zlacker

>>ksec+(OP)
I know it's morally dubious, but I'm completely back in pirateland because of all the changes/price hikes/partitioning in the streaming space. My interests make it so I only watch 1-2 shows per platform so I'd be approaching ~100$/month.

And even if I was swimming in money, it's often easier to just download the shows I want and watch them on Plex/Jellyfin than trying to navigate the (often ad-riddled) interfaces of the various platforms and finding where the content I want is.

One example is Rick and Morty, it's made by Adult Swim, but they don't have a streaming service in Canada. It seems to be on Primevideo but under a different system than their regular content. The other way to watch it is to buy it from my cable provider (I don't have cable). So to watch a 20-minutes animated show I'd have to take a +40$ subscription.

>>belval+Qg
I don't find this particularly morally dubious. These companies are approaching monopoly powers and using it to squeeze consumers. Disney owns about 1/3 of all box office revenue. The government has shown they're unwilling to break up monopolies, or even really limit them in any meaningful way.

Also, I don't quite know my feelings on this yet, but there is something real about some shows and movies being part of the milieu. Something doesn't sit quite right about repeatedly increasing the pricing via anti-consumer acquisitions on products that are contributing a substantial part of how the society collectively feels and thinks. It feels like you have to make more money to live in the same society.

>>nscalf+FE
> approaching monopoly powers and using it to squeeze consumers

“There are too many streaming services to choose from and I don’t like having to pay for competing services therefore there is a monopoly”

So it wouldn’t be a monopoly if there was one company that had all of the content you wanted?

> Disney owns about 1/3 of all box office revenue

A third of one channel of distribution is not a “monopoly”

> Something doesn't sit quite right about repeatedly increasing the pricing via anti-consumer acquisitions on products that are contributing a substantial part of how the society collectively feels and thinks

Yes the government must step in for the good of society because having a team of superheroes including a man who turns green when he gets mad is influencing society.

>>scarfa+DJ
Good points. It seems that arguing or challenging free loaders is considered morally reprehensible here!

>>geodel+IS
When freeloading becomes widespread and normalized, perhaps it is those who are creating the conditions that gives rise to that freeloading who are in the wrong. Digital piracy might be wrong, but the business decisions driving it seem as wrongly-implemented as Prohibition was.

Castigating modern streaming freeloaders might give a feeling of moral superiority, but it seems as futile as yelling at music downloaders back in the P2P days. It's using a bucket to drain the ocean of a widely accepted behavior.

That said, most people don't pirate movies or shows these days, even if they might not have qualms against it- they simply share streaming accounts. Is that illegal, or even against EULA? The platforms don't seem to mind.

>>Apocry+bh1
> When freeloading becomes widespread and normalized, perhaps it is those who are creating the conditions that gives rise to that freeloading who are in the wrong. Digital piracy might be wrong, but the business decisions driving it seem as wrongly-implemented as Prohibition was.

Do you apply the same standard to other laws? If too many people do it, we must legalize it?