The golden age of streaming has come to an end. There are no longer streaming services offering a wide selection of shows and movies, but silos of self-produced or owned content.
In the next 12-24 months it'll be obvious the way to consume media will change from a monthly netflix/apple/cbs/peacock/hbo/anyone else fee to a 30 day run. People will sign up and churn based on what they want to see. Services will pop up around this and handle your memberships for you. Those service will become the new cable companies.
Netflix is still a good value for the money charged.
I switched to that model a while ago. I refuse to pay for Netflix/Disney+/Hulu/Crunchyroll simultaneously. So I queue up shows I want to watch on a given platform, buy a month of that platform, and then switch to the next platform in the queue the next month.
It requires more overhead (i.e. manually cancelling and re-enabling services), but it saves probably $200-300+ per year vs. having 4 simultaneous subscriptions.
Yeah, I switched back to just plain old piracy last year. One button on Sonarr and it's on my NAS and playable on Plex on all my devices a few minutes later. I'm done. They had the right model, but it's gone now. Oh well.
Curiously it seems to be a problem of rent seeking. “I’ll start my own streaming service, with blackjack and hookers” said every rights holder. And why is it so expensive to “rent” a movie from for example Apple? Rent two movies and you’ve paid for a month of Netflix. How did that compute?
Maybe someone with experience in the field and more up to date info will correct me, but
I did some research on the subject 10 years ago while entertaining the idea to launch a VOD service in France, and the right holders expected that such a service would:
- pay them a percentage of the price of the rental, which could not go below a certain amount,
- pay a yearly license (~3500€/year just for my country for a popular movie) per language audio track,
- handle on their own sending technicians to rip the masters to then host them on the platform.
I don’t exactly remember the minimum price per rental, but the economics didn’t make sense in terms of what we wanted to attempt, so we gave up. One would have to pay an enormous amount in upfront license costs without being able to generate a big volume of views by undercutting the competition in the case where technical excellence could allow us to cut prices.
This is also mentioned in various Netflix help pages, like here, which says 5-7 subtitle languages are shown by default, and you need to change UI language to see the rest: https://help.netflix.com/en/node/13245
It's extremely easy to set up the entire stack (Sonarr for TV, Radarr for movies, Lidarr for music, Transmission (or Deluge, or Rtorrent) and Jackett for torrent handling, Plex (or Emby, or Jellyfin) in a docker-compose using the LinuxServer containers, shouldn't take more than a couple of hours to set it all up for complete automation. I have a NUC from... 2016? running all of these and handling a couple of Plex streams at the same time as well, everything works perfectly (but if you're looking for an actual NAS be careful since Plex is a bit on the heavy side, especially if you want transcoding). You can find more info on Reddit, especially /selfhosted /datahoarder /plex and /homelab
as I trust HN more than reddit (perhaps optimistically), what VPN should I use with a seedbox? I've been looking at seedhost, but wondering if I also need a VPN as well, as an american
After a bunch of churning I just realized I'm not currently subscribing to any of the services, and I'm okay! There's not really any/much new content now anyway, due to the covid shutdown in Hollywood.
many people might have prime on an annual basis but amazon seems content with offering prime on a monthly basis as well. In fact the only way to get prime video (without prime) is monthly. https://www.amazon.com/amazonprime
In my opinion the next step is going to be what network TV did. Single episodes available for a week, then available in reruns a year later.
You can see the beginnings of this in shows like “The Boys” that have a weekly release cycle.
To be honest, for some shows, I prefer a weekly release schedule over release of everything at once. It gives you a chance to discuss an episode with friends and speculate about what will happen next.
Services have been doing that for a while though... it's to prevent you from joining on a mass drop, binging the season then only staying for a month... with a 10 week run, you're subscribed for 3 months... and you can watch the back catalog any time.
Yea was thinking the same, I had an idea as to how can I "lend" my account for service A out to some stranger on the internet and in exchange, can get access to HIS/HER account for service B for say 3 months.
Obviously the privacy and payment details is an issue.
I like the NetFlix "guest account feature" reminds me of the "gym membership model" of the 90's bring a friend.
> Even though the United States Supreme Court held Aereo was "performing" the broadcasters copyrighted material because Aereo "looks-like-cable-TV" and was similar to community antenna television (CATV) systems, it was later held Aereo could not continue its service under a compulsory license, the way a cable provider would.
They lost the Supreme Court case because they were considered the same as cable broadcasting companies, but then were denied the same legal rights as cable broadcasting companies by a lower court?
I am not a lawyer but what the fuck happened there?
I think they're proposing that you still pay for your own Netflix account for October, then when you switch to Disney+ in November, you pay for your own Disney+ account again -- the service just handles starting and stopping the monthly contract, for a fee. Maybe this would be illegal too.
let me clarify -
Let's call the startup an "Aggregator" - you only pay monthly to this middle man aka "aggregator" but you can watch any of these services during anytime i.e any time in a year as long as you are an active user. The "Aggregator" would buy pool of accounts on their users behalf. Some more breakdown -
For this discussion - let's say there are total of 10m users for these services but they all would never be online at the same time. So, the aggregator can buy 5m Netflix accounts, 1m Apple, 1m hulu, 2m HBO, and so on.
I think it's a very fragile idea. Once Netflix, and the gang would figure out about the "Aggregator", they might start blocking it. There are ways to handle that but how long are you going to play this cat and mouse game?
If a typical potential customer pays for 2 of these streaming services for the unique content and at any given time is only using one of them to its limit after having shared with family and friends then you have the entire extra subscription as surplus value to be captured. $9/mo per household across much of the developed world with minimal infrastructure costs could fund a cat and mouse game for a long time.
Locast limits access to users within the geographic broadcast range of the relevant TV stations. Apparently that falls within the same legal framework that allows cable TV operators to rebroadcast TV signals over their cable networks, which are similarly geographically limited.
hi, try joinkeyring.com. We're launching a bundle with a 7 services for $35/mo: Disney +, Showtime, CBS, Philo, Starz, HBOMAX, and Peacock on computer only.
Venmo me @chinolex today and I'll give you a months free (I'm the Founder).
The next step is "discounted" year-long subscriptions as the month-to-month price steadily rises. And suddenly we've returned to the world of annual contracts as the standard.
Amazon did this from the start with Prime Video. CBS now does annual pricing. Speaking of CBS, I have a discounted CBS+Showtime bundle via Apple. HBO is “free” as part of my AT&T phone plan.
The annual discounts and bundles are already here!
I don't know if you follow the piracy news much, but the crackdown has only increased in viciousness.
Tools like youtube-dl get banned from github, and private torrent servers are taken down, and the data the site has is used to subpoena email providers and ISPs for individuals to sue.
I know we all come from the background of imagining information wants to be free, but it's only going to be another 20 years or so until having a general purpose computer in your house will be as suspicious as having a chemistry lab in your basement.
The next step I'm expecting is some blurring of the line between civil and criminal penalties for piracy, and for police to seize someone's house because it was used for piracy.
Piracy is still thriving. Living in a country that only Netflix and prime are available we use piracy for everything else that's worth it. The availability is still there as easy as it's always been.
And yet here I am happily using Stremio in the 3rd world. Even then, with all the content available I average at most 1 episode per week. 99% of the content produced is crap. Youtube offers better free options, try the DW documentaries for example.
My experience is that everyone is sharing with everyone. This person share their Netflix. The next their Disney+. A third, their Hulu. End result is that each person subscribed to only one, but ends up with access to many.
Yep, currently in this boat. Had a group of ~5 friends since about 4 years ago, where we subscribe to pretty much every streaming service out there and share the accounts within the group. This way we get every single subscription, while paying for the price of just one each (on average).
And streaming services realize that a lot of people use it that way, so they have nice individual profile functionality within a single account, so my shows and my recommendations don't get mixed up with those of other people using the account. Not every single streaming service had that feature at the beginning, but by now iirc they all got it.
Well, I'm pretty sure those multi-account features are meant for multiple members of a single household. I'm sure they know that people are sharing among friends, but I don't think they are trying to encourage that.
>Well, I'm pretty sure those multi-account features are meant for multiple members of a single household.
You are correct, I think it is one of those technically grey areas. However in my scenario, given that the same group of 5 shares pretty much every single service subscription and physically spends a lot of time watching it together, I think, even in the intended spirit of household sharing, it sorta follows.
Regardless of that, imo there would be a lot of outrage if streaming services started cracking down on that, and, my guess, streaming services are intentionally not letting that happen.
It's been a while, we went full circle. Look at youtube, they display more ads than the TV channels I was watching 10 years ago. The content is spread over more and more services, so you end up paying for a few of them, exactly like we used to do for TV channels, it's ridiculous.
It's ironic how copyright itself prevents these companies from properly competing with "piracy". They just can't offer a better service no matter how hard they try.
Copyright isn't the problem, it's greed. Each company is offering a unique product, so they get to charge whatever they want for it. And users that want that media will chase the platforms around, so they're able to extract the maximum out of every subscriber.
Streaming just allowed cable networks to unbundle in the most lucrative way possible... and when users stop subscribing to various services because their prices have gone too high they'll scream "see, it doesn't work, we have to sell packages!"
Meanwhile the users are back to either pirating or suffering shitty overpriced services, of which Netflix is on a quick pace to make themselves one as their catalog narrows from TV producers moving to their own platforms and they continue to cancel their native shows and give ridiculous fortunes to D-list movie directors churning out flop after flop.
Same reason why every other industry has exclusivity deals (eg. video game consoles): to attract customers. If you're a TV/streaming network, and you want to attract customers, how else are you going to do it? Good ux can only get you so far.
Music streaming solved this problem by remembering they were combating piracy not each other. Each music service has all the music and they all pay royalties.
TV streaming services have come full circle and are repeating the same cable tv mistakes that caused piracy to flourish in the first place.
I knew someone was going to bring up music streaming. Yes, it's indeed true that releases there are (mostly) available across the major platforms. The difference I think, is that music is a loss leader. record/streaming sales is a small drip in the bucket compared to other sources like touring/events and merchandising[1]. Streaming to them is basically another way for them to promote themselves, to get more customers so they can earn the real bucks via the other methods. The same can't be said for tv/movie releases.
> According to a recent Citigroup report, the music industry generated a record $43 billion in 2017, but recording artists saw just 12% of that revenue, or $5.1 billion, and the "bulk" of their revenues came from touring.
Music streaming solved this problem with a baseline of compulsary licensing for 'radio style' plays.
I think we've been trained towards seeking out specific shows to watch in order now, so a you can't pick exactly what to watch model wouldn't really fly, but even if it did, it wouldn't cost any less, or be able to include nearly everything.
The key difference is the music streaming services aren't necessarily owned by the content producers. I'm assuming Spotify and Apple Music dominate streaming (could be wrong), whereas Hulu/Disney+/etc are all owned by the content producers. Netflix eventually merged into a production company too, which has only made it worse
Music streaming doesn't have many real players. Spotify got in first, apple and google use their huge userbases to push their product and everyone else is irrelevant. If you wanted to make a new music streaming service you could never get anywhere close to big.
Spotify would probably be dead by now if Apple and Google didn't do such a poor job.
You understand that without copyright the underlying content wouldn't exist, right? Piracy isn't a sustainable strategy unless it is a small fraction of consumers. Am I missing something here?
> You understand that without copyright the underlying content wouldn't exist, right?
Is it, really? Not OP but I think there is a lot of room for alternative business models that doesn't have to depend on copyright. It's just that copyright already taken a hold on most people's mind so they default to it.
Just like the guy that take his stuff from the back of a van, Best Buy can't compete with him too! It's crazy. It's crazy how much better you can offer a service by not paying for what you offer.
The thing is, someone has to pay for that content to exist... if that's not the pirate that pay for it... who does? Oh yeah, me by paying for that uncompetitive service.
But that market exists, we can all hop online and buy counterfeit goods today. The difference between the van and Best Buy is customer service -- with BB I can return the item in a week if I don't like it, claim warranty, etc., and with the van I can't. Meanwhile, I've gotten better service from private tracker staff than any streaming service.
At least counterfeited come with some kind of effort to produce the product in some similar manners. That come with it's own issues, the quality of the product is a big one.
> with BB I can return the item in a week if I don't like it, claim warranty, etc.
Yeah, never got theses issues over media files luckily. You could argue that a rebate high enough justify not being able to return an item. I'm sure plenty of van guy could allow you to return it too ;). I bought a 1060 on Kijiji and the guy told me that he would replace the item if it wasn't working. He got just as much incentive to do this than the van guy ;) hell maybe he even stole them, who knows.
> Meanwhile, I've gotten better service from private tracker staff than any streaming service.
Sure, when that's all you pay for, it's easy to offer great service. Believe me, there's a MUCH bigger part from Netflix price that go toward paying for content than from your private tracker. Not by choice... they need to pay for that content, someone has to pay for it.
I wonder if we've come to a point where people will watch what's promoted at the top of the streaming services they subscribe to, with the exception of virally popular shows or shows recommended to them by friends and family. A good chunk of TV watching is just watching to pass the time. Whatever's trending on Netflix is good enough, coupled with a few shows you and your family are rotating through. Some exceptional shows do drive subscriptions for a particular service. But I think Game of Thrones and The Mandalorian are the exception. More common is watching Friends reruns or the new comedy that pops up on the front page of your streaming service.
I wish I could buy torrent files direct from the creative forces behind the entertainment I watch. Imagine if a single TV episode torrent file cost, say, $2. A season torrent file could be say $16 for a 10 episode long season and a movie could be $12 or so. (Numbers just plucked out of the air, but you get the idea)
Let me give the creative forces the money they deserve for the content they produce, but let me keep the file without being bound to a subscription service where I lose everything the moment I cancel.
Ten years ago it looked like that might be where the entertainment industry was headed, but then Netflix and Spotify got big because it was even more convenient than torrents. When there are 10 major streaming services with exclusive content, then it's no longer convenient and torrents come back. If it were stupid-easy to get torrented content on a big screen television, then Netflix et al would be in trouble. That's the one missing part, which may keep people on streaming even with the Tower of Babel variety of different services. Netflix et al is installed by default on all new TVs you can buy in a store now. I think there was an attempt to make pirated content easy to consume, those Kodi boxes which are now banned and relegated to enthusiasts now. That's what they are really afraid of, because when your mom can torrent with a remote control it's over.
(Spotify on the other hand is in a different league because there is almost no such thing as exclusive music. It's still way more convenient and time-efficient than torrenting. In my experience you can't even find music torrents anymore unless you go down the private tracker rabbit hole (which definitely doesn't scale)).
all of the simple player boxes like roku et al have terrible support for playing plain old media files whether via USB storage or over a network (which is often not a feature at all, and forget the smart tv built-in players altogether).
I've wondered if that is intentional, to discourage casual piracy.
My guess is a middleman like Apple isn't necessarily a problem if the content were DRM free. It's the sword dangling overhead which may invalidate ones license without reimbursement, or limit access arbitrarily that is burdensome.
When I downloaded a movie from Netflix I couldn't watch it on vacation because of region locking.
Region locking is typically do to contracts with the content creators, actors, etc. typically has nothing to do with the middleman. DRM isn’t much different, the content creators often demand/expect it.
Probably minus the "through Apple" part. If that's not your thing, there's lots of independent content on youtube, podcasts, etc that are member-supported via patreon and its alternatives. Shame that isn't available for all the mainstream stuff too, but maybe things will move in that direction.
I pay far more for the content I get on Patreon than the content from the big providers. Curious why that is, maybe it’s content that lacks broad appeal, and content that has broad appeal works better on the platforms?
I use JustWatch for that, it's amazing to find where to get my content.
The biggest issue is to unsubscribe each time on the different service. At one point we will have a middle man that does this for us, we will go full circle.
Agreed ! In the beginning (golden age ?) I spend way less time on P.B and torrents.
Now with more services than ever I'm only have access to two services:
a) Netflix - (via gf account)
b) Amazon Prime (own account). The last year or two I'm back to doing a lot more torrenting !
We've never had it so good in terms of overall content, yet we have never had it as expensive to access say my "top15 Films/Shows" if they are widely spread across service providers.
PS/Sidenote: I do miss channel hopping (click-click oh what is this ?)
Similar here... though I'm more and more inclined to just torrent what I watch even if I'm paying for the services. For live-tv, I've had lots of issues with more popular feeds. For example, when the fiance watches Big Brother, it's the worst experience, I swear I've had to download almost every episode this season for her to be able to watch... it's been pretty bad.
Not to mention trying to remember what is where etc... was so much easier when I had a list of shows, I'd check the torrent site(s) about once a week for new episodes, snag them all to a seedbox and download and watch local over the following week as time permitted. At least with less TV I'm getting more done.
Gonna save my money and just put a few bucks towards a VPN. Streaming was a fun ride while it lasted, but I can get higher quality video through torrents and the selection is limitless.
Maybe in 20 years these streaming services will collapse and be replaced by something better, and then those services will once again split up.
I really always wondered why people thought this wasn't going to happen, because at the end of the day all the institutions that produced the dynamics of cable television exist on the internet, nothing has changed.
It doesn't really matter whether you send information over an ethernet cabel or a satellite dish.
I kind of hope that the silo packages via Amazon Video or Hulu become easier and/or more popular to integrate. I'm a bit disheartened at the pricing model that has one likely to only subscribe or unsubscribe in waves. Also, being able to conveniently search across different services is a huge issue... a unifying experience is needed.
Similar to how Spotify membership packaged Hulu membership for me, we might see this "bundling" packages among service providers. OR a startup can provide an abstraction layer on top. Eg. 39$ membership with us will get you Netflix & Amazon Prime. For $59 we'll add Hulu & Disney+ on top. etc.,
Nah people will just go with whatever junk is on the service they signed up for in the past 2 years, which is why these guys are so aggressively trying to get market share.
In the next 12-24 months it'll be obvious the way to consume media will change from a monthly netflix/apple/cbs/peacock/hbo/anyone else fee to a 30 day run. People will sign up and churn based on what they want to see. Services will pop up around this and handle your memberships for you. Those service will become the new cable companies.
Netflix is still a good value for the money charged.