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Too Many Video Streaming Choices May Drive Users Back To Piracy

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Re: Too Many Video Streaming Choices May Drive Users Back To Piracy

#121

Post by imglorp »

hunta2097 wrote: post #20
sbarre wrote: post #6

"May" drive them back? This has already happened in my circles.. People who had cut the cord but all but walked away from casual piracy and signed up for Netflix and HBO (and probably Prime Video because they had Amazon Prime already) are openly talking about the fact they're definitely not signing up for more streaming services, and are seeking out torrenting again for the stuff that's being pulled from Netflix (esp…

I think there is a model for rotating streaming provider. You can easily watch a year's worth of a provider's [good] content in 3 months. Just change provider every 3 months to a different one, then binge it all. Maybe a service that automatically deactivates your account at the best point in the billing-cycle? If you could do it without too much overlap you could actually do it on a monthly basis: Jan - Netflix Feb…

> binge it all

Yeah until they spread out releases of a program over long periods to force you to keep a subscription. Eg Hulu and Disney (1).

The reason people pirate is they want to watch WHAT they want, WHEN they want, in the REGION they want and on the DEVICE they want. The content makers want to control all those things.

https://thestreamable.com/news/disney-is-saying-no-to-binge-...

Re: Too Many Video Streaming Choices May Drive Users Back To Piracy

#122

Post by Fabricio20 »

scarface74 wrote: post #74
hendersoon wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't understand how low-friction piracy is these days. Only techies deal with automation and Plex. Most people just buy a "fully loaded" android box which lists thumbnails for all the latest movies and TV shows on various file storage sites. They select a thumbnail and the movie plays. Nothing local at all, all streamed.

Which again doesn’t help when so much video streaming is done on mobile devices....

Ever heard of Kodi? That's a set-top box OS but that also is an Android App.. Then watch some youtube videos on how to install the magic box addons and you have access to millions of movies for streaming.

As hendersoon noted, nowadays, piracy is extremely low-friction.

Re: Too Many Video Streaming Choices May Drive Users Back To Piracy

#123

Post by eyegor »

sbarre wrote: post #6

"May" drive them back? This has already happened in my circles.. People who had cut the cord but all but walked away from casual piracy and signed up for Netflix and HBO (and probably Prime Video because they had Amazon Prime already) are openly talking about the fact they're definitely not signing up for more streaming services, and are seeking out torrenting again for the stuff that's being pulled from Netflix (esp…

This is why in my circle we set up the town pump plex server. Originally it was for streaming older movies (pre 1970) which you can't stream from any major service but the new era of fragmentation has drastically expanded it. We bought a retired datacenter rack and everyone contributes a few bucks a month to cover running costs. Then we have scripts scraping the top x movies/shows from torrent sites once a week and a little web ui for adding individual magnet links or uploading files directly. It's so much easier to find things when they aren't changing availability every 2 months (netflix et al).

Re: Too Many Video Streaming Choices May Drive Users Back To Piracy

#125

Post by sbarre »

imglorp wrote: post #121
hunta2097 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there is a model for rotating streaming provider. You can easily watch a year's worth of a provider's [good] content in 3 months. Just change provider every 3 months to a different one, then binge it all. Maybe a service that automatically deactivates your account at the best point in the billing-cycle? If you could do it without too much overlap you could actually do it on a monthly basis: Jan - Netflix Feb…

> binge it all Yeah until they spread out releases of a program over long periods to force you to keep a subscription. Eg Hulu and Disney (1). The reason people pirate is they want to watch WHAT they want, WHEN they want, in the REGION they want and on the DEVICE they want. The content makers want to control all those things. https://thestreamable.com/news/disney-is-saying-no-to-binge-...

And they will leave money on the table because of it. That ship has sailed, and people don't want "appointment TV" anymore.

I will stop short of saying they will "fail" because we all know they won't, they have too much money, but I think they will certainly discourage people from giving them money if they try to enforce some drip-feed delivery model just to squeeze more money out of their customers.

Re: Too Many Video Streaming Choices May Drive Users Back To Piracy

#126

Post by [deleted] »

neuronic wrote: post #65

Germans/Europeans might feel with me: I had the pleasure of using Sky to watch Game of Thrones and a few movies and it was the most abysmal experience I have ever had. Your account is an email combined with a 4-digit NUMERIC-ONLY (!) "password" and once you are hyper-securely logged in the amount of usability pain a single piece of software can cause will immediately become apparent. How can anything paid by a big co…

[deleted]

Re: Too Many Video Streaming Choices May Drive Users Back To Piracy

#127

Post by TeMPOraL »

jadams5 wrote: post #116

10'ish years ago I remember people being mad at the cable companies for bundling all the channels together into all-or-nothing options. Why did I have to pay for ESPN when I just want the SciFi channel? Here we are today with lots of options where you only pay for what you want and now people want them all bundled back together again!

People are still complaining about the same thing. Instead of "why do I have to pay for ESPN when I just want the SciFi channel?", it's now "why do I have to pay for the whole catalogue of yet another streaming service, and deal with its idiosyncraticly broken UI, when I just want to watch that one show that one time?".

People still want the same thing: to have all they want to watch available in a single place, through a single interface, and for a flat price. Without ads, market segmentation, or other exploitative trickery.

Re: Too Many Video Streaming Choices May Drive Users Back To Piracy

#128

Post by probably_wrong »

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #117
ShteiLoups wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Woah, free markets balancing themselves... Crazy

Piracy isn't a "market", it's theft. The free market isn't "balancing itself" when everyone's using an illegal hole in that market.

But it is an imbalance in the market, though. You just have to add the hidden costs of each alternative.

Pirating has costs: financial, legal (chances of getting caught times expected fine), and personal (hassle of hunting down the right torrent). Netflix managed to strike a balance point: you had a higher monetary price, but the legal and personal costs were now gone from the equation.

With all the new competitors, both the price and the personal cost of watching the content you like has risen. The return of people to piracy is then a previsible result of this imbalance.

Re: Too Many Video Streaming Choices May Drive Users Back To Piracy

#129

Post by 0-_-0 »

beardedwizard wrote: post #67
cptskippy wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sadly Disney is a lifestyle choice for a lot of people and the passion they have for the brand can be downright cultish and creepy at times. Groups like hardcore Disney fans, R. Kelly fans, and Evangelical Christians all share a very similar devotion and loyalty to their idols.

Tell me more about how R. Kelly and Disney fans are similar. Share your point by point analysis and include examples. Maybe you would like to bring Taylor Swift into the discussion? Your comment is a poorly disguised insult.

I can tell you really like R. Kelly or Disney but I can' tell which.

Re: Too Many Video Streaming Choices May Drive Users Back To Piracy

#130

Post by DHPersonal »

jadams5 wrote: post #116

10'ish years ago I remember people being mad at the cable companies for bundling all the channels together into all-or-nothing options. Why did I have to pay for ESPN when I just want the SciFi channel? Here we are today with lots of options where you only pay for what you want and now people want them all bundled back together again!

That's why I don't really believe people who claim that having to pick a streaming service is a burden too great to bear and can only be resolved through piracy. I don't think the issue is too little choice, too much choice, too much cost, or two much mental overhead—I think they just want to pirate and find a reason to use for the moment.
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