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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

#461

Post by wat10000 »

What’s really amazing is the contrast with music.

Music has figured it out. I subscribe to one of the major services. In exchange for my money, I get access to music. For my purposes, I get access to effectively all music from that one service. When I want music, I open that app and play it. End of story. If I don’t like that service for some reason, I can pick a different one.

Obviously, the logistics for long-form video are not exactly the same. But still, surely this is possible.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#462

Post by jancsika »

energy123 wrote: post #442
prepend wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think things are moral unless proven immoral.

Morality is self-interest. Piracy isn't immoral because they aren't staked in the impacted industries. Eating meat isn't immoral because it's in their self-interest to keep doing it. What is immoral are things that would impact them, like if I stole their property, or if I take credit for their code at work, or if I ate their dog. Morality is easy to understand when you realize everyone is a hypocrite who uses their…

> or if I ate their dog

Well, eating an unauthorized copy of their dog.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#463

Post by matheusmoreira »

ninetyninenine wrote: post #431

Why do people try to justify theft? That’s what I’m expecting to see in all the comments here. Like everyone is trying to somehow spin the whole situation into some story that makes their act of theft morally correct. Don’t get me wrong. I pirate my self. But I’m honest about it. It’s theft. I steal because I’m a cheap ass thief. Why can’t you admit that about yourself? If someone makes their product annoying and har…

"Piracy" is not theft, it is copyright infringement. Calling it theft is not "honesty", it's just factually wrong. There's nothing to debate on this matter.

> Like everyone is trying to somehow spin the whole situation into some story that makes their act of theft morally correct.

Nobody is "spinning" anything. We're telling you what we believe and why we believe it.

Actual moral justification involves the realization that all intellectual property is not only unnatural but also fundamentally unjust.

First, copyright is a perversion of reality. The natural state of ideas is actually the public domain. Ideas are infinitely copyable and trivially transmissible. Copyright seeks to completely invert that reality.

Copyright infringement is just reality reasserting itself. It happens every single day at massive scales without people even noticing or caring. It happens every time someone sends a funny picture to a friend. There is no such thing as stopping it, for it is natural, and natural processes shouldn't be stopped.

Second, copyright is fundamentally unjust. It is a functionally infinite state granted monopoly on numbers.

It's absurdity is merely tolerated because it promises well deserved rewards to creators, thereby incentivizing them.

The original social contract was "we're all going to pretend we can't trivially copy your works for a couple decades so that you can turn a profit and then the works will return to the public domain where it belongs".

So when was the last time a work you enjoyed entered the public domain? How many times has copyright duration been extended by now? It might as well be infinite. We're all going to be long dead before our culture returns to us.

They've all made their fortunes a thousand times over but they want to continue their rent seeking and unlike us they've got the trillions of dollars needed to lobby governments and get what they want.

Why fulfill our part of the contract when the copyright holders constantly demonstrate they're not willing to fulfill theirs? There's absolutely no reason to do that. Just stop pretending. It really is that simple.

> When you choose to pirate that work you’re doing something morally unethical.

Nonsense. Copyright infringement is civil disobedience of an unjust law and arguably a moral imperative.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#464

Post by baby_souffle »

mattbee wrote: post #60
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…

Absolutely right! A week ago I downloaded a couple of movies and shows from Netflix for my 6yo daughter, to watch on a 3hr flight. Worked nicely! Today we made the return flight. She opens Netflix, and ⅔ of the films have now "expired" with no notice and she can't watch the one she wanted. For the next flight I'll remember to pirate!

I've lost access to YouTube premium features just because my phone was not the United States for a couple of weeks.

As soon as I was back on a US ip, features just came right back.

Last I checked, background play with VLC just works regardless of where you are physically located at the time.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#465

Post by [deleted] »

dawnerd wrote: post #423
chongli wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2. Highest resolution/bitrate/quality that was available at the time of the work's original release. Arguably higher. For example, fans of Star Wars have scanned the original 1977 theatrical release with very high quality film scanners and created a 4K release complete with film grain and the original scenes intact which is not available through approved channels.

People just don't realize just how garbage even 4k streams are from all the services. It's not in their interest to give you real bluray quality.

[deleted]

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#468

Post by helsinkiandrew »

imoverclocked wrote: post #406
godelski wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Piracy also offers: 0. Ability to watch offline! 1. Ability to fix subtitle issues with minimal tweeks like change size or moving location. 1.2 Ability to get subtitles if they aren't offered (or offered in your language) 2. Ability to normalize audio. 3. Ability to buffer videos when on a poor connection. 4. Ability to create collections, organize, and track your movie as you wish 5. Arbitrary number of user account…

Until recently, 3. (poor connection) has been a huge issue for me and streaming services. When there is a download/watch later, I sigh with relief. 7. is only sort-of an issue, IMHO. Anything that is pirated is usually fairly benign content and I don't care if someone knows how many times I've watched Idiocracy. I just wish I could know how many times I've watched it too. I would add: Piracy offers the ability to rem…

> Tell me, does the original cast get any of that or is it just adding pocket change to Google's coffers?

Google will have negotiated with the “owner” (in this case I think Disney) for a wholesale price and then adds its retail markup (eg 20%). Disney pay the industry standard SAG/DGA union negotiated residual agreements to cast, writers and directors

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#469

Post by Sabinus »

kenjackson wrote: post #455
hbn wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

That seems like a bad reason to swear off streaming services. Do you not shop at stores because they don’t carry offensive clothing?

If a tshirt rental store was renting me my favourite tshirt (not available to buy) for two decades then decided it wasn't available any more because other people don't like the shirt design, I would be pissed and not want to support the tshirt rental industry any more.

Re: Streaming services are driving viewers back to piracy

#470

Post by DowsingSpoon »

kenjackson wrote: post #455
hbn wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

That seems like a bad reason to swear off streaming services. Do you not shop at stores because they don’t carry offensive clothing?

That’s a bad analogy. It works against your point. It seems entirely, entirely reasonable to avoid a clothing store that refuses to stock hip styles simply because they’re “offensive”. For an example using the cliche, many people find a naked ankle to be completely acceptable.
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