• Decimit@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Pirating went down when paying for streaming was more convenient. Well, you are making it far less convenient.

    • Dubious_Fart@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      Streaming has become cable 2.0.

      It was wonderful when everything was on one, maybe two providers. Could watch everything in a very easy, very affordable way.

      But everyone saw that, went “I know, I want that money!” and spent billions building their own individual infrastructures so make their own streaming services, and right around we go right back to the absolute worst days of cable and bullshit.

      Only thing stopping me from saying fuck it and downloading shit I want to watch, is the fact that I no longer know what the good sites are… since I havent pirated since the heyday of the bay.

      • Khotetsu@lib.lgbt
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        1 year ago

        And the irony is that people switched to cable for the exact same reason. They got tired of the nonsense that broadcast TV pulled with subscriptions for different channels and all the ads and everything, and went to cable because you paid one bill for every channel. Then, everyone moved to streaming because you had to buy 50 different cable packages for the one channel on each you actually cared about, and there were just too many ads to deal with, etc.

        Something something, those who don’t listen to history are doomed to lose profit margins or whatever.

        • Whirlybird@aussie.zone
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          1 year ago

          Broadcast tv had different subscriptions for channels? Where? Free to air tv is free with no subscriptions or options.

          • Khotetsu@lib.lgbt
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            1 year ago

            I may be remembering that wrong, as it was before my time, but I had heard that people moved to cable for the same reasons that people moved from cable to streaming services. You bought one cable package, it gave you access to everything, and there were no ads. Then came the ads, and eventually, the packages you have to buy in addition to your cable subscription for the channels you actually care about.

            • Whirlybird@aussie.zone
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              1 year ago

              People went to cable because it had no ads and let you have the opportunity to watch stuff you’d missed because they looped content regularly. Missed an episode of the Simpsons? All good, it’s on again in 12 hours. It also has movies and shows long before free to air because they paid for it. Cable was the start of subscriptions and paying for individual channels.

      • hypnotoad@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        That and movies just suck nowadays. This is partially old man yelling at cloud stuff but also true since the death of DVD’s means studios won’t take risks anymore since they can’t recoup funds after a poor box office.

        • TurtleJoe@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          This isn’t yelling at clouds, it’s check l correct.

          It’s also not quite so much “recoup funds at a poor box office” as it was “count on DVD sales to make up fifty percent of revenue for certain kinds of movies.”

        • cor315@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I can’t tell if no one talks about usenet because no one knows about it or because they don’t want anyone else to know about it.

          • ramjambamalam@lemmy.ca
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            1 year ago

            I prefer torrents because it’s totally free, unlike Usenet. I don’t even pay for a VPN since I don’t care about a few love letters in my inbox. It’s not about the cost; it’s a matter of principle that I disagree with commercialized piracy.

            But Usenet is a good option for other reasons.

      • cazsiel@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Oh, so they defederated and y’all complaining about that now. I see how it is 😋

    • jmcs@discuss.tchncs.de
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      1 year ago

      Well, this time they have Google and Microsoft on big brother duty to make sure you don’t get crazy ideas. And I’m not seeing enough people jumping away from Chrome and Windows to stop it.

      • FaceDeer@kbin.social
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        I’m on Windows and it’s never hindered me when I needed to go download something that would make a studio exec cry. Granted, I use Firefox, but I’m not sure what Chrome would do differently - it’s just a matter of clicking links that get sent off to qBittorrent to handle. What “big brothering” do they do?

        • 4am@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          Google is implementing a new scheme that verifies your browser (correct DRM, etc.) and sites won’t allow access without it.

          Basically you have to have Chrome and without extensions they don’t like.

      • M0oP0o@mander.xyz
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        1 year ago

        But so far google and microsoft are incompetent big brothers, to the point that most people will find free streaming sites just by searching “free streaming epx of show”. Now we are not talking good streaming, or even safe but if you want an example just look at any place with poor users (like a school or library).

      • Whirlybird@aussie.zone
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        1 year ago

        What exactly are you talking about? Google and Microsoft have literally nothing to do with any of this.

  • dinckel@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    To be completely fair, it’s been over for a while. Even if you completely forget about infrastructure, between the endless wars for licenses, endless removals of content from platforms, shitty inconvenient apps, and regional locks, it’s already a dying market.

    On top of all of that, they’re implementing the “don’t you have 5 extra dollars” strategy, with skyrocketing monthly prices for each of these. If it was 15$ a month to watch anything, i would still pay. but it’s 15$ for each of them, and they still serve you ads, and sell your data

    • jet@hackertalks.com
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      1 year ago

      The funny thing is we’re rapidly approaching the point where there’s more digital content than any single human could consume in a lifetime. Including content from before copyright. So the main thing streaming services offer you is convenience and up-to-date media. But if you’re just trying to entertain yourself 30-year-old 40-year-old 50-year-old 60-year-old 70-year-old content can be just as engrossing. You just get emotionally invested in it.

      • maegul (he/they)@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        I’ve found a DVD rental place close to me with quite a collection. Honestly thinking about just unsubscribing from all streaming and going all in on DVD rental. I watched one recently for the first time … you forget how consistently good the qualilty is compared to streaming (YMMV). But, in true hipster fashion, being more deliberate about what I watch, more openly exploratory, making more of an event of it, all seems attractive. If streaming were actually convenient, fine, but with the way things are now … they can go to hell.

        • bdonvr@thelemmy.club
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          1 year ago

          I’d need Blu-ray at least tbh.

          But yeah lately I’ve been buying 4k Blu-rays for movie night

        • dan1101@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          Plus you get commentary and behind the scenes and such, not sure why most of the streaming services don’t offer that.

          • maegul (he/they)@lemmy.ml
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            1 year ago

            Yep … I forgot to mention that. Overall, when I watched a DVD for the first time in ages, it was somewhat eye opening … like we’ve truly gone backwards on what the home viewing experience can be apart from the somewhat minor convenience of being not needing to store the DVDs at home.

        • Matte@feddit.it
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          1 year ago

          this is a rose tinted glass tbh. maybe if you’re watching a dvd on an iphone screen, but DVDs were limited to 720p, and a bad one too. You need modern bluerays to really get up to par with HD streaming services.

          • liara@lemm.ee
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            1 year ago

            DVDs are 480p, 720p wasn’t introduced until the Blu-ray/HD DVD wars

            • Dave@lemmy.ml
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              1 year ago

              There was also the forgotten format, D-VHS which was a specialized VHS tape tape which the recordings could be at 720p or 1080i resolutions. Or the same resolution as DVD but at a higher bitrate so there are less noticeable digital compression artifacts than DVD. The introduction of HD-DVD and Blu-ray disc formats kept the D-VHS format from ever becoming widely adopted.

            • LinkOpensChest.wav@lemmy.one
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              1 year ago

              One of the many things that drove me away from physical media to streaming. Big companies were always pulling the “you will watch what I want you to see” approach. It’s also what killed cable and satellite.

              That being said, I’ve found myself checking out more and more DVDs from the library simply because it’s reliable, and I find it enjoyable in a way. I don’t really care about HD quality or whatever – DVD quality is fine.

              • El Barto@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                I have a good DVD collection I’ve amassed by buying them second hand in thrift stores, and for titles I really want to own.

                • Dubious_Fart@lemmy.ml
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                  1 year ago

                  Yep, Get those for like 2 bucks at goodwill. Hell, even entire box sets.

                  Almost got the entire collectors edition band of brothers box set for 2 bucks at goodwill once… only reason I didnt is cause it was missing like 3 of the disks, and I didnt want to spend the rest of my life trying to hunt those 3 down.

          • maegul (he/they)@lemmy.ml
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            1 year ago

            The place has plenty of Blu-Rays too … I’m grouping them in with DVD for convenience … also you shouldn’t presume the quality of my internet and streaming subscriptions or even my TV.

      • floofloof@lemmy.caOP
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        1 year ago

        If you can go to a source of older content it often comes pre-filtered for the better stuff too, so you don’t have to wade through a ton of rubbish to find the occasional gem like you do with the new stuff.

          • PanaX@lemmy.ml
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            1 year ago

            Criterion Collection

            Or

            Janus Films

            Both offer the best films of all time.

          • TechnicalCreative@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            1 year ago

            Reviews from sites like IMDb and rotten tomatoes. As a movie or series is older, or finished, the general audience has had plenty of time to review it and if it’s fondly remembered, then it might get mentioned on here or other social platforms.

            The issue with new content is that it can be amazing at first and then they release the last two episodes and ruin pretty much the entire series, eg. Game of thrones, and more recently, secret invasion.

            • Haui@discuss.tchncs.de
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              1 year ago

              Secret invasion really shocked me in its brutality in unceremoniously taking out loved characters.

              But thanks for elaborating. :)

    • jonne@infosec.pub
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      1 year ago

      And the writer’s strike shows that the artists don’t get paid anyway if you pay for content, so they can’t even play that card either.

      • dinckel@lemmy.world
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        We all knew that even before the strike too. Musicians get paid pennies on a dollar, and it’s the same with writers. Actors are probably treated the same way, if you’re not one of the hall of fame elites who get insane cash for garbage roles, after they’ve been in a Marvel movie once

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        1 year ago

        They get paid, they just don’t get residuals for life from every job they were paid to do.

        • CmdrShepard@lemmy.one
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          1 year ago

          Just read an article stating that the writers of a show were only paid a combined $3000 after the show was streamed over 16 million hours on Netflix. These companies try to crack down on piracy by claiming artists/writers/actors don’t get paid if we pirate but they’re clearly not getting paid anything outside their normal wages when we don’t pirate either.

    • Potatos_are_not_friends@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Peacock HBO Max Showtime Disney. Fucking DC Universe was trying to be a thing.

      Every media company wanted a streaming service but failed to deliver because of their hubris.

      Hulu and Netflix have been my constant subscription services.

      • InverseParallax@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Disney is an absolute must if you have a kid, and a great value besides.

        Otherwise it makes 0 sense except for maybe star wars sometimes.

        • Very_Bad_Janet@kbin.social
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          We got Disney + for our kids and they couldn’t care less. The only thing they were interested in was The Mandolorian (bored after the first season) and the latest live action Spiderman (which was not available in Disney+ !!!). We’ll be canceling once our special deal is over. Maybe we’re lucky that our kids don’t care for it because that will save us some money.

        • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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          Nah, my kids prefer Netflix. Even then, they prefer to play games instead. So I’ll be steering them toward video games instead of TV, and only for a limited time each day.

        • some_guy@kbin.social
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          Disney is an absolute must if you have a kid and aren’t capable of raising them without parking them in front of the TV.

          • Elivey@lemmy.world
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            Downvoted for telling the truth. I know people raising kids who don’t plant their kids in front of a tablet or TV to watch Disney+ or YT ever. It’s possible if you spend some goddamn time with your child and have a creative mind.

      • Nacktmull@lemm.ee
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        That is an alternative I´m not going to argue against, you wholesome motherfucker 🌻 🌼 🌷

      • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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        1 year ago

        all the shows are shit.

        That was one of the main reasons I cut cable years ago.

        The amount of content worth watching (let alone worth paying for) had become far too low.

        Combine that with the constant price increases and worsening of the content-to-commercials ratio, and it was a easy decision to make.

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        I would never pirate anything since it’s illegal and immoral.

        But I imagine the selfish criminals that do like the fact they can limit their media consumption to the occasional worthwhile thing. They might even assuage their guilt by paying for it when possible after they establish it isn’t garbage.

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            That’s a far worse hypothetical crime than you realize: it harms the profits of billionaires. Why don’t you think about all those poor oligarchs you’re hurting?

            How will they be able to buy politicians and judges if people stopped giving them money?

        • Cyanogenmon@lemmy.world
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          I honestly can’t tell if you’re trolling.

          Also, “limiting their consumption to the occasional worthwhile thing” can also be written as:

          “spend their well-earned time actually watching something worth the investment”

          And “they might even assuage their guilt by paying for it…” as:

          “if they find content they enjoy, they’d like to show that monetarily and hopefully boost the production of more content of that same caliber”

          • oatscoop@midwest.social
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            I just want those large, deep pocketed, sue-happy corporation’s legal teams to know I’m a good consumer that never violates DMCA or other intellectual property laws: it’s wrong. I mean, that’s what they say and obviously we should trust them.

            I can’t imagine much worse than violating the inalienable rights of amoral multi-billion dollar industries, except maybe bragging online about it afterwards.

        • chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          Zero guilt, never pay. Bonus: no guilt for dropping something midway through out of disgust at its poor quality, because you just wasted X dollars on it. You can go through hundreds of options without trying to evaluate them indirectly pre-purchase, and read-watch whatever you feel like whenever.

          • lud@lemm.ee
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            1 year ago

            I actually feel more guilt dropping things I downloaded since I wasted bandwidth and storage on it.

            • chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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              If you haven’t spent extra money on that bandwidth and storage, what’s the problem? Just delete it and download something else?

              • lud@lemm.ee
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                But I spend more time and stuff on it then I would on a streaming service’s series.

                For streaming I don’t lose anything by dropping a series, it’s not like I spent any extra money or time or anything getting the series.

                • chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                  Fair enough, that makes sense for streaming. I was thinking more along the lines of books and videogames, but this thread is about streaming.

    • Queen HawlSera@lemm.ee
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      Especially since these services will drop their original content after awhile…

      Is Willow considered lost media yet?

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    Well, hell. I guess I’ll go back to watching less and buying DVDs. I’m not watching commercials on a service I pay for. That’s a non starter.

    Worst comes to worse, I can dust off my eye patch, grab my parrot, and take to the high seas. I don’t wanna, I prefer to pay for stuff, but ffs, if they can’t be reasonable, I guess it’s back to arrr me hearties.

  • ExLisper@linux.community
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    I’m paying for Spotify and Netflix because they are very convenient. I’m not paying for another 5 subscriptions because they maybe have this one show I would like to watch. They worked hard on fragmenting the marked and now they will complain people don’t want to pay for 10 different subscriptions

    • raptir@lemm.ee
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      Music services are almost a necessity to me because of the amount of music I listen to, but it’s also a different animal. They all have mostly the same library, so you won’t typically be subscribing to more than one.

      The problem with streaming video services is that most people watch a couple genres, and there’s content in every genre on every streaming platform. I watch a lot of scifi, for example. So I would need to subscribe to Apple TV for Silo and Foundation, Paramount+ for Star Trek, etc…

    • jimbo@lemmy.world
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      I just jump from service to service to watch the shows I’m interested in. No way in hell I’m paying for them all at once.

  • HonestMistake_@lemmy.ml
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    Oh well, there’s plenty of space for all of ya here on the high seas, welcome aboard, mateys!

  • GnuLinuxDude@lemmy.ml
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    But Wednesday’s move to significantly bump prices, marked an acknowledgment by Iger of the media giant’s intent to squeeze more revenue out of streaming by pushing consumers to the advertising-supported plans, which have proven to be more profitable.

    “The advertising marketplace for streaming is picking up,” Iger told investors on the quarterly earnings call. “It’s more healthy than the advertising marketplace for linear television. We believe in the future of advertising on our streaming platforms, both Disney+ and Hulu.”

    This is extremely important for them. Netflix’s excellent deal for most of its streaming existence was obviously a thorn in the side of many other businesses. Even if streaming services can get you to pay an exorbitant amount of money on an ad-free tier, advertisers are frothing for the chance to advertise to you regardless. They want you to see their ads so badly. And let’s not forget all the big tech companies, Netflix included, were riding high during the free money days of 0% interest loans. Those days are over, and the bill is due. Wall Street wants its money. And we are all the ones who have to pay up. Cheap streaming is officially over.

    This is why these companies, including Netflix, have all introduced ad tiers. Not only is it a great way for them to juice their revenue streams, but also every other company wants a permanent residence in your brain, and then some. Given the way things have been going since duo-eras of the COVID pandemic and corporate profit-based inflation, they don’t even need to collude on prices. All the execs need to do is look at the business press and say, “Hey, they’re getting away with increased prices and password sharing crackdowns. We can do the same thing. The pay pigs keep paying!”

      • TehWorld@lemmy.world
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        Is it really unclear? If you had never heard of a product, you would much less likely purchase it. If Coke stopped advertising today, they’d start a very slow but real loss of market to it’s competiton, be it Pepsi or whatever. Note that a LOT of advertising is not for you. It’s for the corporate buyer at name your favorite restaurant so that they think that they’ll get more consumers in the door because they have Coke products, as opposed to some other brand.

        • salient_one@lemmy.villa-straylight.social
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          I suppose it’s not that unclear if you compare the revenue of all other industries combined to the revenue of the advertising industry. The ratio is pretty large and every type of industry buys ads, so it trickles down from everywhere.

      • Frank [he/him, he/him]@hexbear.net
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        As far as I know internet advertising is an economy destroying sunk cost fallacy. No one makes money off of it, but if they stop basically everything collapses catastrophically, so they just keep pouring more money in to it in hopes that someone will find a way to make it profitable before the bill comes due.

        • fox [comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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          Ehhh, not really. If showing 10,000 people an ad costs you $10 and even one person made a purchase off that, you’ve paid for the ad buy. Internet ad conversions are considered unbelievably excellent if 1% of viewers click on the ad and 1% of those people make a purchase.

          Also, if you don’t advertise, then your competition that do advertise are going to eat your lunch.

      • Tankiedesantski [he/him]@hexbear.net
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        Big advertising budgets that are funded from the value alienated from exploited workers and consumers. Information asymmetry in the marketplace means that even if you make a superior product at a lower price, you could still be outcompeted by an expensive inferior product if more people know about that worse product and don’t know about your product.

        That’s for most basic products anyway. Luxury products like bags and clothes are almost all marketing since the cost to create them is so low compared to their sales price. People buy them because of perceptions created by marketing and not any inherent value in the product itself.

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        You know it’s coming. Why would a streaming company want a consumer buying one month, binging a single show they’re interested in, then immediately cancelling the subscription after, when you could guarantee a 6- or 12-month revenue stream for them?

    • Frank [he/him, he/him]@hexbear.net
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      Might fuck around and start invoicing companies for attention time, comprehension time, storage capacity, and of course the 500$ per instance recall fee.

  • GiddyGap@lemm.ee
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    It’s an ironic end to the streaming wars. After pouring billions and billions of dollars into constructing supposedly revolutionary streaming platforms, and decimating the business models that had offered the industry stability for decades, the ultimate product looks awfully similar to what companies and consumers were trying to break free from in the first place.

    I’ll still take streaming any day over cable.

    No contract and you can put everything in rotation. Sign up for a month, binge, cancel, next.

    • lukzak@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      The streaming companies are starting to get wise to that. They’ve started splitting seasons and releasing them separately so that you have to be subbed for 2 months.

          • CmdrShepard@lemmy.one
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            1 year ago

            Might seem stupid, but it’s actually much more enjoyable to be watching something at the same time as others because you can sit and discuss it, come up with theories for how things will play out, and avoid having things spoiled for you. Nobody is going to be excited when you tell them you just started Game of Thrones last week because the show ended years ago and many people have already seen it all.

          • lukzak@lemmy.ml
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            1 year ago

            That’s a real concern if you’re at all worried about spoilers. It’s so easy just to have shit spoiled even if you try to avoid it. Passively hearing about it from school/workmates, social media, or even radio. The stupid radio spoiled the ending of Breaking Bad for me and I never got over it, I guess.

        • VernetheJules [they/them]@hexbear.net
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          1 year ago

          Sure until they start adding game mechanics like daily login rewards and episode “loot boxes” that give you a chance to increment your streaming battle pass so you finally have a shot at rolling for the show you actually want.

        • Aceticon@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          If you look at the world of Gaming, you see plenty if not most people being unable to refrain from instant gratification and just “having to have” the latest installment of some game series NOW at full price instead of waiting 6 months or a year go get it much cheaper.

          I think there’s still some post floating around in Active in lemmy bitching and moaning about how this year’s installment of some (american) football game is $70 and a few about how great Baldur’s Gate 3 is (which you can only really know if ypu bought it full price in the first week as it just came out)

          It seems to me that effect is even worse for things which are a social phenomenon (essentially, those things that people like to talk about it with each other) and that applies to TV Series and Films, not just games.

          I mean, kudos for being able to refrain from Instant Gratification (I do the same too), it’s just that nowadays that doesn’t seem to be what most people do.

      • CybranM@feddit.nu
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        1 year ago

        Or they could release one per week, two batches isn’t really “starting to get wise to that” imho. Either way, being patient is the best and only paying for one month

        • lukzak@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          I think it’s just the beginning. They’ll split seasons eventually into 3 or more parts. Or if you wait till all seasons are released, they’ll paywall earlier parts. They know people won’t wait that long, especially with how easy it is to have things spoiled by social media or among friends/co-workers.

    • mild_deviation@programming.dev
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      1 year ago

      Sign up for a month, binge, cancel, next.

      That’s not going to last. As soon as they run the numbers and decide it’s worth it, they’ll create ways to lock you in.

    • MoonRaven@feddit.nl
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      1 year ago

      The difference between watching something programmers and on demand is big. I still detest the newer prices though coupled with the decline in interesting content.