The case for physical media ownership • Hacker News Board

Re: The case for physical media ownership

#131

Post by lmm » Sat, Jun 27, 2026, 5:26 PM UTC

IAmGraydon wrote: post #102

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I purchased it, and you're taking it away? Then either I didn't actually purchase it (despite the word appearing in the notice), or you're stealing it from me. Which is it, Sony?

This isn’t that difficult. You purchased the ability to use it while they let you, and yes, it was in the terms.

They said they were selling it, all over their site. The button said "buy". They can put whatever crap they like in a section that they know nobody ever reads, that doesn't negate what they said in large print up front and no sane court will entertain the notion that it does.

Re: The case for physical media ownership

#132

Post by rhinoceraptor » Sat, Jun 27, 2026, 5:29 PM UTC

It seems like more and more people are moving back to physical media, I'm seeing more blu-rays and DVDs at retailers. There are just too many streaming services, each with distinct catalogs which creates two problems: it's too difficult to find specific titles when you know what you want to watch, and it's too difficult to find anything worth watching when you don't.

I'm not someone who keeps the TV on in the background, so I'd much rather spend $100 a month on physical media even when I don't plan on watching them immediately, than spend $100 a month on five different streaming services that I barely even use when I did subscribe to them.

Re: The case for physical media ownership

#133

Post by protimewaster » Sat, Jun 27, 2026, 5:33 PM UTC

dijit wrote: post #98

protimewaster wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What happens when those servers go offline? Funny enough, if you keep your PS4 on an old version and jailbreak it, you can just go in and activate the license yourself. No internet or servers required. Turns out, you can also pirate games if you do this. Piracy wins again? > Sony was the principle architect of Blu-Ray, if even they can’t build a system that comes with decryption keys then who can? The even weirder…

Keeping anything at an old version requires perfect foresight (in the face of diminishing capabilities). It's not like original PS4's can continue playing games as they're released, new releases assume later and later PS SDKs, you're only meant to certify against "latest". And since downgrading is not possible on most "appliance" class devices (phones, consoles)... :\

Yeah, it definitely requires some luck or planning. I mostly meant that all simply to say, I think that, with Blu-ray physical media, the odds are pretty good you'll be able to watch it in the future, via some means. Right now, used PS3s and Blu-ray players are pretty cheap, used PS4s that haven't been updated in a few years are available, etc. There are ways to play Blu-rays even if all the supporting online infrastructure is shut down, even without resorting to breaking any DRM or pirating. That's a contrast to movies on services like PSN.

Re: The case for physical media ownership

#134

Post by altern8 » Sat, Jun 27, 2026, 5:34 PM UTC

ryandrake wrote: post #82

blfr wrote: post #3

Just pirate it. They can't tell you this but there's a quagmire of rights, licenses, agreements, treaties... and you can untangle this Goridan Knot by just pirating, especially media, for your own use. There are pixel perfect 4k drm-free rips out there made by people who poured thousands of hours into understanding codecs. They will work on any platform, forever, you can stream them or play offline. These rips can be…

Another thing that always needs pointing out: that ad-free, copyable, unencumbered, pixel perfect 4K drm-free rip with multiple language audio streams, hand crafted accurate subtitles, chapter tags, and embedded poster art cannot be bought from the movie industry at any price. That's why piracy is a product problem, not a price problem. The industry refuses to produce and offer the superior product, so regardless of…

This is so true, I pirated movies that I was ready to pay for so many times, just because they weren't available in my area, or there were no subtitles, or they only offered 720p.

You can download a MTK file at 4K with multiple audio tracks and subtitles and more often than not there are enough seeders to just start watching it while it downloads in the background.

They need to wake up.

Re: The case for physical media ownership

#135

Post by titzer » Sat, Jun 27, 2026, 5:35 PM UTC

I have a large collection of DVDs that I've amassed over the years.

There's something nice about physical media; the bits are physically stamped into the medium. They're DVD-encrypted but I lawfully extract these bits and view them regularly.

When streaming services start on-the-fly editing for content[1] and revoking licenses, they can absolutely shove it up their butts. My old man take is that if a TV show or movie or whatever isn't worth putting onto a physical medium and distributing it to people who will buy it, I won't miss it if--I mean when[2]--it's gone. I mean, these huge movie studios act like pirates are going to ruin their massive profits, when they won't.

[1] And yes, they will absolutely on-the-fly, 1984-style edit films and TV shows for content.

[2] And it will go [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_dark_age] along with lots of other things into the memory hole of the digital dark age.

Re: The case for physical media ownership

#136

Post by nik282000 » Sat, Jun 27, 2026, 5:37 PM UTC

AlotOfReading wrote: post #93

nullhole wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I disagree with the interpretation that it needs to be held physically. Digital ownership is still ownership. I go out of my way to find music on Bandcamp, games on GOG, and rip movies myself using MakeMKV. Files on a hard disk that you own are still files that you physically own. The only difference between those files and, say, a DVD, is that the encoding is more space-efficient.

The parent's point is that possession of a physical good is a bright line separation. For digital files, there's a huge difference between [Files you own] on a hard disk, and files [on a hard disk you own]. There are files you can put on a hard drive that you don't own and will ultimately kill themselves when specified criteria are met, like DRM'd ebooks.

I would argue that the files on your hdd that can expire or made unusable by some remote third party are as incomplete as a book that is missing half the pages. For example a keepass file without the password/key-file is incomplete, the same goes for Audible aax files that can not be played without per-user 'activation bytes.' You have possession of the file but you never owned its contents.

Re: The case for physical media ownership

#137

Post by TeaVMFan » Sat, Jun 27, 2026, 5:39 PM UTC

Even if you _can_ hold it, you may not own it if the player is internet-connected or even receives a firmware upgrade during maintenance or from a disc. New discs may not play unless you upgrade, and an upgrade can also remove keys, blocking you from watching discs you already have.

https://www.dell.com/community/en/conversations/windows-gene...

https://web.archive.org/web/20070430070403/https://www.aacsl...

Re: The case for physical media ownership

#138

Post by markhahn » Sat, Jun 27, 2026, 5:39 PM UTC

If you can't hack it, you don't own it.

Re: The case for physical media ownership

#139

Post by cassianoleal » Sat, Jun 27, 2026, 5:40 PM UTC

brookst wrote: post #50

carra wrote: post #28

This article is quite right, but there's even more to it than that. Why should we need to hold ANY kind of relationship with the seller/provider of an article we bought? You certainly don't need a bookstore account to buy a paperback book. Nor do they get to keep your contact information. You get your article and a ticket. They get your money. End of story.

Goods / services. You probably need a relationship to use a warranty. The tension is that digital goods are somewhere between. Especially when the delivery mechanism is streaming, and/or DRM keys that need to be renewed. Sure, many people want a one-time download with no promise or obligation to re-deliver it in the future. Then again, many people don’t want the burden of caring for bytes for the rest of their lives…

It's a very different thing to stop serving a download link to a purchased good from blocking access to the user's local copies altogether.

Re: The case for physical media ownership

#140

Post by rhinoceraptor » Sat, Jun 27, 2026, 5:42 PM UTC

blfr wrote: post #3

Just pirate it. They can't tell you this but there's a quagmire of rights, licenses, agreements, treaties... and you can untangle this Goridan Knot by just pirating, especially media, for your own use. There are pixel perfect 4k drm-free rips out there made by people who poured thousands of hours into understanding codecs. They will work on any platform, forever, you can stream them or play offline. These rips can be…

I have a TrueNAS server with Jellyfin, but I'd still much rather have a physical blu-ray, especially if it's something with a Criterion release. I think the "inconvenience" of physical media is enjoyable. It makes me commit to actually watch a movie and not just have it on in the background while I look at my phone, much like how a physical record makes me commit to listening to a full album.