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A golden age of consumer convenience is passing

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Re: A golden age of consumer convenience is passing

#51

Post by EB-Barrington »

gonehome wrote: post #28
TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #13

Media embedded advertising has already been a thing for years, but companies hate leaving money on the table so they cannot resist the temptation of showing more ads. I wonder why it is that Steam hasn't had any issues remaining such a successful video game platform, while other forms of media have struggled to keep up. You're competing with piracy, but you throw ads in my face. I can download any show or movie I wan…

> “ I can download any show or movie I want and have it playing in minutes without having to deal with multi platform bullshit.” Is this as true as it once was? It seems most of the old trackers are offline or dead now. I’d guess because of the success of streaming services finally meeting the market demand. It’s also possible I’m just old and out of the loop now.

Hi, yes, as true at it ever was. Indeed, the choice is wider than all the paid streaming services combined.

Re: A golden age of consumer convenience is passing

#52

Post by gsatic »

TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #13

Media embedded advertising has already been a thing for years, but companies hate leaving money on the table so they cannot resist the temptation of showing more ads. I wonder why it is that Steam hasn't had any issues remaining such a successful video game platform, while other forms of media have struggled to keep up. You're competing with piracy, but you throw ads in my face. I can download any show or movie I wan…

Is HN an example of mindless consumption?

Re: A golden age of consumer convenience is passing

#53

Post by prmoustache »

ramesh31 wrote: post #9

I finally broke down and paid for YouTube Premium. There is literally no other option to watch YouTube on a TV nowadays. It is absolutely mindblowing the level of nonstop ads they shove down your throat in-between (and during) every single video now. Completely unwatchable otherwise. And it's impossible to buy a dumb TV in 2022, so you're stuck with the official Android/Roku YouTube apps that have no ad-blocking capa…

Why don't you use a regular computer plugged to the TV? All you need is a wireless keyboard+trackpad combo.

With firefox and an ad blocker I don't have any youtube ads. Also netflix shows start faster on a browser than they did when I was using a chromecast.

Re: A golden age of consumer convenience is passing

#54

Post by radlad »

gonehome wrote: post #28
TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #13

Media embedded advertising has already been a thing for years, but companies hate leaving money on the table so they cannot resist the temptation of showing more ads. I wonder why it is that Steam hasn't had any issues remaining such a successful video game platform, while other forms of media have struggled to keep up. You're competing with piracy, but you throw ads in my face. I can download any show or movie I wan…

> “ I can download any show or movie I want and have it playing in minutes without having to deal with multi platform bullshit.” Is this as true as it once was? It seems most of the old trackers are offline or dead now. I’d guess because of the success of streaming services finally meeting the market demand. It’s also possible I’m just old and out of the loop now.

Yes, this is absolutely still true if you have access to a couple private trackers.

Re: A golden age of consumer convenience is passing

#55

Post by Spooky23 »

jcranmer wrote: post #49
TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #13

Media embedded advertising has already been a thing for years, but companies hate leaving money on the table so they cannot resist the temptation of showing more ads. I wonder why it is that Steam hasn't had any issues remaining such a successful video game platform, while other forms of media have struggled to keep up. You're competing with piracy, but you throw ads in my face. I can download any show or movie I wan…

> I wonder why it is that Steam hasn't had any issues remaining such a successful video game platform, while other forms of media have struggled to keep up. Well, Youtube's ad problem comes from the fact that it is run by the largest internet advertiser. Netflix--video streaming in general--suffers from the fact that there are very few major content producers, and after seeing the monetary success of Netflix, the con…

I disagree re Netflix. They invented their own problems by pivoting from an video platform to a platform that measured itself by how much attention it could steal or time it could waste.

You may recall they were patting themselves in the back by adopting this strategy of minimally viable programming. Well, Disney got their shit together and turns out people want to watch good TV. Whatcha know?

It’s a management failure and the ad pivot is a bigger failure. If there was a board with a clue, they would fire the management and start over.

Re: A golden age of consumer convenience is passing

#56

Post by rocmcd »

mumblemumble wrote: post #44
pdimitar wrote: post #38

I have YouTube premium and download everything that I like. A home NAS is extremely handy like that. Mine is not even 10TB and I still have more than a year worth of watching. Also it's not illegal because I don't distribute anything. I use a local website run by volunteers that ask permission of publishing houses before putting every scanned & OCR'd & spell-checked book in their online library. Again, not illegal, t…

> I have YouTube premium I do, too. And every month I spend a little bit more time fast-forwarding past people awkwardly dropping pitches for NordVPN into the middle of their videos.

WTF is up with Nord? I always felt that VPNs were a pretty niche tech tool, but I see those ads freaking everywhere. Are there that many people that use VPNs that warrant the ad investment?

Re: A golden age of consumer convenience is passing

#57

Post by brasic »

fein wrote: post #35
brasic wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it ironic? One reason all these services are introducing ads is consumers’ learned unwillingness to bear the full costs of the services they enjoy. I might argue that the true irony is grumbling about a news provider very reasonably limiting their product to those who have paid them.

It's ironic because it's an upfront inconvenience to read what is ostensibly an article critical of how consumers are being inconvenienced. I'm not reading your site if you paywall it. There are too many other free resources that are just as good if not better.

At the risk of belaboring my point, even if what you say is true this attitude is a root cause of this unfortunate situation.

Good journalism isn’t fungible — it costs money to produce. When we actively choose to not pay for media, we have no one but ourselves to blame for the awful biased or clickbait junk that results.

Re: A golden age of consumer convenience is passing

#58

Post by mythrwy »

TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #13

Media embedded advertising has already been a thing for years, but companies hate leaving money on the table so they cannot resist the temptation of showing more ads. I wonder why it is that Steam hasn't had any issues remaining such a successful video game platform, while other forms of media have struggled to keep up. You're competing with piracy, but you throw ads in my face. I can download any show or movie I wan…

It's a strange state when YouTube videos of villagers in Africa building a mud hut or a guy in Asia building a fish tank taken with cheap cameras by amateur videographers are many times more entertaining then Hollywood blockbusters that cost 10's of millions to make.

Re: A golden age of consumer convenience is passing

#60

Post by rowanG077 »

jcranmer wrote: post #49
TheAceOfHearts wrote: post #13

Media embedded advertising has already been a thing for years, but companies hate leaving money on the table so they cannot resist the temptation of showing more ads. I wonder why it is that Steam hasn't had any issues remaining such a successful video game platform, while other forms of media have struggled to keep up. You're competing with piracy, but you throw ads in my face. I can download any show or movie I wan…

> I wonder why it is that Steam hasn't had any issues remaining such a successful video game platform, while other forms of media have struggled to keep up. Well, Youtube's ad problem comes from the fact that it is run by the largest internet advertiser. Netflix--video streaming in general--suffers from the fact that there are very few major content producers, and after seeing the monetary success of Netflix, the con…

Epic game store definitely tries to enforce exclusivity. Prime example beeing Square Enix games. FF7 Remake first released on Epic Game Store and only much later released on Steam. Kingdom Hearts still isn't available in Steam and probably never will be. It's one of the prime reasons I will never buy from them. That way lies madness.
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