Ask HN: How many of you are open to Piracy again? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: How many of you are open to Piracy again?

#141

Post by zug_zug » Thu, Jan 05, 2023, 2:14 PM UTC

I disagree that we're at peak monetization (see what the price of a premium cable package used to be)

Since you mention Spotify I'm super happy with it. It's basically everything I ever wanted consistently. Can recommend new music better than any person I know, and I can feed it any song that I and somebody else like as a radio station and get a pretty decent list of songs we both don't mind. Granted I don't listen to music as many hours as I did when I was young, but that's just me changing I think.

I feel like video games are actually often underpriced if you wait for a steam sale. I think child me would be blown away by the fact I can buy a game 10x better than mario 3 for 1/10th the price of Mario 3 ($50). I'm talking Baba is You, or Hollow Knight is 7.49 right now, or Slay The Spire is 8.49 right now. When I grew up I had "Gauntlet" which had some traits/bugs that made it nearly unwinnable without a guide, even by old standards.

In TV I think there's more of an argument to be had, and if you had only said TV I think this would be an interesting discussion, but if you think it's everything I think the more likely explanation is it's a you thing (maybe just not as easy to please anymore and upset at the media for not giving you that same magical feeling).

Re: Ask HN: How many of you are open to Piracy again?

#142

Post by j33zusjuice » Thu, Jan 05, 2023, 2:14 PM UTC

100011_100001 wrote: post #99

kajaktum wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What did people think was going to happen with subscription services? That you get everything you wanted in just one? This was inevitable, I am not quite sure why people were so excited about Netflix. It just meant that we own even less of what we consume. When you brought a disc (or even a digital version of it), you can kind of claim ownership. With subscription services? You can't even morally argue that you own i…

You are missing an important thing. Netflix allowed a huge library of DVDs to be rented. You could have 3-4 DVDs on rotation for a rather cheap price. This happened when Blockbuster would charge you $5 per movie, and Netflix would charge $10.99 for unlimited DVDs, but you could only have 3 DVDs checked out. That's why Netflix was huge and killed Video Store rentals.

Right! Streaming services weren’t feasible back then. We lacked the bandwidth, no apps existed (because internet connectivity outside of a desktop/laptop computer was in its infancy), and not that many people connect a computer to their TV.

People were excited about streaming services because we all got sick of dropping $20+ to buy a shitty movie or album, and there were always availability issues at video rental stores.

Ownership over movies and TV shows isn’t particularly important. I don’t have data to support this, but it seems true that people watch the (probably overwhelming) majority of movies only one time. Why own what I don’t want or need? And if I really enjoy the flick, I can still buy a disc.

Music seems more important to own since owning is the only way to guarantee availability.

Re: Ask HN: How many of you are open to Piracy again?

#143

Post by digitalsushi » Thu, Jan 05, 2023, 2:15 PM UTC

I read today something I am not sure I believe, that Adobe opts you in by default for all of your photoshop art to be samples for their ML products. (It was a reddit post so I would need to see something more official before I really give this more thought)

If that were true it would definitely get me thinking about whether I want to keep using that product at all, let alone whether I am paying for it.

Re: Ask HN: How many of you are open to Piracy again?

#144

Post by JamesSwift » Thu, Jan 05, 2023, 2:15 PM UTC

voisin wrote: post #119

__jem wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this sounds economical but also a major chore

Seems like it could be an opportunity for a website with all the news shows and movies on each platform. You check off the ones that seem interesting. It tells you what service to subscribe to after you hit a threshold. Not sure if any of the services have affiliate programs for revenue.

Justwatch provides a lot of that and I bet you could automate the rest

Re: Ask HN: How many of you are open to Piracy again?

#145

Post by tluyben2 » Thu, Jan 05, 2023, 2:15 PM UTC

I don't really mind paying. What I mind is geo-limiting content.

And yeah, when Netflix starts enforcing these multiple accounts; my wife and myself often work in different locations (different countries) so if they start enforcing that, it's definitely a cancel as we are not abusing anything.

Re: Ask HN: How many of you are open to Piracy again?

#146

Post by jscheel » Thu, Jan 05, 2023, 2:15 PM UTC

Morally, I won't go back to pirating - I stopped that around 2006. But I understand why people are so frustrated by the current landscape. It's a terrible mess that is incredibly consumer hostile, and these companies deserve to get slapped around by the "free market" (which includes being exposed to the high seas) a bit.

Re: Ask HN: How many of you are open to Piracy again?

#147

Post by chadlavi » Thu, Jan 05, 2023, 2:15 PM UTC

Nice try cops

Re: Ask HN: How many of you are open to Piracy again?

#148

Post by j33zusjuice » Thu, Jan 05, 2023, 2:16 PM UTC

yardie wrote: post #133

100011_100001 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are missing an important thing. Netflix allowed a huge library of DVDs to be rented. You could have 3-4 DVDs on rotation for a rather cheap price. This happened when Blockbuster would charge you $5 per movie, and Netflix would charge $10.99 for unlimited DVDs, but you could only have 3 DVDs checked out. That's why Netflix was huge and killed Video Store rentals.

BTW, this is still the case. https://dvd.netflix.com/ Netflix has never dropped their DVD service even though they wanted to many times. There are still places in the US where broadband is unavailable. Also, due to first sale they don't have same license restrictions as they would on streaming. Once they buy the disc they can rent it as many times they want for as long as they want. I've considered re-adding the DVD…

You know what’s even cheaper than renting DVDs?

But also, I get your stance. I prefer legal routes over gray/black markets.

Re: Ask HN: How many of you are open to Piracy again?

#149

Post by Liquix » Thu, Jan 05, 2023, 2:16 PM UTC

sidewndr46 wrote: post #18

terabytest wrote: post #10

I'm not going to speak about my personal practices, but I find the current landscape of streaming services unusable and unsustainable from a customer perspective. I share a Netflix and Prime account with my parents, and support for that is soon going to end. I don't feel like either of those services provide enough value to me to consider paying for them entirely by myself. The content is mediocre at best, finding an…

I have a Prime account, but I'll soon be cancelling it I feel. The same products can had on eBay for less money with no shipping charges added. Prime video is quite unique, but I'm very much past them putting pre-roll ads on the content I want to watch. It's universally an advert for their own craptastic, homegrown version of an existing well-defined format. If I was interested in watching Law & Order I can start fro…

> The same products can had on eBay for less money with no shipping charges added.

eBay sellers also tend to ship promptly, which used to be one of the main reasons to use Amazon/Prime. The latter's shipping speeds have increased by orders of magnitude in some parts of the country over the last couple years. It's not uncommon these days for a Prime order to sit in limbo for 3-4 days before being shipped, while the same order to the same city shipped instantly in 2018.

Re: Ask HN: How many of you are open to Piracy again?

#150

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet » Thu, Jan 05, 2023, 2:16 PM UTC

For TV and Movies I'm very open to piracy because I often find that when I want to watch something it is, for some reason, only available on some obscure streaming service I don't have. Sometimes it is on Prime or Paramount Plus, but only if I pay extra.

Fuck that noise.

For games though, I have no problem with the state of things. For a while Epic exclusives were annoying, but I just refrained from buying those games until they were on Steam or GoG or something and Epic seems to have become much less aggressive about it now anyway.

Steam: still more convenient than piracy.

TV/Movie streaming: rapidly becoming less convenient than piracy.