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Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

theguardian.com

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Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#201

Post by l72 »

hbn wrote: post #177
ryandrake wrote: post #153

Piracy offers: 1. Unrestricted access to an absolutely huge library of movies, music and TV shows, nearly unlimited. Certainly not limited by opaque "licensing deals" between various companies. 2. Highest resolution/bitrate/quality that was available at the time of the work's original release. 3. No arbitrary device/OS limitations. 4. Can watch/listen/download from any location on earth with sufficient bandwidth. I d…

Don't forget censorship-free I swore off streaming services when they started pulling episodes of comedy shows and editing out scenes because they were worried someone might be offended

They also often time have versions of old movies and shows that have been modified due to silly things like license agreements on music expiring! I have felt gaslighted when I rewatch and old movie and some scene isn’t how I remember.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#202

Post by CivBase »

sneak wrote: post #189
wrasee wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Supply and demand might argue that if there was real demand for something like this that people were actually willing to pay a lot of money for, then the market would be all too happy to provide. I think the inconvenient truth here is that when anyone has got close to doing such a thing the price has been high enough that it turns out nobody actually turns up to pay for it, not at least outside a small niche.

Nah; copyright is a monopoly on specific media/titles. It breaks all of the “market willing to provide” mechanics because there is no free market for Star Wars, it’s Disney or FOAD. Pray they do not alter it further.

Bingo. When distributors get exclusive rights to media, there is no competition anymore. You either do whatever the publisher wants, pirate, or go without.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#203

Post by cammikebrown »

ryandrake wrote: post #186
kaliqt wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only consequences, physically speaking the two are not the same at all. Copying of anything digital is not actual theft, nor will it ever be.

"You wouldn't download a car!" Wait, I absolutely would download a car if I could... or food... or clothing... I'd download the shit out of physical goods if the technology existed. Who wouldn't? You could solve scarcity. If we had Star Trek Replicators, we'd be living in a literal utopia.

The “download” catchphrase is a joke, it was originally “You wouldn’t steal a car”, which I’d argue is true for most people.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#204

Post by phkahler »

DHRicoF wrote: post #170
ryandrake wrote: post #153

Piracy offers: 1. Unrestricted access to an absolutely huge library of movies, music and TV shows, nearly unlimited. Certainly not limited by opaque "licensing deals" between various companies. 2. Highest resolution/bitrate/quality that was available at the time of the work's original release. 3. No arbitrary device/OS limitations. 4. Can watch/listen/download from any location on earth with sufficient bandwidth. I d…

Netflix and to some level spotify drowned piracy for a time. But then a lot of companies tried to rap the same "winings" splitting the ecosystem and trashing the user experience. - ¿could we watch x movie? - let me see. no, it in this other service beside the 3 we are paying.

At some point I'm willing to just pay a few dollars for a movie. But even then you cant get them all in one place! And they like to charge a premium for some. Im not paying a premium for anything I've already seen a while back.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#205

Post by tick_tock_tick »

massysett wrote: post #154
system2 wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is easier to download from a torrent or illegally stream.

What a surprise, it’s easier to steal than to pay content creators. (I know, someone will now chime in and say it isn’t really stealing, etc etc.) Actually I disagree though. Software and UX for torrenting is a pain. It’s easier to buy a $10 DVD.

> Actually I disagree though. Software and UX for torrenting is a pain. It’s easier to buy a $10 DVD.

You probably haven't checked back in in the last 5-10 year then. Honestly the UX is almost too good.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#206

Post by interestica »

kashunstva wrote: post #47
sunrunner wrote: post #24

"Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem" -- Gabe Newell [1] And I think he was largely correct, although the term _service_ seems like it now has to do a lot of heavy lifting as it now encompasses: - Availability by Company - Availability by Global Region - Stream Quality - Advert Policy (why does the lowest tier need to be ad supported? What am I paying for aside from being upsold?) - Qu…

> service problem and not a pricing problem Indeed. Recently we purchased season 1 of a reasonably popular U.S. produced show via Apple TV. When played, it is available only in dubbed French in our region (Canada.) None of the info available beforehand said anything about this. Guess where I obtained the subsequent seasons? I will pay for content but not if you lie, or make me jump through ridiculous hoops.

In a weird quirk that must be a bug, you can watch the first season of the Good Place in French in the USA but not in Canada.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#207

Post by testing22321 »

vhanda wrote: post #6

All streaming services should have a pay per minute system as an alternative to the fixed monthly subscription. That way, I'd happily use any service to watch whatever cause it would be convenient, instead of piracy. And it would be a reason for them to really improve their recommendation systems.

Idea for a service.

The service effectively rebroadcasts all the streaming services to provide exactly what you suggest. It’s still paying the streaming services, and users pay it.

Better not set it up in the US .

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#208

Post by l72 »

wrasee wrote: post #161
ryandrake wrote: post #153

Piracy offers: 1. Unrestricted access to an absolutely huge library of movies, music and TV shows, nearly unlimited. Certainly not limited by opaque "licensing deals" between various companies. 2. Highest resolution/bitrate/quality that was available at the time of the work's original release. 3. No arbitrary device/OS limitations. 4. Can watch/listen/download from any location on earth with sufficient bandwidth. I d…

Supply and demand might argue that if there was real demand for something like this that people were actually willing to pay a lot of money for, then the market would be all too happy to provide. I think the inconvenient truth here is that when anyone has got close to doing such a thing the price has been high enough that it turns out nobody actually turns up to pay for it, not at least outside a small niche.

You have to have real options or people can’t make informed decisions.

I have a background in city planning, and in the US, you’ll constantly hear about how trying to make cities more friendly to pedestrians, bicycles, or public transit is a waste because no one uses it. But the truth is, most people will end up using the system you design. If you build a system just for cars, people will use cars. If you build a city around public transportation, people will happily use it. If you build a walkable city, people will walk.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#209

Post by l72 »

franciscop wrote: post #179
wrasee wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Supply and demand might argue that if there was real demand for something like this that people were actually willing to pay a lot of money for, then the market would be all too happy to provide. I think the inconvenient truth here is that when anyone has got close to doing such a thing the price has been high enough that it turns out nobody actually turns up to pay for it, not at least outside a small niche.

IMHO not really, supply here is the limiting factor since the constrain is in licensing the work. The goal of the right holders is not to maximize access to the work or those stated by OP, but to maximize profit for the company, which when at odds with those other goals still prevails. e.g. someone calculated/believes that having a big catalog from Disney at X/month is more worth more for Disney than sublicensing to…

I really wish we had laws that producers of content cannot also be distributors. That just creates perverse incentives to use content to lock people into their distribution platform.

If they had to be separate, that gives content producers the ability to cross license and those licenses to be better deals. We’d actually have competition in distribution companies as distribution providers would then be competing on price, quality, convenience, and other things that matter, not locking content away.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#210

Post by hxtk »

wrasee wrote: post #161
ryandrake wrote: post #153

Piracy offers: 1. Unrestricted access to an absolutely huge library of movies, music and TV shows, nearly unlimited. Certainly not limited by opaque "licensing deals" between various companies. 2. Highest resolution/bitrate/quality that was available at the time of the work's original release. 3. No arbitrary device/OS limitations. 4. Can watch/listen/download from any location on earth with sufficient bandwidth. I d…

Supply and demand might argue that if there was real demand for something like this that people were actually willing to pay a lot of money for, then the market would be all too happy to provide. I think the inconvenient truth here is that when anyone has got close to doing such a thing the price has been high enough that it turns out nobody actually turns up to pay for it, not at least outside a small niche.

Streaming services were great back when they were separate from content producers and IP holders.

Once every media company became a streaming company and started using anticompetitive licensing practices in an attempt to drive viewership to their own platforms, the market fractured too much for it to be profitable.

Something smells “prisoner’s dilemma” about it: the best move for any individual streaming service is to have exclusive content (and the best-positioned players to do that are the studios), but when everyone does that, it decreases the overall profit available in the market more than it increases their slice of the pie.

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