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Has streaming effectively "beat" piracy?

jigglet

Banned
Mods feel free to delete this if this type of discussion isn't allowed.

I was looking for some old movies that I can't find on any streaming service, so I hit up Piratebay and a few other torrents. Nothing to be found. Curiously I typed in the first thing that came to mind - The Simpsons. Other than the old 360p videos, none of the modern DVD or bluray copies can be found there.

Out of curiosity I searched for a bunch of other random movies - Aliens, Back to the Future, some modern stuff. All the old DVD rips can be found, almost zero presence of Bluray / 4k rips.

I did the same search across a bunch of other pirate sites. I'm not saying piracy is dead / defeated. But it feels to me that for the most part, it's a problem that has been solved?

I have a subscription to every major streaming service* and other than a handful of old movies I can't find, it feels like I can get everything I need without having to resort to this. I haven't looked on torrents in so long now I was completely unaware that it appears to be a thing of the past.

*Except I'm getting rid of Paramount+ soon, what on earth made those guys think they had enough content to create their own service.
 
Nah. Streaming made it easier to watch stuff for a while and reduced the need to pirate. Now everyone and their cat has a streaming service. Everything is fragmented and to watch everything you need to sign up to 10 different services. I bounce between Netflix, Prime, and Disney but there are more. I don't pay for those 3 all at once but just rotate between them. I'm not signing up to any more so if I need to sign up to watch your movie then forget it.

If there's something I want to watch and it's not on Netflix, Prime, Disney then i'll check Amazon/Apple or even YouTube to see if I can rent it. I always try to find a legitimate way to watch. And if not well I don't watch it or...

With all these different services you can see why people will be pushed back to pirating.

720-1080p rips seem to be the most popular. There are some 2160p rips but not a lot and these are much larger in size. They can be anywhere between 10-50GB in size. Depends on how good the person encodes and packs it and of course if it's a tv episode or a full movie.
 
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you can never beat privacy. Streaming has made viewing content more convenient. However, with so many different platforms you are now forced to have multiple subscriptions, just like back in cable when you are forced to take multiple different packages.
 

MidGenRefresh

*Refreshes biennially
You need 100 subscriptions to watch everything you want to watch. Meanwhile I have this one "website" bookmarked that has everything under one roof. You tell me what's more efficient.

That said, if I like something I will subscribe to a platform just to watch it. For example, I've watched first episode of Cyberpunk Edgerunners on my "website" and I liked it so much that I subbed to Netflix and watch the rest there.

The only subscription that I have active non-stop is Apple music, simply because I have few Apple speakers around the house and it's nice to just ask Siri to play a song.
 

nush

Member
I was looking for some old movies that I can't find on any streaming service, so I hit up Piratebay and a few other torrents. Nothing to be found. Curiously I typed in the first thing that came to mind - The Simpsons. Other than the old 360p videos, none of the modern DVD or bluray copies can be found there.
1Fr8OD.png


You could not be more wrong. Piratebay, torrents? It's as easy as Youtube now.
 

Sybrix

Member
It's even easier to pirate thanks to streaming services.

I dont have Disney+, Prime, HBO+, Netflix but i've loved Stranger Things, The Mandalorian, House Of The Dragon and Clarkson's Farm.
 

Nobody_Important

“Aww, it’s so...average,” she said to him in a cold brick of passion
I wouldn't say it "beat" it because there are still some shows that are being stubbornly held on BS streaming services (hello Top Gear) but I think it has reduced it by quite a bit.


Why search for janky low quality streams online when 90% of what you want is on one of the 4 different subscriptions that you already have?
 
Well, the streaming that I am using kind of does, fmovies has saved me a penny, but since in Ukraine most of the streaming services don't work anyway, I think that I kind of have no choice, and using proxy is "illegal" according to their own TOS, so..
 

nush

Member
Why search for janky low quality streams online when 90% of what you want is on one of the 4 different subscriptions that you already have?

Tell me you've never seen a pirate streaming site without telling me you've never seen a pirate streaming site.
 

rofif

Can’t Git Gud
The only thing beating up piracy is growing up and buying games...
I've not pirated a game for like... 10+ years.. because I can afford them.
 

Nobody_Important

“Aww, it’s so...average,” she said to him in a cold brick of passion
Tell me you've never seen a pirate streaming site without telling me you've never seen a pirate streaming site.
I can't stream pirated shit on my living room TV comfortably and easily. If it was as easy as turning on my Roku and flipping through the apps I have then I would have the FBI at my door by now. But its just not.



TL;DR: I am lazy as fuck and would rather spend money than time.
 

winjer

Gold Member
A few years ago, when almost everything was on Netflix, streaming had a very strong case against piracy. It was much easier to use, had all the content, no virus, etc.
But now streaming has gone full circle and we are back to a similar situation as with cable TV.
 

Sorcerer

Member
I have noticed when you click on those pirate streaming sites, you are directed to an official link to stream or buy the movie. It seems the sites were taken over and are now used as gateways by the major media companies.
 

nush

Member
I have noticed when you click on those pirate streaming sites, you are directed to an official link to stream or buy the movie. It seems the sites were taken over and are now used as gateways by the major media companies.
Nope. But I've heard you do need a fully shielded browser to get to the content in some cases.
 

Mistake

Member
I can't stream pirated shit on my living room TV comfortably and easily. If it was as easy as turning on my Roku and flipping through the apps I have then I would have the FBI at my door by now. But its just not.



TL;DR: I am lazy as fuck and would rather spend money than time.
1. Turn on roku/smart device
2. Open website on phone
3. Screen mirroring.
It literally is that easy
 

Nobody_Important

“Aww, it’s so...average,” she said to him in a cold brick of passion
There's a certain app you can easily get on your Xbox that can do all of that.









but dont do it because its naughty
I will set myself on fire with a combination of gasoline and my own piss before I buy an Xbox.

I just don't want to spend the money lol
 
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BadBurger

Is 'That Pure Potato'
No, I don't think so. Piracy gets easier every year really, and will remain so long as there's people without the money to purchase content / subscribe, just don't want to pay, or cannot legally obtain some media given their location.

I miss that very brief time, it felt like perhaps only two years long in the early 2010's, when the only two serious streaming companies were Hulu and Netflix, and all of their shows and movies could be purchased individually for reasonable prices on iTunes and Amazon. So if I didn't want to sub to Hulu to watch Misfits, which was a UK show and not available on any traditional network or cable channel in my country at the time, I could just buy the new episode each week from Apple for like $0.99. No biggie.

Now I'm dropping services and juggling a few subs at a time even though they're not financial burdens to me. I no longer feel like any individual service gives true value and none of them are capable of serving up fresh and (true) quality content year round - because frankly I don't think such a thing is possible.
 
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BlackTron

Member
I will set myself on fire with a combination of gasoline and my own piss before I buy an Xbox.

I just don't want to spend the money lol

Honestly, I never thought it was that bad using a wireless mouse to pick a movie from a folder in Windows on a TV. I mean it was kinda jank but still OK back when we had to connect a laptop to a CRT with s-video to watch anime episodes. I don't even get why it's a big deal today, in fact I like knowing I won't have to update an app or whatever to start the movie...
 

LordCBH

Member
Streaming was great when it was just Netflix and Hulu. Now I have to pay cable prices to watch everything I want because it’s split up across like 29 different services. Shit fucking sucks now.
 

RunLoganRun

Neo Member
Didn't kill it, but changed the how's and why's of pirating. Back in the day people generally kept their own libraries, whereas now it's download>watch>delete. The need to hoard was killing by steaming services, but with so many different services and regional delays, it was replaced up urgency, people just download the most recent episodes asap, then delete when done.

Not to say there aren't still hoarders. Obviously they're still out there, for better or worse, providing a backbone for it all.
 

poppabk

Cheeks Spread for Digital Only Future
For music - definitely.
For tv and movies - for the most part but as prices go up and services proliferate they are at risk again.
 

Batiman

Banned
It was a real hustle back in the day. Now it’s for broke teens with no jobs
200w.gif
 
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TrueLegend

Member
Hell no. I actually pirate the streaming content that I already pay for due to unreliable horrible apps and networks. These guys need to have download option that doesn't glitch. I had to wait and watch the boys through piracy even though I had prime and it was all available but the 4k version will just get stuck and immediately drop to 360p like every few minutes.
 

Soltype

Member
Not even close, they offer way too much stuff I don't want to see, and the there are too many services.Not to mention the pricing keeps going up.I'm surprised no one has done a steam like setup for movies/TV.
 

mcjmetroid

Member
God no.

But as someone mentioned for music absolutely.

Because for whatever reason if you have one music service like spotify or apple. You literally don't need anymore.

How did this happen with music and not with movies?
 

daveonezero

Banned
I don’t watch much 4K content but if I did it’s better to have a local copy.

Most streaming doesn’t give very good 4K quality.
 
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