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Online Piracy Is More Popular Than Ever, Research Suggests (torrentfreak.com)
An anonymous user writes: A broad and detailed report from piracy tracking outfit MUSO shows that visits to pirate sites went up last year. The company recorded more than 300 billion visits in 2017, which suggests that "piracy is more popular than ever." TV remained the most popular category and most pirates prefer streaming over torrents or direct downloading.
So, an outfit that makes it's money fighting "piracy" releases a report that "piracy" is on the upswing. Who woulda thunk it?
I know lots of people who pirate. They also pay for lots of media. They go to concerts and fan events. The popular artists and companies tend to get money one way or another.
The content on legal services is shrinking all the time, so we are forced to pirate to get what we paid for. Plus the BBC dosen't get to complain about piracy because we pay our licence fees.
The reason the streaming options are popular is because it's entirely possible for nontechnical people to call up their technical friend (and by "technical" I mean "can follow a Youtube tutorial"), hand them a Fire Stick, and add streaming plugins. These people aren't doing anything terribly different than what they do with Netflix or Hulu, just a different icon.
Moreover, the experience involves "having all the things in one place". No going to Netflix for this show (except that one episode where there's a license discrepancy over a song's usage so it's unavailable), then Hulu for that one, Crackle for the next, then CBS All Access for yet another one, HBO Go for still another...it doesn't matter what show someone wants to see, all the episodes are available, on demand.
Netflix mostly-had this situation under control, then everyone wanted their pound of flesh, which turned Netflix into half original content, and half "the refrigerator the night before grocery shopping". Even if the content producers wanted to charge a premium for their section of content, but still allow Netflix to handle the streaming, I think that model would make everyone happy..but alas, it does not.
Finally, I've always kinda wondered what's in it for the sites who serve the streaming files. At least torrent sites can say "community" and "advertising/donation revenue", but the sites that serve the streams can claim none of the above, have to pay the bandwidth and server bills, and have a bullseye painted on them from the *AA...so, all of the liability, none of the perks. I don't get it :/.
P.S. in case anyone was wondering, I don't own one of these devices, nor have I ever modded such a device for anyone.
Content producers make it so hard (and expensive) for consumers to purchase their wares,
The existence of multiple separate disjointed competing services makes it harder and more expensive to watch things that are freely broadcast in most places.
If you have paid for content, there is no long term plan allowing access when that content provider inevitably fails.
They're still trying to get rid of actual physical media so everything is "in the cloud" When is the last time you "bought a CD/DVD/Blu-Ray?
Netflix has probably done more good than harm in reducing "unauthorized viewing" than any anti-piracy group.. But even their content disappears over time.
What piracy? We have Netflix and a dozen other services without ads served for less than 10 bucks a month? I don't get it.
The problem is the dozens part. With each of them $5-10 a month.
Not one has almost all the content.
I might do a streaming service, if I can get 90% of the content and not 10.
The millennial that doesn't like most of the stuff designed for millennials.
The media industry supports criminals, rapists, and other scrum, but sharing is bad?
These people make them money and that is all they care about.
I am pretty sure most of them would say Hitler is a good guy if they were making money with him.
Also fuck Amazon, Facebook, and most (if not all) of the top 50 tech companies. Agree with you there.
The millennial that doesn't like most of the stuff designed for millennials.
The green got slightly darker.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
At the same time there are more people that ever on the internet as well - I mean, what are the odds?
Gee, when people can't buy their favorite 60's, 70's, 80's, and 90's TV shows ... what do you think is going to happen? A certain percentage of people will always resort to piracy.
Piracy just shows that there is a _demand._ Let me buy the entire series, say Mash, for $20 instead of price-gouging me $120 / season like ST:TNG used to do.
What I don't understand is how the "long tail" is completely ignored in film / television but the games industry has embraced with sites such as Good Old Games (gog.com) and Steam.
> We have Netflix and a dozen other services without ads served for less than 10 bucks a month? I don't get it
Streaming (quality) doesn't compare to BluRay (quality).
> And for software, we have TONS of open source equivalents.
I always look for and use an OSS version first and then fall back to a commercial version only if the OSS versions doesn't do what I need but let's be realistic. There just aren't valid OSS replacements for everything (yet.)
* Gimp is still crap compared to Photoshop. And yes, I use both -- both professionally and personally.
* I don't see any alternative to Keyscape's 77 GB VST piano library that sells for $399.
That said, overall, yes Open Source Software is getting there. I certainly find Inkscape a helluva lot easier to use Adobe Illustrator.
And thankfully there are lists that make it much easier to find an OSS replacement.
http://www.damicon.com/resourc...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
So now they're trying to label streaming as "piracy?" You've got to be kidding me! These people will stop at nothing to maintain their 1950s business model and tarnish public perception with misinformation.
An the fact that on any service there is no guarantee that the content will be there tomorrow. There are a number of series that I have streamed off Netflix in the past only to find them gone when I wanted to go back and watch them later.
There there are things like Disney pulling all its contents off Netflix to try to milk another subscription off of us. There are a lot of, pirates, that I know that collect tv shows for just this reason. They want to have that beloved sitcom or movie they grew up watching and not have to chase it down on some obscure subscription service.
I read at +2. If your post doesn't reach that level I will not see or respond to it.
Some of it is. But some since netflix started producing its on content this is becoming less of a issue. For the first time in years I actually sat down and watched each episode of a show. Normally, I will start to watch something, pause it, and come back to it later. Some times days later.
Oh, that show was Altered Carbon. If you like Blade Runner, I highly recommend this series. An the book is pretty fucking good too.
I read at +2. If your post doesn't reach that level I will not see or respond to it.