Yup, this is the same fight the Music labels fought in the late 90’s and early 00’s. Piracy offers a far superior user experience and a lower price point. With the chances of facing punishment low enough that most people expect to get away with it. The content producers could solve the problem, but none of them want to, as that would mean lower profits per person. So, we’re stuck in a cycle of companies whining about piracy while not actually addressing the incentives which drive people to it.

It’s kinda funny that, what people want is a lot like the old cable TV model, without the bullshit of contracts and bundles. Imagine a single service, when you can get all the content from all the producers for one price. Ya, that’s cable TV. The problems were that cable TV had regional monopolies (in the US), consumers got locked into expensive contracts which discouraged free choice and it was largely impossible to say, “I want channels X, Y and C. But not Z, A or B.” Your choices were “Here’s every channel known to man for the low, well not that low, price of hundreds of dollars per month; or, you can get two of the channels you want, but not that other one you really want.” It’s no wonder that people jumped ship when streaming came along. Oh and as a bonus problem, time shifting content on cable was chock full of “fuck you”.

I was a reasonably early cord cutter. Went with an OTA antenna for a few years, followed by YouTube TV and finally just axing live TV all together. I’ve done the math a few times and even with costs creeping up, and subscribing to half a dozen services, the costs for streaming still beat the stuffing out of what I was paying for cable. Back when I cut the cord, I was up around $200/month for all the channels I wanted (and a shit-ton I didn’t). With the services I have now, I’m closer to $100/month. And I had to pay an “early termination” fee back then to break my contract. Given that history, anyone asking for a return to that type of model can go get fucked. Ya, it’s a PITA when content is pulled or I have to fumble between several different services to find something to watch. But, I’d rather have the freedom to trim and adjust services at a whim, than be locked back into that bullshit.

And all this is why rising piracy doesn’t surprise me either. The current system is broke. The system which came before it was broke even worse. And it’s been pretty well established that piracy on the internet is a low risk action with an end result that puts the official way to shame. Piracy isn’t a price problem, its a service delivery problem. You can never compete with piracy on price, just on service. And the content companies aren’t doing that. Video content needs a Steam like service to create a service offering which is, at least, as good as the service piracy is offering. And while some people won’t use an official service at any price, it’s still early enough that many potential pirates could be swayed to pay a reasonable cost for a good service. But, that might mean lower costs and companies not having exclusive access to viewership data. And they won’t allow that until market forces make their refusal untenable.

This is the way. Plex user here, wouldn’t ever go back to anything else.

You wouldn’t download a car

I could afford a hundred a month but having to deal with multiple platforms is a no go for me. Then even when something is available, it might not be available in a certain region just makes the whole system crappy.

When you can do it on one UI and pretty much have the entire catalog available without complexity…

Yesterday I finished automating my seedbox and oh my, it’s so so good. I gave my family their Plex accounts and they’re so happy getting any movie or tv show they want in two clicks in any device they have. Plex->Overseerr->Radarr/Sonarr->Download, it was so satisfying to set up, a lot of fun too haha. I even set up a Telegram bot so they know when their requests are available.

One can never resist the allure of the sea

I was gonna say, the article says that streaming ruined media preservation for an entire generation, but guess what, the pirates were preserving it anyway.

It’s weird that they mention games getting rereleased over and over. But that’s really the popular games. The less popular games, like the unpopular shows and movies, just get abandoned. Hell, with companies closing or splitting, they might not even know who owns a lot of them.

Or don’t remake it and instead release it together with a subpar emulator. Nintendo style