• @Decimit@lemmy.world
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    3261 year ago

    Pirating went down when paying for streaming was more convenient. Well, you are making it far less convenient.

    • @Dubious_Fart@lemmy.ml
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      1031 year ago

      Streaming has become cable 2.0.

      It was wonderful when everything was on one, maybe two providers. Could watch everything in a very easy, very affordable way.

      But everyone saw that, went “I know, I want that money!” and spent billions building their own individual infrastructures so make their own streaming services, and right around we go right back to the absolute worst days of cable and bullshit.

      Only thing stopping me from saying fuck it and downloading shit I want to watch, is the fact that I no longer know what the good sites are… since I havent pirated since the heyday of the bay.

      • @Khotetsu@lib.lgbt
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        101 year ago

        And the irony is that people switched to cable for the exact same reason. They got tired of the nonsense that broadcast TV pulled with subscriptions for different channels and all the ads and everything, and went to cable because you paid one bill for every channel. Then, everyone moved to streaming because you had to buy 50 different cable packages for the one channel on each you actually cared about, and there were just too many ads to deal with, etc.

        Something something, those who don’t listen to history are doomed to lose profit margins or whatever.

        • @Whirlybird@aussie.zone
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          71 year ago

          Broadcast tv had different subscriptions for channels? Where? Free to air tv is free with no subscriptions or options.

          • @Khotetsu@lib.lgbt
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            01 year ago

            I may be remembering that wrong, as it was before my time, but I had heard that people moved to cable for the same reasons that people moved from cable to streaming services. You bought one cable package, it gave you access to everything, and there were no ads. Then came the ads, and eventually, the packages you have to buy in addition to your cable subscription for the channels you actually care about.

            • @Whirlybird@aussie.zone
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              41 year ago

              People went to cable because it had no ads and let you have the opportunity to watch stuff you’d missed because they looped content regularly. Missed an episode of the Simpsons? All good, it’s on again in 12 hours. It also has movies and shows long before free to air because they paid for it. Cable was the start of subscriptions and paying for individual channels.

      • @hypnotoad@sh.itjust.works
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        61 year ago

        That and movies just suck nowadays. This is partially old man yelling at cloud stuff but also true since the death of DVD’s means studios won’t take risks anymore since they can’t recoup funds after a poor box office.

        • TurtleJoe
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          11 year ago

          This isn’t yelling at clouds, it’s check l correct.

          It’s also not quite so much “recoup funds at a poor box office” as it was “count on DVD sales to make up fifty percent of revenue for certain kinds of movies.”

        • @cor315@lemmy.world
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          31 year ago

          I can’t tell if no one talks about usenet because no one knows about it or because they don’t want anyone else to know about it.

          • @ramjambamalam@lemmy.ca
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            11 year ago

            I prefer torrents because it’s totally free, unlike Usenet. I don’t even pay for a VPN since I don’t care about a few love letters in my inbox. It’s not about the cost; it’s a matter of principle that I disagree with commercialized piracy.

            But Usenet is a good option for other reasons.

    • @jmcs@discuss.tchncs.de
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      161 year ago

      Well, this time they have Google and Microsoft on big brother duty to make sure you don’t get crazy ideas. And I’m not seeing enough people jumping away from Chrome and Windows to stop it.

      • FaceDeer
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        331 year ago

        I’m on Windows and it’s never hindered me when I needed to go download something that would make a studio exec cry. Granted, I use Firefox, but I’m not sure what Chrome would do differently - it’s just a matter of clicking links that get sent off to qBittorrent to handle. What “big brothering” do they do?

        • @4am@lemm.ee
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          21 year ago

          Google is implementing a new scheme that verifies your browser (correct DRM, etc.) and sites won’t allow access without it.

          Basically you have to have Chrome and without extensions they don’t like.

          • FaceDeer
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            141 year ago

            I’m preeeeetty sure that the Pirate Bay isn’t going to implement that scheme.

      • @M0oP0o@mander.xyz
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        81 year ago

        But so far google and microsoft are incompetent big brothers, to the point that most people will find free streaming sites just by searching “free streaming epx of show”. Now we are not talking good streaming, or even safe but if you want an example just look at any place with poor users (like a school or library).

  • dinckel
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    1831 year ago

    To be completely fair, it’s been over for a while. Even if you completely forget about infrastructure, between the endless wars for licenses, endless removals of content from platforms, shitty inconvenient apps, and regional locks, it’s already a dying market.

    On top of all of that, they’re implementing the “don’t you have 5 extra dollars” strategy, with skyrocketing monthly prices for each of these. If it was 15$ a month to watch anything, i would still pay. but it’s 15$ for each of them, and they still serve you ads, and sell your data

    • @jet@hackertalks.com
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      621 year ago

      The funny thing is we’re rapidly approaching the point where there’s more digital content than any single human could consume in a lifetime. Including content from before copyright. So the main thing streaming services offer you is convenience and up-to-date media. But if you’re just trying to entertain yourself 30-year-old 40-year-old 50-year-old 60-year-old 70-year-old content can be just as engrossing. You just get emotionally invested in it.

      • maegul (he/they)
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        441 year ago

        I’ve found a DVD rental place close to me with quite a collection. Honestly thinking about just unsubscribing from all streaming and going all in on DVD rental. I watched one recently for the first time … you forget how consistently good the qualilty is compared to streaming (YMMV). But, in true hipster fashion, being more deliberate about what I watch, more openly exploratory, making more of an event of it, all seems attractive. If streaming were actually convenient, fine, but with the way things are now … they can go to hell.

          • El Barto
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            -171 year ago

            Why? You’re giving the people who ruined streaming more money.

        • @dan1101@lemm.ee
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          121 year ago

          Plus you get commentary and behind the scenes and such, not sure why most of the streaming services don’t offer that.

          • maegul (he/they)
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            71 year ago

            Yep … I forgot to mention that. Overall, when I watched a DVD for the first time in ages, it was somewhat eye opening … like we’ve truly gone backwards on what the home viewing experience can be apart from the somewhat minor convenience of being not needing to store the DVDs at home.

        • Matte
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          71 year ago

          this is a rose tinted glass tbh. maybe if you’re watching a dvd on an iphone screen, but DVDs were limited to 720p, and a bad one too. You need modern bluerays to really get up to par with HD streaming services.

          • @liara@lemm.ee
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            251 year ago

            DVDs are 480p, 720p wasn’t introduced until the Blu-ray/HD DVD wars

            • Dave
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              61 year ago

              There was also the forgotten format, D-VHS which was a specialized VHS tape tape which the recordings could be at 720p or 1080i resolutions. Or the same resolution as DVD but at a higher bitrate so there are less noticeable digital compression artifacts than DVD. The introduction of HD-DVD and Blu-ray disc formats kept the D-VHS format from ever becoming widely adopted.

          • El Barto
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            161 year ago

            Don’t get me started with the unskippable intro screens.

            • LinkOpensChest.wav
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              111 year ago

              One of the many things that drove me away from physical media to streaming. Big companies were always pulling the “you will watch what I want you to see” approach. It’s also what killed cable and satellite.

              That being said, I’ve found myself checking out more and more DVDs from the library simply because it’s reliable, and I find it enjoyable in a way. I don’t really care about HD quality or whatever – DVD quality is fine.

              • El Barto
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                61 year ago

                I have a good DVD collection I’ve amassed by buying them second hand in thrift stores, and for titles I really want to own.

                • @Dubious_Fart@lemmy.ml
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                  51 year ago

                  Yep, Get those for like 2 bucks at goodwill. Hell, even entire box sets.

                  Almost got the entire collectors edition band of brothers box set for 2 bucks at goodwill once… only reason I didnt is cause it was missing like 3 of the disks, and I didnt want to spend the rest of my life trying to hunt those 3 down.

          • maegul (he/they)
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            31 year ago

            The place has plenty of Blu-Rays too … I’m grouping them in with DVD for convenience … also you shouldn’t presume the quality of my internet and streaming subscriptions or even my TV.

      • @floofloof@lemmy.caOP
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        201 year ago

        If you can go to a source of older content it often comes pre-filtered for the better stuff too, so you don’t have to wade through a ton of rubbish to find the occasional gem like you do with the new stuff.

          • @TechnicalCreative@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            51 year ago

            Reviews from sites like IMDb and rotten tomatoes. As a movie or series is older, or finished, the general audience has had plenty of time to review it and if it’s fondly remembered, then it might get mentioned on here or other social platforms.

            The issue with new content is that it can be amazing at first and then they release the last two episodes and ruin pretty much the entire series, eg. Game of thrones, and more recently, secret invasion.

            • @Haui@discuss.tchncs.de
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              31 year ago

              Secret invasion really shocked me in its brutality in unceremoniously taking out loved characters.

              But thanks for elaborating. :)

    • @jonne@infosec.pub
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      471 year ago

      And the writer’s strike shows that the artists don’t get paid anyway if you pay for content, so they can’t even play that card either.

      • dinckel
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        211 year ago

        We all knew that even before the strike too. Musicians get paid pennies on a dollar, and it’s the same with writers. Actors are probably treated the same way, if you’re not one of the hall of fame elites who get insane cash for garbage roles, after they’ve been in a Marvel movie once

        • @CmdrShepard@lemmy.one
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          11 year ago

          Just read an article stating that the writers of a show were only paid a combined $3000 after the show was streamed over 16 million hours on Netflix. These companies try to crack down on piracy by claiming artists/writers/actors don’t get paid if we pirate but they’re clearly not getting paid anything outside their normal wages when we don’t pirate either.

    • @Potatos_are_not_friends@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Peacock HBO Max Showtime Disney. Fucking DC Universe was trying to be a thing.

      Every media company wanted a streaming service but failed to deliver because of their hubris.

      Hulu and Netflix have been my constant subscription services.

      • @InverseParallax@lemmy.world
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        -11 year ago

        Disney is an absolute must if you have a kid, and a great value besides.

        Otherwise it makes 0 sense except for maybe star wars sometimes.

        • Very_Bad_Janet
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          41 year ago

          We got Disney + for our kids and they couldn’t care less. The only thing they were interested in was The Mandolorian (bored after the first season) and the latest live action Spiderman (which was not available in Disney+ !!!). We’ll be canceling once our special deal is over. Maybe we’re lucky that our kids don’t care for it because that will save us some money.

        • Nah, my kids prefer Netflix. Even then, they prefer to play games instead. So I’ll be steering them toward video games instead of TV, and only for a limited time each day.

        • some_guy
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          -21 year ago

          Disney is an absolute must if you have a kid and aren’t capable of raising them without parking them in front of the TV.

          • @Elivey@lemmy.world
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            11 year ago

            Downvoted for telling the truth. I know people raising kids who don’t plant their kids in front of a tablet or TV to watch Disney+ or YT ever. It’s possible if you spend some goddamn time with your child and have a creative mind.

  • @s20@lemmy.ml
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    811 year ago

    Well, hell. I guess I’ll go back to watching less and buying DVDs. I’m not watching commercials on a service I pay for. That’s a non starter.

    Worst comes to worse, I can dust off my eye patch, grab my parrot, and take to the high seas. I don’t wanna, I prefer to pay for stuff, but ffs, if they can’t be reasonable, I guess it’s back to arrr me hearties.

    • silent_water [she/her]
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      451 year ago

      who the fuck pays to watch ads. what a ludicrous proposition. that’s the part that makes no sense to me.

      • @HughJanus@lemmy.ml
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        01 year ago

        No one pays to watch ads. They pay to watch movies and shows, which are (optionally) supplemented in cost by ads.

              • @Whirlybird@aussie.zone
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                41 year ago

                There are many things that are free if you just ignore the law. Cars are free. Groceries are free. People’s wallets are free!

              • @HughJanus@lemmy.ml
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                -11 year ago

                You mean should they choose to steal them? No shit, everything is free if you steal it. Not everyone wants to be a thief.

                • alcoholicorn [comrade/them, doe/deer]
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                  221 year ago

                  It’s not theft, because it doesn’t deprive the original owner of anything.

                  But if it did, theft from billionaire hollywood studio owners is cool and good.

                  You’re not paying the wages of the hollywood workers, you’re just increasing the funds the studios have to break the worker’s strikes and further depress their conditions.

  • @GnuLinuxDude@lemmy.ml
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    621 year ago

    But Wednesday’s move to significantly bump prices, marked an acknowledgment by Iger of the media giant’s intent to squeeze more revenue out of streaming by pushing consumers to the advertising-supported plans, which have proven to be more profitable.

    “The advertising marketplace for streaming is picking up,” Iger told investors on the quarterly earnings call. “It’s more healthy than the advertising marketplace for linear television. We believe in the future of advertising on our streaming platforms, both Disney+ and Hulu.”

    This is extremely important for them. Netflix’s excellent deal for most of its streaming existence was obviously a thorn in the side of many other businesses. Even if streaming services can get you to pay an exorbitant amount of money on an ad-free tier, advertisers are frothing for the chance to advertise to you regardless. They want you to see their ads so badly. And let’s not forget all the big tech companies, Netflix included, were riding high during the free money days of 0% interest loans. Those days are over, and the bill is due. Wall Street wants its money. And we are all the ones who have to pay up. Cheap streaming is officially over.

    This is why these companies, including Netflix, have all introduced ad tiers. Not only is it a great way for them to juice their revenue streams, but also every other company wants a permanent residence in your brain, and then some. Given the way things have been going since duo-eras of the COVID pandemic and corporate profit-based inflation, they don’t even need to collude on prices. All the execs need to do is look at the business press and say, “Hey, they’re getting away with increased prices and password sharing crackdowns. We can do the same thing. The pay pigs keep paying!”

      • Tankiedesantski [he/him]
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        211 year ago

        Big advertising budgets that are funded from the value alienated from exploited workers and consumers. Information asymmetry in the marketplace means that even if you make a superior product at a lower price, you could still be outcompeted by an expensive inferior product if more people know about that worse product and don’t know about your product.

        That’s for most basic products anyway. Luxury products like bags and clothes are almost all marketing since the cost to create them is so low compared to their sales price. People buy them because of perceptions created by marketing and not any inherent value in the product itself.

      • Frank [he/him, he/him]
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        171 year ago

        As far as I know internet advertising is an economy destroying sunk cost fallacy. No one makes money off of it, but if they stop basically everything collapses catastrophically, so they just keep pouring more money in to it in hopes that someone will find a way to make it profitable before the bill comes due.

        • fox [comrade/them]
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          111 year ago

          Ehhh, not really. If showing 10,000 people an ad costs you $10 and even one person made a purchase off that, you’ve paid for the ad buy. Internet ad conversions are considered unbelievably excellent if 1% of viewers click on the ad and 1% of those people make a purchase.

          Also, if you don’t advertise, then your competition that do advertise are going to eat your lunch.

      • @TehWorld@lemmy.world
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        41 year ago

        Is it really unclear? If you had never heard of a product, you would much less likely purchase it. If Coke stopped advertising today, they’d start a very slow but real loss of market to it’s competiton, be it Pepsi or whatever. Note that a LOT of advertising is not for you. It’s for the corporate buyer at name your favorite restaurant so that they think that they’ll get more consumers in the door because they have Coke products, as opposed to some other brand.

        • @salient_one@lemmy.villa-straylight.social
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          1 year ago

          I suppose it’s not that unclear if you compare the revenue of all other industries combined to the revenue of the advertising industry. The ratio is pretty large and every type of industry buys ads, so it trickles down from everywhere.

      • @Eccitaze@yiffit.net
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        191 year ago

        You know it’s coming. Why would a streaming company want a consumer buying one month, binging a single show they’re interested in, then immediately cancelling the subscription after, when you could guarantee a 6- or 12-month revenue stream for them?

        • Historical_General
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          71 year ago

          Rents work this way; it wouldn’t be a surprise if the same playbook was adopted by these neo-feudalists.

    • Frank [he/him, he/him]
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      191 year ago

      Might fuck around and start invoicing companies for attention time, comprehension time, storage capacity, and of course the 500$ per instance recall fee.

  • @docrobot@lemmy.sdf.org
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    611 year ago

    Am I the only one that remembers the “cut the cord” and “stop feeding the cable pig” nonsense? What happened to all that? Thankfully, none of this has affected me, then or now. I don’t usually bother with “programming” of any kind but, when I do, “arr mateys.”

    • Unaware7013
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      1 year ago

      The cable pigs moved into the streaming game, and used licensing to enshitify streaming

    • spectre [he/him]
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      141 year ago

      I mean it was nonsense to think it would solve your costs, but streaming is superior to cable TV from a tech standpoint for sure.

      People should expect that yeah, new software is cheap when it’s rolled out, but it’s gonna get more expensive as time goes on, but I can understand why that wasn’t quite as apparent to people 10 years ago as it will be 10 years from now

      • @RoosterBoy@lemm.ee
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        That’s literally the opposite of how it’s supposed to be, new tech is expensive and only early adopters can buy in, then when the EA’s money comes in, it is spent to improve and make the tech cheaper, which allows it to be adopted by the masses. With streaming, all of the fat cats decided to start it cheap to get everyone hooked and moved over, then jacked up the prices because the shareholders aren’t satisfied with their draconic gold hoards.

        • spectre [he/him]
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          131 year ago

          I think the model that you’re referring to is generally more applicable to hardware, but since you can make free copies of an app, Uber for instance can keep things low cost till they eat the competition

    • Frank [he/him, he/him]
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      Honestly people should probably be thinking about future-proofing things and putting as much media as physically possible on to drives in anticipation of whatever the next wave of bullshit. At some point Samizdat2.0 will probably be the only way to preserve and share media under the capitalist censorship regime. They’re just going to keep cracking down and cracking down and cracking down until no one can move without bleeding for the privilege.

      As they said in the bad old days: Keep circulating the tapes.

      Until we can pull this whole bullshit edifice down, kick it in the kidneys a few times, and set it on fire the only way to protect media from the companies that “own” it is going to be little people with really big RAID arrays.

      • The_Grinch [he/him]
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        31 year ago

        It certainly feels like we’re on the precipice of something breaking what with computers rapidly getting more locked down, these secure enclaves and/or TPM chips verifying that you’re watching on an approved OS and web browser before allowing you to stream, and then the video is encrypted until it gets to your actual TV. Crazy what they’re getting away with.

        In the near future I foresee pirates pointing cameras at TV screens then using AI to clean up the video, then media companies responding by creating randomized slightly different versions of videos so they can trace them back to the account holder who shared it (move some tree branches around, slightly different colored hat on background actors, etc) and perhaps getting legislation passed to stop cameras from being allowed to record IP protected material, and so on.

    • Album
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      01 year ago

      Is that true? Most of the best public trackers got shut down. Anything left has bots recording your IP and you’re getting a letter from your ISP.

      If you’re not on a private ratio tracker or paid tracker it’s basically a non starter. So I’m not sure about unaffected era the last 10 years have been brutal for pirates via torrent.

      • @PowerCrazy@lemmy.ml
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        231 year ago

        VPN has been necessary for pirating for a long time. And fortunately a VPN is cheaper then any streaming service, and has other benefits besides.

        • @DogMuffins@discuss.tchncs.de
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          51 year ago

          What’s the situation with usenet these days ? I preferred nzbs over torrents for several years but it just became impossible at around the time nzbmatrix chucked it in.

          • @Whirlybird@aussie.zone
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            101 year ago

            Better than ever! Seriously.

            Indexers like NZBGeek, Drunkenslug, and NZBFinder have resulted in me getting almost anything I want, short of some obscure Australia series from the 80s. Providers are doing 2000+ days retention and I’m only using 1 myself, never even needed to get a backup on a different backbone.