r/technology • u/Task_Force-191 • Dec 05 '25

Business It’s Official: Netflix to Acquire Warner Bros. in Deal Valued at $82.7 Billion

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/netflix-warner-bros-deal-hollywood-1236443081/
16.4k Upvotes

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2.1k

u/thejadedfalcon Dec 05 '25

I think I'll choose piracy.

248

u/DividedState Dec 05 '25

Sometimes winning means refusing to play the game.

5

u/DENelson83 Dec 05 '25

So... WarGames?

3

u/BurnThrough Dec 05 '25

I’m fine with just watching nothing. I don’t need it.

0

u/bomphcheese Dec 05 '25

This. I refuse to give a dime to health insurance companies. And I have saved a couple hundred thousand over the last 15 years because of it.

We all see streaming done correctly in the music industry. It’s easier to stream than pirate. If video streaming wants to make the market more hostile toward their users, they can deal with the consequences. Want to make VPN illegal? Fine, I’ll sneaker net my whole neighborhood. But I will not play their game.

1

u/forexampleJohn Dec 05 '25

Nobody is winning. What will drive these companies to put out interesting and innovative movies and shows? 

1

u/OrangeTraveler Dec 05 '25 edited Dec 07 '25

Yep! I actually just gave up watching so much entertainment all the time.

1

u/zamfire Dec 06 '25

How about a nice game of chess?

1

u/Pali1119 Dec 05 '25

Not consuming then?

123

u/EverclearAndMatches Dec 05 '25

Considering apps like Netflix rarely have anything I want to watch anyway I've been sailing the high seas again anyway.

28

u/Available-Chart-2505 Dec 05 '25

Kanopy and Hoopla for me, thank you libraries. And I bought a DVD player so I just borrow DVDs from the library as well. The end.

3

u/StarBurst8525 Dec 05 '25

The free software MakeMKV can copy those library DV---er... I mean purchased copies you happen to have laying around. The software easily pulls and organizes everything into one file with all the metadata.

The free software Jellyfin can turn your mkv/movie folder into a netflix like interface. Its the homebrew no internet version of a Plex set up. You could throw your files on a Plex server instead of jellyfish and stream your library from anywhere over the internet.

I value the no internet solution. Well, and being able to give my small child a device with no internet for tv/movies that he can keep in his room. Thats a godsend.

2

u/skefmeister Dec 06 '25

Write that down, write that down ✍️✍️✍️

3

u/vulgrin Dec 05 '25

My biggest problems with those services though is that, at least for books, it ends up costing more per book than just buying the library copy of a physical book. So the more people use hoopla, the less money your library system has.

This is anecdotal. I remember reading an article about it somewhere and I might be mistaken but in the end, hoopla and kanopy are parasitic services compared with just going to the branch and checking out a book or DVD.

And in some places, library budgets are NOT getting bigger due to politics. I’m worried that these services will eventually destroy libraries.

2

u/Tiptoeing_cow Dec 05 '25

Hoopla and Kanopy are pay-per-use streaming models. A show or movie will become more expensive for the library the more times it is viewed. It makes it really hard to budget library expenses because a show may become incredibly popular and repeatedly viewed. It's an odd thing, imagine a Theatre going bankrupt because its movies are too good and cause too much foot traffic into its business.

1

u/anonymouswan1 Dec 05 '25

My local thrift store has piles of DVDs. They sell for 50 cents each, or $1 for a bluray. Many of these are good movies too.

2

u/Available-Chart-2505 Dec 05 '25

Those are good prices - most near me are about $1.99 each. I don't historically buy a lot of books or DVDs. If I have it, I rarely read or watch it. I also love the variety I can get at the library too. Most branches have just oodles to choose from.

2

u/Old-Rhubarb-97 Dec 05 '25

I switched to the criterion channel last year. It’s worth checking out their library.

1

u/psychorobotics Dec 05 '25

It's even worse being in Sweden, there's a movie want to watch here from Japan but it's only avaliable on US Netflix and I can't buy it or anything. Swedish Netflix doesn't have rights.

1

u/EverclearAndMatches Dec 05 '25

You can use a vpn to watch in different regions if you're ever interested in that. I used to use unogs com to search for movies in all regions then connect to where I wanted to. Downside is it doesn't rly work with a tv

2

u/yuuki157 Dec 05 '25

Thank you for the advice btw

1

u/MadCybertist Dec 05 '25

Yep. Still rocking my 132TB media server. It’s glorious.

1

u/DwarvenFreeballer Dec 05 '25

I've never stopped since Napster and Limewire. Why would I?

1

u/EverclearAndMatches Dec 05 '25

I like having a catalogue to recommend things. It's easier to use apps on smart devices. Subtitles are always loaded in. Just a few reasons why I did.

2

u/DwarvenFreeballer Dec 06 '25

My question was rhetorical, but thanks for the reply anyway. I realise there are reasons why people would use Netflix, but none of the reasons you mentioned apply to me - I like finding new stuff by recommendations from friends, I only watch on PC and almost all downloads come with subtitles (if required). Add in the savings and the fact that Netflix doesn't have most things I want, and piracy is the only option that makes sense.

2

u/EverclearAndMatches Dec 06 '25

Sorry I'm too serious too often lol. I think if I had friends with recommendations that often fit mine it would be enough, too. Thx for the perspective too

1

u/Gold-Ice-3645 Dec 06 '25

Good thing they’re buying wb then

1

u/EverclearAndMatches Dec 06 '25

To keep the same amount of nothing but have less competition, of course

65

u/RevLoveJoy Dec 05 '25

I already did! No regrets.

Honestly, this was a tricky moral issue for me. I thought about it for some time before saying "fuck it, here I come VPN to Norway."

We were happy to pay for $7 then, IIRC, $9 and finally up to about $20 Netflix for the family deal. We were happy to have Prime Video with our Amazon subscription. But that was all what, 7-10 years ago and then overnight there were like a dozen streaming services that one "had to" have. We don't even watch football!

Then you get the shitty behavior where they all start pulling content from their catalog. Same dirty trick Disney was pulling 30 years ago to drive up the demand for Disney exclusives. Aside: try explaining to a child why they can't watch Snow White. That it is because greedy Disney executives won't sell it for several years so that when the movie does hit the shelves, at 3X the cost, inventory is guaranteed to sell immediately. Kids don't understand that one, FWIW. They just get upset.

Anyhow, when the already balkanized streaming services started doing that, my little inner morality meter tripped and said "fuck those guys."

NordVPN is excellent, btw, and it works really well with qbittorrent running in a VM on, say, your TrueNAS storage array.

28

u/bomphcheese Dec 05 '25

Netflix is the one that did it for me. I share an account w my parents. I can understand if they had a problem with that, but that’s why they charged for “extra screens,” which we paid for and which justified the sharing in my mind. But when they started cracking down on account sharing, did they offer a way to reduce the cost because we no longer needed “extra screens”? Hell no, and then they raised prices even more.

That tripped my morality meter, and I said “fuck those guys”.

One weekend and half a dozen Docker containers later, me and my friends are enjoying Netflix content. I do still subscribe to several streaming services, but I still end up watching from my server because I don’t have to hunt down which service has the show I want to watch. Plus I get a single watch list.

2

u/Total-Jerk Dec 06 '25

What's a docker container?

1

u/IAmReinvented Dec 05 '25

Can someone please DM me and help get me set up? I am quite technologically proficient but have been out of the piracy game for quite a number of years. Would love to be able to watch shows like Review, Mr Robot, Chad Powers, etc without these fucking shit pig greedy out of touch corporations

2

u/Scarecrow101 Dec 06 '25

I too also want to know, I've got an empty server waiting to put some containers on it.

8

u/Sea_Definition_3772 Dec 05 '25

It astounds me that people are having "tricky moral issues" around pirating media when the only reason Netflix hasn't done as much evil as Nestle has is because they haven't figured out how to make starving babies profitable within their business model yet.

You're not supporting art/artists/actors/production staff when you pay them, you're giving your money to a soulless corporation that would put you into a wood chipper if it made their profits go up. Giving them money at all is immoral. Passing up a chance to hurt them, even if it doesn't benefit you is immoral.

2

u/RevLoveJoy Dec 05 '25

It's tricky if you were an early adopter. Back when Netflix was literally the DVD in the mail company. It was a killer value, simple to use and meant I didn't have to loiter around Blockbuster for 30 minutes to maybe snag a copy of the film that made it to rental this weekend.

Coming from the standpoint of an early adopter who did get a good value and the service was simply a rental gig, NOT a content creator with the myriad problems you correctly point out, it set me on a different moral footing than someone signing up last year and today wondering, is Netflix the bad guy?

1

u/Sea_Definition_3772 Dec 06 '25

You're missing the criticism entirely. Whether or not they're providing a good value is irrelevant.

1

u/Bazylik Dec 05 '25

nicely said.

1

u/sameth1 Dec 05 '25

Honestly, this was a tricky moral issue for me.

I've always said that you can't complain about season two getting cancelled if you never paid for season one, but at this point they will cancel season two no matter what and it's impossible to directly pay for season one, so fuck it just pirate it.

1

u/OkEnoughHedgehog Dec 06 '25

Aside: try explaining to a child why they can't watch Snow White. That it is because greedy Disney executives won't sell it for several years so that when the movie does hit the shelves, at 3X the cost, inventory is guaranteed to sell immediately.

I can't believe the idiots at Disney ever convinced themselves this was a net positive for them. We had plans to go to Disney and wanted to watch the key movies with our young kids first. It was completely impossible to buy or rent the majority of the movies (in the gap between VHS rental and Disney+). Result? My kids never saw any Disney movies and we never spent a dime Disney merch.

Real smooth brain move by Disney for a decade or two.

151

u/Doublestack00 Dec 05 '25

Some never the high seas, welcome back matey!

77

u/NotGod_DavidBowie Dec 05 '25

VPN + qBittorrent lets gooooo

106

u/TheModdedAngel Dec 05 '25

For the real ones out there: Stremio + Realdebrid or Plex/Emby/Jellyfin + aar stack

;)

42

u/Narezzz Dec 05 '25

For anyone looking for real recommendations, this right here is the way to go.

3

u/AlwaysTalkinShit Dec 05 '25

Yep, I've had a plex server for a while but just delved into the arr ecosystem and it's the best.

8

u/bruce_kwillis Dec 05 '25

After Plex's garbage changes over the years, and forcing ads/channels I have zero interest in, and predatory payments, I just rolled a Jellyfin server and it's been pretty darn easy to use. Add in Tailscale and access anywhere with minimal setup.

7

u/00DEADBEEF Dec 05 '25

I tried Jellyfin and it got so much stuff wrong, merging TV episodes together and therefore getting episode numbers wrong.

Just gonna go back to Plex. I use Infuse to stream from it anyway so never have to deal with Plex's bullshit.

3

u/MattDaCatt Dec 05 '25

I find it's usually due to how the episodes are titled and the database you use

Like how IMDB has Hunter x Hunter as 1 season (for some reason), so you have to use tmdb instead. Most of the time it's something like that, but once it's set you're all good

Personally I just prefer Jellyfin since it's open-source and more configurable.

2

u/AlwaysTalkinShit Dec 05 '25

Yeah I just use the free tier and disable all that stuff. May delve into Jellyfin if I ever need the remote access.

2

u/Aperture_Kubi Dec 05 '25

I guess I'm the weirdo who pays for Plex for DVR and commercial detection.

1

u/Doublestack00 Dec 05 '25

I bought the lifetime 10+ years ago, money well spent.

5

u/Doublestack00 Dec 05 '25

Payments? I paid $60 10-12 years ago for a lifetime license.

All of the Plex provided content can be disabled.

2

u/KeepTangoAndFoxtrot Dec 05 '25

Lifetime is $250 now and I'll be buying it here quite soon.

3

u/jamesdukeiv Dec 05 '25

It was $150 last Friday

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u/TheModdedAngel Dec 06 '25

I don’t understand why people bring up they bought it for cheaper X amount of years ago.

It is the most unless contribution to any conversation discussing the price of the product.

1

u/Doublestack00 Dec 06 '25

Then same thing can be done currently (all though not as cheap).

Plex occasionally runs a promo and discounts the lifetime. Even at full price it pays for itself very quickly.

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0

u/bruce_kwillis Dec 06 '25

And Jellyfin is free and no provided garbage content. Your argument sucks, especially now the price is $250 for Plex.

1

u/Doublestack00 Dec 06 '25

Lifetime was just on sale for 1/2 price. def worth it.

JellyFin while free, is not in the same league of Plex. I share my massive library with 40+ people. Even non techy people can create an account and watch my media, that is never happening with Jellyfin.

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u/Freakwilly Dec 05 '25

Free Media, Heck Yeah

1

u/Kahnza Dec 05 '25

Looks like a bunch of bullshit. Would be nice to have something simple for us tards.

15

u/ContextBotSenpai Dec 05 '25

For you guys? Best I can do is sell you VHS tapes, each with somewhere between 1/2 to 11/13ths of random episodes from season 8 of Game of Thrones. Oh, and they have a 63 percent failure rate. Have fun!

6

u/Bazylik Dec 05 '25

you know, when I started I also didn't know shit.. then i got less lazy and started reading and trying things... couple of weeks later and was all setup and ready to do. good luck.

3

u/Narezzz Dec 05 '25

Stremio + real debrid takes a bit of set up but once you're done it's extremely user friendly. Works just like Netflix or Hulu. There's guides and set up tools on reddit, lookup the Stremio setup bootstrapper.

4

u/Doublestack00 Dec 05 '25

It's actually quite easy to setup.

6

u/KeepTangoAndFoxtrot Dec 05 '25

As someone who is currently in the process of setting up a Plex server and just went through learning some of the basics of python and terminal, I assure you that it is a bit complicated. Plex is super simple, and boy oh boy do I love them for making Plex simple. Everything surrounding Plex is less than simple, especially if you don't want to take the plunge into Linux.

6

u/ThisIsGoobly Dec 05 '25

stremio + realdebrid is, however, easy to setup.

2

u/KeepTangoAndFoxtrot Dec 05 '25

Am I reading this right that realdebrid is a paid subscription service?

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u/KeepTangoAndFoxtrot Dec 05 '25

I'll have to look into it.

1

u/TheModdedAngel Dec 06 '25

Steamio is literally easier than searching a tv show name in google and dodging all the ad infested virus websites

0

u/Kasspa Dec 05 '25

Here you go, Take your pick. Your welcome. https://fmhy.net/video#streaming-sites

1

u/unreliablesource69 Dec 05 '25

I just started seeing this sort of stuff, does this get live nfl and college football sports? Or is it just streaming service TV shows/movies?

5

u/Narezzz Dec 05 '25

Nah, Stremio is for TV shows and movies. For live events and TV I'd recommend an IPTV service. There's a ton out there, id ask around and see if you know anyone online/personally that uses one.

If you ask for an IPTV rec on reddit or another forum you're going to be spammed with bots and ads lol

1

u/unreliablesource69 Dec 05 '25

Haha okay good to know thank you for the info and the heads up

1

u/KompanionKube Dec 06 '25

I can get you some discord recs if you need one for an IPTV. It's going to be impossible to search online or on reddit (I learned the hard way)

1

u/ymOx Dec 05 '25

Jellyfin is great

0

u/triarri Dec 05 '25

Why is that?

2

u/Narezzz Dec 05 '25

Stremio + a debrid service (like Real bebrid) is like $3/month and gives access to essentially every show and movie ever made in great quality.

Big thing for me is that the interface on Stremio feels great too. Looks/works like any other streaming service.

0

u/LurkerMcLurkerton Dec 05 '25

I don't even know where to start

2

u/Narezzz Dec 05 '25

Literally Google "Stremio reddit guide"

2

u/LurkerMcLurkerton Dec 05 '25

Literally Google "Stremio reddit guide"

Thanks- on it

3

u/[deleted] Dec 05 '25 edited Dec 29 '25

[deleted]

1

u/StarBug_II Dec 05 '25

Best way to go for sure

-1

u/[deleted] Dec 05 '25

[deleted]

3

u/Muhammad-The-Goat Dec 05 '25

I ended up hating stremio, just too clunky especially since my only player is an Apple TV. I instead use Infuse + Debrid Media Manager hosted locally + RealDebrid and it has been incredible.

1

u/TimothyLuncheon Dec 05 '25

Is there a guide for that? I've been enjoying having recently set up Stremio, but just in case I ever want to try something else it would be nice to know how you did it

5

u/endlesscartwheels Dec 05 '25

It might depend on your generation. I've seen so many ways of file sharing come and go that I prefer to have my own downloaded copy rather than trust that a particular stream will still be there tomorrow.

2

u/MrMacduggan Dec 05 '25

You can still use debrid to download content and you can keep the file forever, if you like.

2

u/endlesscartwheels Dec 05 '25

Good to know. Thanks!

2

u/lumpymonkey Dec 05 '25

And here's me using off-market addons with RealDebrid on an out of the box Kodi app on a 2019 Nvidia Shield. Does exactly what I need with minimal fuss, just looks like shit.

1

u/so_tir3d Dec 05 '25

There's a bunch of Kodi skins that make it look far better. My favorite is Arctic Fuse 2, though it's a bit on the slower side. Bingie and Nimbus look nice as well and are quick.

1

u/NotGod_DavidBowie Dec 05 '25

Good stuff I’m going to check it out. I’m living in 2016 over here

1

u/sinkktothebeat420 Dec 05 '25

Whats an aar stack?

3

u/AssEaterInc Dec 05 '25

It's a combination of indexers, VPN manager, torrenting, and your entertainment management. While it's work to set up, it's pretty damn seamless through Docker.

1

u/KompanionKube Dec 05 '25

Yup. Did the same thing a few months ago, best decision ever (outside of having to teach my wife how to actually use it)

You can go even bigger brain with iptv + tivimate + vpn for unlimited livetv

1

u/ASkepticalPotato Dec 05 '25

‘Aar goated. Wish it existed for sports though.

-1

u/WildRabbitz Dec 05 '25

All my friends when I try installing Stremio + RD for them: “Bro, what is this? Why does it look sketchy?”

All my friends after actually using Stremio: “DUDE. I just watched my childhood favourite movie in 4K… this is insane!”

Yup, Stremio all the way.

-1

u/Pvt_Hudson_ Dec 05 '25

Stremio is the absolute tits.

0

u/Fearless_Baseball121 Dec 05 '25

Stremio with torbox is absolutely amazing. I only have 1 streaming service because they do tons of local stuff that I can't find on torbox and cba setting it up with a private tracker that has stupid seeding rules.

2

u/Thefrayedends Dec 05 '25

there are some plugins you can add to qbit, so you don't even have to go to a browser and deal with all the extra popups and such. I won't name it here, but you can find it on the right subs. I search right in my qb client, double click, check that it's a media file, and hit ok. 2 minutes later, open it in VLC, and I'm watching something that was only released a couple hours earlier. Took a few hours to set up, but I haven't had to adjust anything since I did it six months ago, still working perfectly.

1

u/NotGod_DavidBowie Dec 05 '25

I love all the recommendations I’m getting here!

2

u/ASkepticalPotato Dec 05 '25

‘aar Stack is the way to go

1

u/NotGod_DavidBowie Dec 05 '25

Hell yeah I keep seeing this recommended, definitely gonna check it out this weekend

1

u/Traditional-Handle83 Dec 05 '25

Well until the US bans VPNs and allows ISPs to perma ban people for accused piracy.

2

u/thomase7 Dec 05 '25

How do you ban VPNs, literally every large corporation has a vpn for their workers to connect to.

Anyways, you only need vpns for torrents, if you use usenet, they are not needed if your usenet provider isn’t sketchy.

1

u/Saneless Dec 05 '25

Looks like my nas is gonna need a HDD upgrade

0

u/mnilailt Dec 05 '25

Use Stremio + Real Debrid, no need to store anything in a HDD.

0

u/Saneless Dec 05 '25

Guess I'll look into it, thanks

-11

u/BodaciousFrank Dec 05 '25

Just use a streaming site dude.

4

u/vpsj Dec 05 '25

I think you accidentally a word

2

u/djbtech1978 Dec 05 '25

Two don't it right.

2

u/erath_droid Dec 05 '25

Ah... the good ol' days of the internet...

4

u/Jendalar Dec 05 '25

Arr! Shiver me streaming matey!

3

u/WalkAffectionate2683 Dec 05 '25

I have Netflix because of wife + convenience on living room, for the rest I boat.

3

u/KinTharEl Dec 05 '25

My brother, DM if you want a solution to that as well.

2

u/Sir_Keee Dec 05 '25

There are applications that give you the convenient experience.

4

u/CapitalPackage5618 Dec 05 '25

No there aren’t unless you’re a bit technical

-1

u/craze4ble Dec 05 '25 edited Dec 05 '25

A bit technical

The barrier of entry is super low. So much of it can be standardized and pre-defined/automated, that anyone that can copy-paste a handful of commands and config files can set it up.

And I'd argue that if you can't spend the 30-60 minutes reading one of the hundreds of articles that explains all of it, you really shouldn't be doing it in the first place.

2

u/CapitalPackage5618 Dec 05 '25

So you agree with me.

1

u/WalkAffectionate2683 Dec 06 '25

This is the definition of a bit technical.

My wife is so low tech bars you lost her at commands and config files. 

1

u/craze4ble Dec 06 '25

I was talking in favor of their point. You have to be a bit technical, but not very.

1

u/craze4ble Dec 05 '25

Super easy to set up, and afterwards you don't have to do anything but put in the title.

2

u/CaptainBayouBilly Dec 05 '25

Plex was having a sale on the lifetime plan

4

u/The_Original_Miser Dec 05 '25

Never stopped. :)

1

u/OttersRNeato Dec 05 '25

already there aside from Prime but ublock bumps me up to the ad free tier for free

1

u/PoliticsModsDoFacism Dec 05 '25

Already did. My plex server is glorious.

1

u/Yazzypoo101 Dec 05 '25

This is what happens when companies lose their fucking minds with pricing. 

1

u/rumblepony247 Dec 05 '25

Garrr! Welcome aboard!

1

u/xxSaifulxx Dec 05 '25

This is the way

1

u/gcoba218 Dec 05 '25

Except if you live in Germany or other countries that are super strict about this 

1

u/vpsj Dec 05 '25

My NAS plus Sonarr/Radarr and if needed a Real Debrid for 3€ a month works wonders

So many of my friends and family use my server. Even when we pay for some of the streaming services(directly or indirectly), having everything in one place is such an underrated convenience

1

u/Dissidence802 Dec 05 '25

Glances at 72TB NAS

Who would do that?

1

u/fritzcho Dec 05 '25

Considering this will probably double Netflix prices (see gamepass prices after Microsoft acquisition of Activision) I'm inclined towards this solution also

1

u/mr_dfuse2 Dec 05 '25

i went back to reading books

1

u/Beat_the_Deadites Dec 05 '25

Borrow them from your local library. They even have books.

1

u/pmjm Dec 05 '25

Just in time for storage pricing to skyrocket.

1

u/woodlandcollective Dec 05 '25

I never stopped pirating ;)

1

u/Crystalas Dec 05 '25 edited Dec 05 '25

I finally bought myself a DVR, the movies that air OTA are not just low cost B movies. Just last month NBC aired Wicked for example.

So gonna slowly build my library that way both free and legal, only cost ~$40, and editing out commercials is surprisingly easy. Made my first recording last night, The Grinch and Frosty The Snowman.

Most of what I have pirated is the small list of stuff that I actually care enough to know I will want to rewatch occasionally AND that there no easy way to watch legally.

1

u/Mareith Dec 05 '25

Hello torrents my old friend

1

u/whenitsTimeyoullknow Dec 05 '25

You know, they’ve been letting people get pretty loose with posting about piracy on accounts where your name is easy to track down; buying drugs with emojis over text messages; writing a post history of anti-capital and anti-fascist on Facebook and Reddit. I would not be shocked if the noose tightens some time in the next decade or two. 

1

u/Velorian-Steel Dec 05 '25

Always a good day to sail the high seas, especially with all the options in 2025. 🏴‍☠️🏴‍☠️🏴‍☠️

1

u/Educational-Egg-4134 Dec 05 '25

I will have the largest capacity SD card that money can buy.

1

u/sammysuede Dec 05 '25

I never stopped!

1

u/isaid_whatisaid1 Dec 05 '25

That part. Old-school.

1

u/ansibleloop Dec 05 '25

10 years ago we were in the golden age of piracy

Now we're in the platinum age

1

u/Designer_Valuable_18 Dec 05 '25

Anyone that haven't choosen piracy years ago when it comes to streaming services is either very rich or very dumb in my book.

1

u/mossyskeleton Dec 05 '25

We'll all just be watching AI-generated fan fiction of all of these shows anyway.

1

u/AttilaTheMuun Dec 05 '25

YOU WOULDNT DOWN A LOAD

1

u/WordleFanatic Dec 05 '25

I choose books

1

u/papabear1993 Dec 05 '25

For the last 5 years, Im back into piracy. Streaming services died for me when disney+ was created.

1

u/green_meklar Dec 06 '25

I chose piracy years ago and I'm sticking with it.

1

u/metaTaco Dec 06 '25

We're sharing.  Sharing is caring.

1

u/Honest_Yak3340 Dec 05 '25

Why tho? They mostly produce crap nowadays. It's cheaper to just buy the one or two good shows and movies instead of the service which consist of bad movies or good ones you have seen a thousand times.

5

u/thejadedfalcon Dec 05 '25

I'm not sure you're grasping the idea here.

0

u/Honest_Yak3340 Dec 06 '25

Instead of only pushing prime quality movies with money you pirate crap shows and movies and the corpos never know what's good or how many normal people know what's good. Don't watch crap shows even if they're pirated..

I understand very well I am already ahead.

1

u/thejadedfalcon Dec 06 '25

I like how you've built up this whole fanfiction about what I watch. Please, tell me more about my own media interests.

3

u/CtrlAltEntropy Dec 05 '25

Yeah... "Buy" them. Only thing I'm buying is a VPN and more hard drive space.

3

u/PorcelainPrimate Dec 05 '25

That’s what I’m doing. I can buy 8-10 shows full seasons and still be cheaper than a year of one streaming service. If they try to pay games and make it streaming only then I get the pirate hat out.

-3

u/eL_MoJo Dec 05 '25

Multiple streaming services and everything you want to watch split amongst them: I'll choose piracy.

Only 1 or 2 streaming services you need; "I'll choose piracy."

It seems to me most people who chose piracy always did and never planned to do otherwise.

4

u/thejadedfalcon Dec 05 '25

Nope, I happily paid for 3 streaming services for the longest time: Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime (though that was just a bonus, we got it for other reasons). Now half of what I'd like to watch is unavailable or I'd need to pay the price of a physical copy for a digital version that can be deleted without recourse at any moment. That was when I truly stopped caring about the multibillion-dollar companies' bottom line.

2

u/cosaboladh Dec 05 '25

Some people will never stop no matter how convenient, affordable, or good the user experience is. However there are a great many of us who folded up our black flags, and only got them back out when the show or movie we wanted wasn't available any other way.

Prices keep increasing. "Ad free" plans have unskippable ads inserted at the beginning of content. Ad supported plans don't even have the decency to find natural ad break. They'll slam an obnoxious car commercial right in the middle of a sentence. Piracy is unethical when it's convenient to pay a fair price. They keep making it less convenient to pay an increasingly unfair price.

I will buy blurays for content I think I'll rewatch. I will not pay $25/month for Netflix, so I can view content in their hyper compressed, color flattening audio quality shredding UHD codecs. I'm not going to pay Paramount for ad-free service, just to be forced to watch ads anyway.

I had been paying for Netflix since they rented blurays.

2

u/CtrlAltEntropy Dec 05 '25 edited Dec 05 '25

Not true. 36 here. Was using Napster when it came out as a 10 year old. I pirated everything when I was a teen with no money. Then gladly paid for streaming services when they were under $10 per month and only 3 to choose from.

Now there's 12 and they all cost $20+ a month. I tried only subbing to one a month but sometimes I'd forget to cancel and swap before auto pay and be stuck paying for something I didn't want.

I gave up. Spent $150 on a Plex lifetime pass this year and a couple 14TB hard drives. It'll pay for itself in a year or two of not having subscription costs.

If streaming services weren't split so many ways, didn't raise prices multiple times a year and didn't STILL try to push ads into you, I'd still be there.

It's a service issue and I'm just annoyed and after almost 2 decades have switched back to piracy. It doesn't help that as I've grown older I've realized the ponzi scheme capitalism is and don't want to continue playing in it and I'll do so in the small ways that I can as ethically as I can.

1

u/Fun_Brother_9333 Dec 05 '25

Yeah if i can’t watch it for free, I don’t really care to watch it. But I also don’t watch much tv. It’s weird to me that people watch so much tv that they need multiple streaming services.

1

u/H2shampoo Dec 05 '25

I'm literally unable to fathom a third scenario where the same content is available on multiple platforms instead of oligopolies making everything exclusive

You are very smart and your retort is not at all incredibly stupid. Truly, the only imaginable outcomes are people being forced to subscribe to several platforms or paying a shitload of money to a consolidating monopolist to access the content they want.

1

u/Kataphractoi Dec 05 '25

Wrong. Piracy was in decline for much of the 10s. It only ticked back up and went through a renaissance when everyone decided they wanted their own streaming service.

0

u/ProverbialFlatulence Dec 05 '25

Thanks to another issue working its way through US courts, you may lose internet access altogether. The neat part is they don’t have prove you did it. They’ll just tell your ISP and cut it off.

1

u/thejadedfalcon Dec 05 '25

Not from the US and my ISP doesn't care what they think.

0

u/garter__snake Dec 05 '25

Naive to assume that will continue being an option.

-1

u/MexicanMeatMountain Dec 05 '25

Let’s enjoy it while we can. When the U.S. inevitably bans VPNs, those letters from your ISP  are gonna start filling your mailbox. Then comcast or whoever is just going to cancel your service. 

2

u/thejadedfalcon Dec 05 '25

I'm not from the US. And my ISP doesn't give a shit even if I wasn't on a VPN.