Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Popcorn Time 4.0

github.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 229 posts

Re: Popcorn Time 4.0

#91

Post by Avalaxy »

tnolet wrote: post #71
1_player wrote: post #7

Say what you will about stealing, illegality, unsavouriness. If the film industry would collectively take their head out of their arses and provide such a simple interface and wide catalogue to the masses, they would make hundreds of billions. I would literally pay $50 a month for an official and legal version of this. The end users don't really care that it is not possible because "legal reasons". This app proves ot…

Here here. Been saying this for years as a satisfied Popcorn time users. Been paying for Spotify already for years too. If a legal Popcorn Time existed, I'd signup directly.

Just a minor nitpick, but it's "hear hear", not "here here", as it refers to hearing what is said.

Re: Popcorn Time 4.0

#92

Post by beatgammit »

deanstag wrote: post #21
q3k wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We were fine for a while. Netflix killed film/series piracy for me - for a while it literally made no sense. Then, every copyright owner realized they want a slice of the streaming cake - (HBO, Disney+, all the cable networks...) and started making their content exclusive on their platforms. Now, instead of a single Netflix (or anyone else, really) subscription I would have to pay for a dozen, that I would rarely use…

In that case, what is the maximum amount of subscription fee that you are willing to shell out before resorting to piracy?

Personally, I think it should be tiered. I'm willing to pay ~$2 for older films (that's what my grocery store charged when I was a kid), ~$5 for new releases, and I expect a discount for paying month to month vs ala carte. So, if I watch one movie/week, $10/month seems fair since I'll probably watch 1-2 new releases and likely won't watch a movie every week. If I watch 2x that, then $15-20 seems fair. If I watch a movie every day, $50/month seems fair. Maybe pay extra for higher quality.

I currently pay for Netflix and Amazon prime, mostly so my kids can watch cartoons (we don't have c cable or satellite TV) and because my wife likes fast shipping (we watch way more Netflix than Amazon Prime though). I don't expect to pay more than either service to have access to a better selection of movies.

Re: Popcorn Time 4.0

#94

Post by ApolloFortyNine »

davidmurdoch wrote: post #77
gerardnll wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'... it's hard to decide if that new movie just out is worth spending $15 on. Might be crap.' As well a restaurant might be crap too, or a website or mason work... look up reviews before buying.

Except looking at reviews for a movie spoils the movie.

You can always go by the number itself, or a critic that you trust.

Re: Popcorn Time 4.0

#95

Post by uncletammy »

q3k wrote: post #15
awicz wrote: post #4

Serious question about torrents: How is this not stealing? I'm not trying to be judgemental. I certainly don't have any room to do so as I used Napster and the likes back in the day. Now with the advent of Amazon Prime, Hulu, Netflix, etc, I'm genuinely curious to know the moral argument for using services and platforms that utilize torrents to distribute media other creators are actually trying to sell? Edit: Appare…

We were fine for a while. Netflix killed film/series piracy for me - for a while it literally made no sense. Then, every copyright owner realized they want a slice of the streaming cake - (HBO, Disney+, all the cable networks...) and started making their content exclusive on their platforms. Now, instead of a single Netflix (or anyone else, really) subscription I would have to pay for a dozen, that I would rarely use…

> The music industry got their shit together and even the most copyright-paranoid artists are on Spotify...

To be fair, unless their play count rivals Taylor Swift, those artists probably still aren't making much money. I have quite a few friends who are professional musicians and this is a common complaint.

Im nit saying spotify isnt a positive thing for consumers (and maybe also artists in the long run) but there's definitely a tradeoff to having one platform to rule them all.

Re: Popcorn Time 4.0

#96

Post by rezeroed »

I wonder to what degree piracy serves as marketing ie someone pirates the film then tells three non-pirates what a good film it was, and they pay for it.

Re: Popcorn Time 4.0

#97

Post by ta1235235 »

awicz wrote: post #4

Serious question about torrents: How is this not stealing? I'm not trying to be judgemental. I certainly don't have any room to do so as I used Napster and the likes back in the day. Now with the advent of Amazon Prime, Hulu, Netflix, etc, I'm genuinely curious to know the moral argument for using services and platforms that utilize torrents to distribute media other creators are actually trying to sell? Edit: Appare…

When you steal from someone, you take something that belongs to them. If someone steals your bike, you don't have a bike anymore. When you torrent, you create a _copy_ of your friends _copy_. your friend still has his copy, but now you have a copy too.

Hope that helps

Re: Popcorn Time 4.0

#98

Post by wlesieutre »

Holmes wrote: post #90
wlesieutre wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same boat, I haven't torrented a movie in years because Netflix gave me a good way to pay for them. But now I have two streaming subscriptions and the catalog between them is still too sparse. I think I'd need 4 or 5 separate subscriptions to stop losing the "is this somewhere that I can watch it?" game. Plus I have a VPN account that my phone and tablet are connected through almost all the time. I don't like having…

Can you recommend a good VPN for this use case?

I'm using PIA, but they were purchased recently by Kape Technologies so I'm not sure if I'll re-up when my subscription expires. Where I'm at right now is they're probably more trustworthy than Comcast, and less likely to do something like selling my IP address -> personal identity to advertisers.

https://www.hackread.com/private-internet-access-pia-vpn-sol...

They say it doesn't change anything, but with VPN services you really have no way of knowing how trustworthy they are.

https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/the-continually-e...

Still, I figure on balance I'm better off having my internet browsing aggregated with all the other traffic coming out of their endpoints versus coming from my modem's IP address.

Re: Popcorn Time 4.0

#99

Post by beatgammit »

awicz wrote: post #4

Serious question about torrents: How is this not stealing? I'm not trying to be judgemental. I certainly don't have any room to do so as I used Napster and the likes back in the day. Now with the advent of Amazon Prime, Hulu, Netflix, etc, I'm genuinely curious to know the moral argument for using services and platforms that utilize torrents to distribute media other creators are actually trying to sell? Edit: Appare…

Legally, it is stealing. However, just because something is illegal doesn't make it wrong.

However, you could also think of it like the digital equivalent of sharing. If someone purchases a movie or TV series on physical disks, they could loan it to you without breaking the law. In fact, they could even make a copy of the disk and not break the law. The only way to break the law this way is by having multiple copies in use at the same time. This is just digital sharing without checks in place to make sure multiple copies of the content aren't used simultaneously.

That being said, who is really harmed when I give someone a copy for free? I'm not stealing from the content creator (I paid, after all), and I'm not selling it, and there's no guarantee that the person I gave it to would have purchased it. If the creator hasn't lost anything and I'm not taking credit for it, nobody was harmed. In my eyes, this makes piracy acceptable as long as I don't sell it.

If we didn't have such strong copyright protections, content creators would be forced to compete with piracy by offering convenience, but instead they sue. Netflix has proven to reduce piracy because they offer convenience, but that only works for content they can provide.

Re: Popcorn Time 4.0

#100

Post by pbhjpbhj »

gerardnll wrote: post #73
1_player wrote: post #7

Say what you will about stealing, illegality, unsavouriness. If the film industry would collectively take their head out of their arses and provide such a simple interface and wide catalogue to the masses, they would make hundreds of billions. I would literally pay $50 a month for an official and legal version of this. The end users don't really care that it is not possible because "legal reasons". This app proves ot…

'... it's hard to decide if that new movie just out is worth spending $15 on. Might be crap.' As well a restaurant might be crap too, or a website or mason work... look up reviews before buying.

If you go too a restaurant and the food is really terrible, then you can refuse to pay, send a dish back, get a reduction/waiver of the bill - even the best places get it wrong sometimes.

Anyone ever got money back from Amazon/Apple/whoever because a movie they sold you sucked?

Post reply on HN