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Grand Tour 'Most Illegally Downloaded TV Show In History' (theguardian.com)
Jeremy Clarkson's new motoring show has become the most illegally downloaded television programme in history, figures suggest. Amazon paid a reported $160 million for three series of The Grand Tour, which stars former Top Gear presenters Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May, after Clarkson was sacked by the BBC in March 2015. From a report on The Guardian: But figures from Muso, data analysts of the piracy market, suggest unprecedented numbers of people are avoiding paying $90 a year to sign up for Amazon's online streaming service, Amazon Prime, and instead downloading the show illegally. The data, shared with the Mail on Sunday, suggests the first episode was downloaded illegally 7.9m times, the second 6.4m times and the third 4.6m times. British viewers made up the largest percentage (13.7%) of the total number of illegal downloads.
I'm not signing up for a 100 dollar membership just to watch one show. Hence, the pirating.
My guess though is those numbers are hugely inflated to help justify the UK's crackdown on all things torrent.
Pointless time filler stuff with predictable interpersonal poking and ridiculous, although expensive content. ...and this is a comment from a legal viewer.
Morality has gone down the tubes.
People inviting friends over to watch television, and not compensating the content creators.
People using sling, and other illegal "time shifters" to avoid paying compensation.
People inviting other people to watch their streaming content, and not compensating the content creators.
People sharing their netfix passwords with other people, and depriving people of compensation.
People "archiving" and "ripping" CDs, instead of purchasing multiple copies, people are not getting compensated.
Look in the mirror to find out the reason the economy is down the tubes, dirty pirates.
What if you watch it at a friend's house.. does that count?
There is no way for them to know how many times something was downloaded or pirated. This is more of the same crap the RIAA/MPAA used in the US to try to convince politicians they were losing insane amounts of money. These figures are completely fictional and this article is a joke.
... given his best mate AA Gill died of cancer the other day.
AFAIK Prime Video is only available in United States, United Kingdom, Germany and Austria. Leaving much of the world without a way to watch the new show. I don't consider it an excuse to pirate it, but i can certainly understand why so many would download it illegally when they have no legal means of acquiring it. Prime Video used to be in the nordic countries but was close in 2014 for unknown reasons (probably not that popular). I hope Amazon can see a potential in this widespread piracy and start offering it through legal means to more people. It worked for HBO with GOT in the nordic countries when they started offering their content through "HBO Nordic".
Any plans to build firewalls or plug the intertubes to stop this from happening?
These thieves must be punished to the fullest extent of the law. Maybe that special prosecutor for Crooked Hilary's email server can tackle this at the same time.
I am just sick of these endless subscriptions everyone wants me to join up with. I don't want to sign up to ten difference services so I can watch one series/sport on each one of them. Rich people might have that sort of money to piss away, but I don't and between rent, car expenses, insurance and basically knowing I will never get a cent of pension from the govt, despite paying an ever increasing portion of my income for boomer's pensions, I am just not interested in attaching yet another leeching service to my meager paycheck.
It is three old men acting like teenagers in cars. It does not cost $90 per subscriber per year to make, and I'm not interested in paying that sort of money to watch ten hours of television so that Jeff Bezos can go to mars.
I always thought that laws were binary. Either you are breaking a law or your aren't. How can something be more illegal than something else?
My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.
Surprising, knowing that the show is so shitty
Why pay the Nielsons for their service?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
I haven't watched the show, even though I guess I could because I have Amazon Prime, It's interesting to me that 1.5 million downloaded the first episode and didn't want to download the second. Then almost 2 million more downloaded the first 2 episodes and didn't want to download the third. Is this version of the show much worse than the series that was so successful?
No doubt Amazon doesn't offer Prime in many countries and in some of them probably doesn't offer the show.
Dunno why. It's someone tossed all the worst bits of the old Top Gear into a concrete mixer with a tonne of Jeff Bezos' pension fund. The episode with the sci-fi style reboot army thing was just embarassing. And I say that as someone who liked the old Top Gear.
I had a dream, bright and carefree, but now there's doubt and gravity
And look at the mods of other comments.
There's satire here - me thinks.
...and before that, it was Game of Thrones. Media companies don't seem to get that this isn't yesteryear where they could corral people into paying for a very broad service with exclusive content. Meanwhile, online sales of television series remain brisk, even at prices around $30 to $50 for a single show season. Sure, consumers aren't acting rationally here -- you can get the entire prime video catalog for the same price as two to three shows -- but that's how economies *actually* work. It blows my mind that the people selling these shows and services still can't see that. I really have very little sympathy for those content owners who choose not to sell their shows free-and-clear of other services. They get exactly the piracy they're asking for.
So why are people wondering where violent assholes come from?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
https://www.netflix.com/title/...
$90/year for one season of a show? Yeah, I'd download that too, if I was at all interested in it.
I doubt it.
It's at the point I'm considering stopping using amazon at all. OK I think the show is for idiots and any of my money going into the pocket of clarkson is a personal affront, but its the blanket advertising that's pissing me off most . go to amazon.co.uk and its there in the top header bar. then a big banner ad. go to prime video and have to sit through a trailer. and if i buy anything it gets delivered in a box with a picture of clarkson and his 2 cronies on.
can i have a tickbox so i never see their stupid faces again?
Is this really a surprise, and not something Amazon would've expected, considering that Top Gear gained such a large international audience on the back of "illegal" downloading.
First thought is, who are "Muso", and what are they selling?
I have a Amazon Prime, Hulu, and Netflix subscription.
I still illegally(?) download content offered on these services because it works with my media center software of choice (Kodi). Also I can watch the content in a offline mode if I want.
Amazon is basically charging $90 to watch a show. Who in their right mind would do that?
So what else am I supposed to do? There are features missing from Prime in Canada and this is one of them.
I have prime, and if I wanted to watch the show, I'd torrent it anyway.
Maybe they should've thought about actually releasing it. I'm in Europe and I still can't watch it unless I fuck around with VPNs.
Amazon paid a reported $160 million for three series
So Amazon just paid the Dane-geld, and now we all have to deal with the consequences of a well-funded Dane. There is something very wrong if we just sit back and let companies like Amazon get away with that kind of behavior.
These are not "illegal downloads." Downloading isn't illegal. *Sharing* and distributing it is (in some jurisdictions). The are also failing to account for those of us who have Amazon Prime subscriptions, but CANNOT VIEW the show because Amazon refuses to make their proprietary player available on Android TV. Amazon is the real criminal here.
I have Prime, and a Vizio TV with the Prime app bundled onto it (there's even a button on the remote control). Everything plays fine except Grand Tour, which just stays on a black screen. No plans to pirate it, but it would be nice if Amazon and Vizio got their act together a little more.
So what else am I supposed to do? There are features missing from Prime in Canada and this is one of them.
I do appreciate the way they are touting it as a global show, different country each week and all that, but apparently unless you actually live in the US you can go fuck yourself.
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I have prime video but, amazon has no app for my prefered TV watching device (4th gen apple tv). If I didn't end up watching at my dads house on his roku, I would have torrented it.
Was just going to binge watch at some point at the rels, but there is no way in heck I'm paying $100 for that.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
After all there is no legal way to watch that show without giving away our basic freedoms of "Privaccy and Integrity of Information processing systems" as declared by the German constitutional court in 2008.
Offer it as a DRM-free downloadable copy and people will buy it in hordes.
GT's OK but is too much like the latest seasons of Top Gear with its over-the-top attitude. Seems like the seasons 5-12 will never come back. Damn shame.
Personally I'd like to see more James May's projects, maybe new season of the Cars of the People, or the Man Lab (boy that was nice show). Still BBC promises special of the Reassembler (just think about it... Christmas Special of the show basically featuring old man in the shed playing with his spanner. Now that's post-modern).
A) It applies to U.K. markets only, and B) This is quite "staggering" number, given this show's popularity in the U.K.
WhenTop Gear pushed a perfectly charged Tesla Roadster off the track, Tesla naturally sued. BBC's response was that Top Gear is "an entertainment programme, and should not be taken seriously."
Since then, I have refused to watch any Top Gear show or anything affiliated with Jeremy Clarkson.
I know one thing for certain: Make sure there's a hot meal waiting for Clarkson after he gets back from the pub! Don't say I didn't warn you.
Amazon Prime in Canada costs $79, but AFAIK, it doesn't include access to Grand Tour. If it does and I've got it wrong, there's still a huge number of Top Gear fans in a lot of countries who don't have a legal option for getting the show.
So yeah, a lot of people are going to looking for torrents. Quelle surprise.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
I do appreciate the way they are touting it as a global show, different country each week and all that, but apparently unless you actually live in the US you can go fuck yourself.
The plan is to stream it in 200 countries. The BBC is probably being a PITA about distribution.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The internet is available to the world, Amazon streaming service is available to Americans. I am sure if the made the service available in other regions people would be happy to pay and there fore the whole "downloading" issue would go away.
I do appreciate the way they are touting it as a global show, different country each week and all that, but apparently unless you actually live in the US you can go fuck yourself.
The plan is to stream it in 200 countries. The BBC is probably being a PITA about distribution.
What does the BBC have to do with anything?
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What does the BBC have to do with anything?
I was expecting this question, since I am not new here, and I am never surprised when a slashdotter asks a stupid question.
Please think for more than two minutes about what the BBC has to do with anything before replying. There are hints all over these threads.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The BBC have nothing to do with Clarkson et al, nothing to do with Amazon, nothing to with The Grand Tour and nothing to do with internet distribution for anyone but themselves. So please, enlighten my ignorance and explain how the BBC could be doing anything to positively or negatively affect this endeavour, especially in regards to its internet broadcast the 199 countries they have even less relevance in.
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So please, enlighten my ignorance
There is not time for that, but start here.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
OK, so you think the BBC have a contract stopping it? With who? Clarkson, Amazon or the rest of the world? When all this shit went down that got Clarkson sacked, you know he didn't actually get sacked, just didn't get his Top Gear contract renewed, no new contracts were imposed and they're obviously not under any kind of non compete or the show wouldn't have got made in the first place. So, what kind of contract would the BBC have that would stop Amazon from rolling out their own service under their own timetable? Do you think maybe they are strongarming the governments of Canada and that to not allow The Grand Tour to be shown so they can push new Top Gear? Do you think maybe they are holding Bake Off and Eastenders as leverage or something? Maybe you have insider knowledge on the BBC contacts, are you Tony Hall?
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First those numbers are a bit meaningless without context. How many people paid for the episodes? If 1000 people paid for it and 7.9m downloaded it that is catastrophic. But if 10000000000m paid for it and 7.9m downloaded it then that is irrelevant. What % downloaded it without paying? How does that % compare to other shows? Is the show just so popular that the same amount of piracy reached 7.9m? Or was there more or less piracy compared to other shows?
Secondly: 7.9m times for the first episode, the second 6.4m times and the third 4.6m. How does that compare with the number of peoples watching the show legally? Did more people pay for the second and third show because they deemed the content worth their money? It is not unheard of that people pirate things just to get a taste and then decide to buy it or delete it.
Thirdly: How much of the piracy comes from regions where there is no alternative? How much piracy is going on because they fail to sell the show? Seriously, if they don't allow us to pay them then why do they complain when we don't pay?