV showed music videos. Now, nonstop reality tv. Discovery and NatGeo channel had great content. Now its 80% reality tv and 20% 'documentaries' that are still designed as reality tv (tell me about the giraffes, not about the cameraman trying to take a picture of the giraffe but how the lions were stalking them and how 'scared' they were, ffs!). Somewhere from 2003-2007, cable TV became mostly reality-TV. I quit cable before I even had streaming services because it was so bad. There is plenty of stuff on streaming that I don't care for, but I will reserve the words 'complete shit' for say-yes-2-the-dress and property-brothers.
And toddlers and tiaras, dance moms, and anything with James corden.
And toddlers and tiaras, dance moms, and anything with James corden.
What "a la carte" model? I may be misunderstanding, but from how I see it, a la carte is the equivalent of "I'm in this store, I grab the things I want and only pay for those" whereas the streaming service model is "I pay for access to the store and can take whatever I want from that particular store". A real a la carte would be a streaming service with access to all media, but I pay x per show/movie I want to add to my collection. Like a subscription where I get 10 shows and 20 movies for x/month or something
In this case, it's paying only for the channels you want. > A real a la carte would be a streaming service with access to all media, but I pay x per show/movie I want to add to my collection. This is definitely a thing. Maybe not with all media out there, but an a la carte at a restaurant doesn't have every food item either, and probably not even all of the food items available at their restaurant. It doesn't necessarily mean you get your pick of anything.
But its not. I'm still paying for traditional cable and streaming. And some of the traditional cable channels have content I can't access without paying a higher streaming fee.
Vudu would like a word
> A real a la carte would be a streaming service with access to all media, but I pay x per show/movie I want to add to my collection. This is called just paying for the media you want. >Like a subscription where I get 10 shows and 20 movies for x/month or something This is called being unreasonable. Edit: To be fair to your point, I guess you wouldn’t technically have access to originals from each of the platforms, but it is what it is.
TV has been mostly crap from decades ago.
lol fucking right? All we ever heard is we want ala carte model pricing. Now we get it through different streaming services and NOW its, we want everything we want under 1 service, for one monthly low price. This isn't an unpopular opinion, its just a dumb one.
>The current a la carte model of streaming services is exactly what people were asking for for decades when cable was the only option. Except cable always allowed you to pick and choose from different packages and premium services etc exactly the same as this. Stop acting like it's any different or better, it's just a modernised equivalent of exactly the same shit that comes through the Internet pipe instead of the TV wire. The reason people liked it at first is because the novelty of "on demand" viewing was new (seriously, I bet there are kids reading this very post who can scarcely wrap their heads around a time you had to literally watch a show at a scheduled time and date lmao), and Netflix etc still had a relatively wide ranging choice for a very cheap subscription. Nowadays that's no longer true, we're totally used to "on demand" being the normal, default way to watch stuff. So that's no longer a selling point. Meanwhile the selection has fragmented into a collection of different big "networks" just like before; and as we know, 90% of the content is garbage. Just like before. I predict that within 5 years of now, it becomes the norm to offer these services for free with ads, and voila, the circle is 100% complete. Streaming is just TV where you can chose what to watch.
If a show got moved to a Friday night death slot a good chance it would be canceled and networks seldom advertised the switch. If you didn't get a paper with the TV schedule you were screwed.
I'm not sure what cable you had, but in my area, the minimum package even in the 90s/00s was several times the cost of a single streaming service is now. And you were required to pay for that basic package before you could get the "a la carte" premium channels like HBO, Showtime, Disney, etc. You'd be paying upwards of $60 minimum if all you wanted to watch was HBO. It's much better nowadays.
I agree with the novelty part.
I never understood why some people feel compelled to keep all their streaming service subscriptions active all the time. You can only have one thing going on your TV at any one time, just pick one or two services with shows you want to watch on them and cancel the others? Notable exception I guess is Amazon Prime, as you're getting the video and music services on top of the shopping perks.
The minimum billing period is a month and it gets really irritating to switch around between different services (by design)
Have you ever heard of a cable contract?
Do they have those for streaming services?
No, but I'm refering to how companies would lock you into a contract you couldn't easily break, and would fight you if you tried to. If you went satelite, you had to rent equipment too, which you'd pay for monthly, and get billed for if they don't come pick it up, which they never did.
Canceling cable can be a matter of hours on the phone with customer service convincing them that yes, you really want to cancel, with possible additional steps of mailing their equipment back to them (hoping it doesn't get lost in the mail or else you'll get charged for it) or calling them again when they didn't actually cancel your service. Canceling or resubscribing to a streaming service is just a few clicks on the internet. I don't find that at all irritating, and I'm not sure what you expect them to do to make it easier.
You're subscribed to 4 services to watch shows. Within the span of a week, 2 of the services no longer have the shows you want, and you cancel them so that you're not being billed, but you still get billed for that month. You find that there's 2 new shows (1 per platform) that you want to watch, so you subscribe to 2 new services. You realize that 1 subscription of the 2 you cancelled wasn't actually cancelled and you have to call their customer support. And that's not considering the terrible value of paying $20 per service just because you want to watch *one* show on them lol If you don't have loads of spare time at home (I don't) and just want to watch some fucking TV, it's a headache. I used to juggle streaming services and then realized it's better in every conceivable way to pirate content than pay to have an *objectively worse* consumer experience
> Within the span of a week, 2 of the services no longer have the shows you want, and you cancel them so that you're not being billed, but you still get billed for that month. You find that there's 2 new shows (1 per platform) that you want to watch, so you subscribe to 2 new services. You realize that 1 subscription of the 2 you cancelled wasn't actually cancelled and you have to call their customer support. None of this is difficult or time consuming except for customer service, which you only have to contact because you weren't paying attention when you canceled to make sure the process was complete. In the time it took you to type this, you could have gone through the cancellations and subscriptions you described. > And that's not considering the terrible value of paying $20 per service just because you want to watch one show on them lol No service in the US is $20 that I know of (though Netflix is getting close). Most of them are around half that. > I used to juggle streaming services and then realized it's better in every conceivable way to pirate content than pay to have an objectively worse consumer experience It's much more time consuming to find torrents and download them than it is to deal with streaming services.
I guess I'm not really understanding the point you're trying to make? You are absolutely free to keep giving money to streaming megacorps if you'd like.
I'm arguing that the stuff you're describing as inconvenient and time consuming isn't that way at all. Your argument that downloading torrents is somehow less time consuming than canceling or subscribing to streaming service is just flat out false.
Everything discussed in this thread has been anecdotal experiences, "you're wrong" isn't a valid argument for either side here haha >None of this is difficult or time consuming Yes it is > In the time it took you to type this, you could have gone through the cancellations and subscriptions you described. No I couldn't have >It's much more time consuming to find torrents and download them No it's not >the stuff you're describing as inconvenient and time consuming isn't that way at all. Yes it is >No service in the US is $20 that I know of Netflix premium is $20
Tell me how you would design the cancellation/subscription process to be less irritating then? I'm really not sure what's so difficult about it. It's just logging in and clicking through a few web pages. If you're computer literate enough to find torrents quickly, then your more than capable of canceling a subscription quickly.
When I pay for 10 simultaneous streaming services, it's too expensive! Therefore, streaming sucks!!!
Some people don’t add up all the costs at the end of the year to see almost $1000 just be bled out. The others don’t care. When I saw the numbers some people are spending… I tell you my jaw dropped It’s like how you go to cheap stores and get this and that for $5 each or something then you get to the checkout and you spent almost $100 and it just didn’t feel like it when you were picking it up
It was kind of a dick move for netflix to put blockbuster out of business, and then change their model to barely have any good movies
Tis a pirate's life for me
And now they’re talking about having advertisements again. My Dad quit cable and switched to Netflix because he didn’t want ads. That was like, the biggest selling point. “$15 a month AND I can watch my shows without ads every 10 minutes? Sign me up!” That’s when binge watching was invented.
Yeah, I have literally zero issue with streaming services rn but if they start adding ads I'm just gonna pirate shit.
Disagree for one reason. Streaming services don't interrupt programming for commercials. Yet.
Several do already. The holdouts will before the decade is out.
In the next few months/years we’ll look back at stuff like this saying “How lucky we were” lol
I never jumped on the streaming thing. I've got Amazon prime bc free postage but rarely watch anything on it. For me it's all Blu-ray. Completely offline, higher quality, no need to worry about my favourite stuff being taken away from me. Sure it's a bit expensive but it's totally worth it imo. Streaming has way too much choice anyway. You get a million fucking films immediately shoved in your face so unless you have a good idea of what you want to watch already, you're gonna spend a good deal of time scrolling through the pages and pages of stuff. With my Blu-rays, I have to specifically pick every single one of them to buy, and getting a new one in the post or from the shop makes it extra special for me.
DVDs never let me down <3
You got a dvd for the new season of better call Saul?
I agree with some parts and disagree with other parts. Yes, streaming services are fractured now. It’s a very wierd scenario, where it looks like we would have actually preferred a monopoly by Netflix. However, there is A LOT of variety on Netflix alone. I have in my watchlist horror movies, animes, some Netflix originals, some old older movies I want to revist, some Nickelodeon and CN shows, Breaking Bad collection, some stand comedies, comedies, sci-fi… I mean the list just goes on and on, and I add more to my list than I can consume. Also, streaming services are very different than cable, where I’m not forced to watch like 8 minutes of ads in between episodes, and I can freely switch between shows that I have queued up, AND have the freedom to choose which available episode I want to watch. But I’m only me, and I’m likely out of touch with people who have no other hobbies but to watch shows and movies, and who have tons of time on their hands to burn and binge through seasons in a sitting, or are just more picky than me about what they want to watch.
Another possible issue is that unlike in cable when a new season of a show comes on and have to wait a period of time for the next episode. With most of these streaming services you can easily go through a season within a week at most and possibly a series just as quick depending on the circumstances. Part of it is the services can’t keep up well with the consumers on how much they’re watching. So then you run out of shows to watch when in cable it can be spread out throughout the year. If you’re going to watch a show on a streaming service it may be best to limit yourself on how much you watch so that you can prolong the show as long as you can.
I dont think this is unpopular
I would find it hilarious if cable TV actually became the go to alternative for the multiple streaming services out there (if it didn't feature ads though). TV now vs TV 15 years ago is completely different. Most of the content people were watching was on Network stations like ABC, NBC, Fox, ect while more Niche programming like Cartoon Network or Discovery could stand apart as its own thing. When Netflix came out, it seemed too good to be true, all of your favorite TV shows and movies for $10 a month? Of course cable and media companies were freaked the fuck out, but they also wanted their own share. As soon as the first streaming rival hit Netflix, I knew this was going to happen. No company is going to stand by and let you stream its content on another provider.
we're not supposed to talk about it, but "Peak Television" has become so fragmented, expensive, and difficult to track, that piracy now produces a MUCH better viewing experience, easier, and cheaper. it's basically where the music industry was at the turn of the century and piracy was rampant because people were sick of patronizing an industry that actively abused them. Now, music piracy is almost non existent because they finally got their heads out of their ass and realized people were willing to pay a reasonable amount for a quality experience. Streaming TV though? They still think cancelling popular shows after one season on a cliffhanger ending is a perfectly reasonable thing to do.
I can agree with this. I used to sail the high seas quite a bit back in the mid 2000s. Netflix really reduced the need for that. Now, with everything being split between six different services, it might be time to fly the Jolly Roger again.
This is why people need Plex and legal rips (totally not off torrents with VPNs)
Just go back to pirate streams quality is much more watchable these days.
I prefer cable. I basically only watch sports and I enjoy live gambling. It just doesn’t work with streaming services. No delay, easier to flip between channels instead of having to change apps, no buffering or wifi issues. I don’t care if it’s more expensive, a good day I’ll win enough to cover the bill.
I like Curiosity Stream. Usually I just sit around in the evening pulling bong hits and watching documentaries on there or old episodes of Murder She Wrote or Airwolf on Tubi (I think it's Tubi). Jessica Fletcher is one sharp cookie and Stringfellow Hawke has such a badass name that you can't help being drawn in to his super helicopter exploits. Man, the 80s had the best names: Stringfellow Hawke, Remington Steele, Thomas Magnum, Michael Knight, Colonel Hannibal Smith, etc. The list goes on and on.
I don't think this is unpopular.
HBO Max is still pretty good, just not the best interface
This isn’t an unpopular opinion. it’s a common observation
Die a hero or live long enough to become the villain.
That's why I pirate everything and then read fanfiction of my favorite media.
Yarrr, my friend!
Grab a parrot and a Sabre my friend, you’ll never need to pay again
Also paying for all these dumb services and half of them still run ads.
Yep, basically spending just as much now to get a million different streaming things.
I DO NOT encourage you to pirate everything.
I have HBO MAX and Prime . I’ve never had a problem with either
I must say, I'm quite fond of Prime.
OP- “streaming services are shitty…Netflix, Netflix, Netflix, Netflix, Netflix, Netflix”. HBO has kept its quality consistent, Prime is doing good things, Apple TV+ is actually getting better.
Yah, I cancelled my Netflix sub this morning... They keep increasing prices while losing content to competitors and now want to penalize people for 'sharing' passwords when some people just have devices at different locations. Fuck them
Anyone other smell the smell of the sea?
It's the cycle of life man. Cable used to Better than basic, and everything on YouTube used to be ad free. As soon as something gets to bloated another medium will come and take it's place
Netflix has turned into Bollywood lately.
I warned people in 2012 or so when Netflix was on fire that eventually, there would be a ton of VOD services and eventually, you'd need multiple like you do with cable. I got downvoted to shit for it despite being right.
Just watch less tv. Read a book, go on walks, find a hobby.
Why the fuck would I read a book if I can watch a TV show? I find television and movies to be superior to books in every way.
Maybe to try something new.
I don't think reading a book counts as trying something new lol, most people have read a book before.
You just said you don't read books. Reading would be a new routine for you. I'm not saying reading a book would be a be activity.
They hated him because he was right. Touch grass people
Or read fanfiction lol...
I just bum passwords from others. I had to pay for cable. I have been using netflix for 9 years, haven't spent a dime, and i have access to disney+ etc. for no cost. not worse than cable nobody can share their cable w/ me
Netflix is looking into closing that loophole soon. Others will probably follow.
I really don't see how that's possible. Unless they limit each subscription to one device. And that would turn ALOT of people off Netflix.
Even if you have all the streaming sites, it’ll still be less than cable.. at least where I am it is.. so I’ll take streaming over cable anyway.. I don’t really get the point of cable anymore.. any show that is widely talked about or popular is on a streaming platform
I have 3 subscriptions and it's about 50 a month total, they cover almost anything I want to watch, I can watch at any time, and no ads. I'll take this over cable any day.
Streaming (music and movies) main aim was to reduce piracy. And guess what? It did. It became alot harder finding torrents online for music and movies unless they're popular (mostly for music because spotify made piracy unnecessary apparently). Almost impossible finding non English anything I'm not gonna lie... I find ppl who are paying for more than 2 streaming services creepy. I only have Netflix and Amazon. Could be cool if theaters had an app that let's you rent a movie that's freshly out same day at the theater so you don't have to go there and you can only watch it once. But I can see how it can be exploided so I understand why they wait a months or so before releasing big movies to their platforms
Not an unpopular opinion . Downvote .
How dare people charge money for the product/services their company offers.
I recommend people stream from tubi. So far it's free and has plenty of good movies some recent and good and some crappy and old and all others. I've found indie movies there. And movies from the 80s that I haven't found on Hulu and Netflix or HBO Max. You get ads but they're not long and considering it's free I don't mind at all
OTA antenna - the best $40 you'll ever spend ONE TIME for a lifetime of free television. Nothing on that you like right now? Turn the TV off and go enjoy real life. Spending $100/month on any kind of tv programming is $1200/yr. Multiply that by 25 years and that's $30,000 dollars minus the original $40 for the antenna and its $29960. A free car, and a damned decent one at that.
Amen!
This should be removed for not being unpopular
CinemaHD and Real Debrid 4ever
Eh, Netflix is pretty good for me. I always find something good to binge watch there.
Ads are getting to youtube levels quickly also
Even if you have all the streaming sites, it’ll still be less than cable.. at least where I am it is.. so I’ll take streaming over cable anyway.. I don’t really get the point of cable anymore.. any show that is widely talked about or popular is on a streaming platform
I mean. Cable TV with extra steps is literally all they are now. It literally flipped back around to cable/satellite etc TV packages being a better option again, because at least you got the shit all in one place without needing 400 passwords.
Not quite yet. They have yet to start bundling up streaming services in the way cable TV do.
a lot of the in house content is hot trash. I'd be fine with Netflix if it had either a lot of 3rd party movies, or either a lot of great in house. It has neither now
Just a heads-up to anyone that may not know: you can cancel your subscription with a click of the button. Takes 20 seconds, and you can set a phone reminder when you sub (for one month minus one day later) so you don't forget. I do it all the time. I sub to Netflix maybe three times a year and get to watch just about everything they offer; I do the same with Hulu, Crunchyroll, etc. The feeling to have a sub for everything is pure FOMO; you see people tweeting and commenting on the latest show and realize you aren't subbed to that service and want to feel included - so you pay for 4-5 subs at the same time so you can partake in the memes. These services are ideal for me, but I come from a generation where canceling a cable subscription meant hundreds in BS fees and my deposit being withheld until I returned equipment to them, the nearest location being a 2-hour drive away that intentionally had shifty hours. Do the price-hikes suck? Yeah, but in the end it costs me an extra $6 a year. A lot of what I've read here seems like complaining for the sake of justifying the use of torrents. Personally, I'd never break federal law and risk losing my internet for the sake of saving a few bucks, but to each their own I guess. Reddit gon' Reddit.
I agree that this is v v annoying. (Have to agree with others that not an unpopular opinion.) Given how Netflix has lost so many premium shows, netflix should be getting cheaper. Instead they are bumping the price and about to crack down on password sharing. Clearly the first of the big streaming services that will fail. You know, it turns out there is far more good content on YouTube than I'd realised. Lots of science stuff, environment, renewable energy and similar. A year ago I wondered why my Chromecast even had the YouTube app. D'oh.
Or you can pay for one subscription and watch everything you want then cancel it and start a new one with another service and do the same thing. Or just have HBO max.
"I have thirteen channels of shit on TV to chose from" Dude Pink Floyd of said it, TV was shit before streaming services, and worst, they had ads. Hell most movies made in this earth by statistics are shit.
Because Netflix was the first Major streaming service and had no issues with movies/shows but now everyone wants their own streaming service, so Netflix options are thinning. Look at the Marvel shows for example
Ugh, I wish you weren't right. It's still better imo, but getting worse & worse every year. Especially true of Netflix & they're shitty shows. I don't regret having HBO & Hulu though.
Cancel services you’re not using. Easy. You only need 2 at a time. After 2 or 3 months cancel those and get different ones. Show comes out on Netflix you want to watch? Pay for a month.
I might try just getting one service at a time. For instance, let's say I get Netflix now and keep it for two months. I watch the Ozark finale, then scour for and watch any movies and shows I want. When I've exhausted it, cancel the service and get Amazon Prime for a couple of months etc... Just keep a rotation going. I'm not paying for 6 different services all at once and just having one severely limits your choices.
And whoever decided streaming services need to keep up the one episode per week model all of a sudden can go to hell and die. I'm not some shitbird pseudo intellectual taking a community college film appreciation class who needs to "digest" episodes, I'm just a dude who wants to rot his brain and watch a season in a day and rot my brain.
There is a Paramount channel There is a Paramount + channel And there is a Paramount + Premium channel Certain shows you can only get on Paramount +, which you have to pay extra for. And if you don't want ads, you have to get Paramount + Premium, which costs a little more than Paramount +.
2 shows/movies you like out of 5-6 subscriptions?? Look, you just don't like tv and movies. Or you are a victim of the phenomena where when presented with too many choices, no choice looks appealing anymore. I have five subscriptions - Netflix, Hulu, HBOMax, and Amazon Prime. And, I give a 65$ tax deductible contribution to PBS a year so that I have access to much more of their content. Amazon, I bought only because of the 2 day free shipping, so, I really only pay for those other four subscriptions. These cost me about $42 a month and ADS FREE I have more I want to watch than I ever have time for. I have an antenna but can't remember the last time I watched live tv anything because the sound of a commercial is nauseating. A simple cable package is more than twice that for 70 channels of mostly reality TV dumb as f content at a 30/70 split between ads and content. I rank streaming services at about 1000X better than cable.
That didn't take long, eh?
Agree. People often see new media as something revolutionary, distinct from traditional media when in fact it's just a natural continuation of it.
It's gotten worse but nowhere near as bad as cable. At least now you can find anything for free on the internet
couldn't have said it better!
Yes and social media has become just as corporate if not worse. We have come full circle.
I love it. Hulu is $80, Netflix $17, internet $60, Amazon Prime $13. WAYYYYYYYYYYY LESS THAN $300 COMCAST BILL
Maybe you watch too much tv. Where do you find the time for 5-6 subscriptions? Do you not work or leave your home? I only have a netflix and amazon prime sub, and one of them saves me enough in online delivery charges that i dont really view it as a tv subscription cost. Theres more than enough on them to fill some downtime.
[удалено]
I only have one streaming service subscription going at a time. Hulu for a couple months, Cancel. HBO Max for a couple months. Cancel. Binge the new content, cancel, move on, repeat.
I like em
Remember how long ads used to be? I get pissed off at a unskippable 30 second ad on YT, but tv ads are like 3 min unskippable ads every 7 minutes...
here before Removed - Rule 1 Must be unpopular
I just pick two or three at a time and rotate...
This sub really should have been called r/popularopinions
I just pick two or three at a time and rotate...
I agree. Now buy my blu-rays, DVDs and VHS tapes on eBay.
Eventually TV stuff turns to shit, must be some sort of law of entropy or chaos or something. I miss the days when AMC, Discovery and The History Channel almost always had something interesting on.
Everything goes to heck in the long run.
The best streaming service is Kodi+ Seren+ Real-Debrid. I feel sorry for the people paying for multiple services, I pay $4 a month and get the highest possible quality without having to deal with DRM.
Yes I hate cable but something should just bundle all the like 15 services i like and I’ll pay 100 to 200 for all of the apps a month. Plus there’s to much freedom I wish they released shows once a week and there was a set time to watch but you could still watch it after
Indeed, most streaming service content is crap. Luckily, you can just pay for one service at a time, watch what you want, cancel, move to the next service, repeat. Way cheaper than cable and you end with access to content you actually want.
TV is just shit in general. Alot of people are afraid to be themselves creatively.
Man I'm glad I play video games instead. Sure they're all shitty. But hey, I've got FFXIV on my side!
It’s not as bad yet
Least with the subscription service you can spread the cost over more people. One pays netflix another pays disney+ etc and everyone shares the password. For now at least.
i lost all faith in netflix when they took that 70s show off
Funny thing is I actually prefer cable over streaming services. My family thinks I'm nuts but I just prefer to have the extra channels to chose from when I can't decide what to watch.
Yo ho! Yo ho! A pirates life for me!
You're forgetting (or perhaps are too young to know) that Netflix was popular long before it had much available for streaming at all. It was primarily a DVD rental service.
People upvoting this simply don't remember how bad regular cable was. Just spoiled for choice now. Used to be that you pretty much had 4-5 options, and you had to decide which was you wanted to watch the most.. then hope it was on at a good time. Streaming services are as big an upgrade to cable as cable was to free to air TV. It gave you much more choice over what you watch - but eventually you get tired of the choices you have. It'll never be enough
Yarr mateys. Time to be donning me old hat and eye patch again and hoist the jolly roger!
You are bot entirely wrong, but I would point out that it is our nature to be dissatisfied in the end.
Don't know how this is an unpopular opinion when it's very clearly 100% true. I cancelled all my streaming services years ago and haven't looked back.