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Comment by e40 | Hacker News Reader

I had completely stopped downloading movies in 2018, and even for that year, I downloaded very few. I had been tapering off since 2015. These are real numbers from my NAS. I got a seedbox 2 months ago. This was my last straw: trying to rent some movie on Amazon and was told I had to subscribe to some service to watch it--there was no price to watch it once.

The other things I did recently: 1) paused Google YTTV because NBA season was over 2) canceled Netflix because I never watch it

I've been watching content (some of it very old, like The Larry Sanders Show) on HBO Max, but the app on Roku is *SO HORRIBLE* I'd rather pirate content and watch it on PLeX.

The Amazon app/UI is *HORRIBLE*, too. Like multiple seasons are separate items? WTF. I'll download series I have access to on Amazon just to avoid that app.

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> The Amazon app/UI is HORRIBLE, too. Like multiple seasons are separate items? WTF. I'll download series I have access to on Amazon just to avoid that app.

Not only that but I've even seen the seasons presented in no order whatsoever: i.e Season 2 followed by Season 8. It is nonsensical.

Ironically, the biggest russian torrent site is just a phpbb forum and it is wonderfully organized and very well moderated. Easy to find the content you want.

Fun fact: previously it tried to cooperate with the content owners and removed content by request, so the UX was considerably worse. But then, someone successfully litigated to block them 'forever' in Russia, so... They restored all prevoiusly removed content and now it has almost everything I ever wanted. Great win!

Sorry, who is the them here? The people who sued? The pirates? Users? The Russian site itself is blocked on Russia?

'them' is rutracker.org, it is blocked in russia. 'someone' is some copyrast litigator who's actions backfired.

What is their site?

I guess rarbg.to.

rutracker.org

I genuinely do not understand how Amazon can have dropped the ball on their UI for this long, this bad. Given their drive to get customers to consume shipped product, their track record with digital products is abysmal. Video games is a product problem and that's a different discussion, but "television" and movies are a different matter. The product and consumer appetite are there, but the roadblock is the UI. Does no one who is in upper management use the product? I know they treat their testers like crap, but surely someone in the marketing or graphics department has at least done some usability polling. Right? Right?

I don't understand it either. It might be hard to quantify the affect of their Prime streaming business on their sales and thus they don't prioritize it ? That's my only guess, it feels to me like their most public product and its received the least attention.

The UI and general use of these apps are so bad - that I literally find myself torrenting things from Netflix, Prime, and Disney+ rather than use those apps, purely to be able to consume it on Plex.

The VPN jumping lunacy bothers me. I moved countries - great so I can't use Disney+? I get it, but that now means I have to download (your new) content because you won't actually let me buy your content, directly from you. For the first couple of months I continued to pay for the service. Eventually I decided that if you don't want me as a customer, I don't feel bad about downloading it. Sad really.

Went to watch Beavis and Butthead on Amazon and it had no music videos... They were all edited out. How is that remotely acceptable?

The Beavis and Butthead music video thing is a decades old problem, unfortunately. The DVDs were like that too. Something about failing to obtain the music video rights for the show outside of its original airing.

The only reasonable option is to pirate.

Happens sometimes with some video games as well. In the past when remasters came out they couldn't secure or couldn't afford the music licensing costs so they had a cut or replaced score.

That became worse in recent years when titles on digital distribution platforms e.g. Steam had music removed due to expiring licenses. This meant a game you had already downloaded and installed would be downgraded unless you were quick enough to stop the automatic updates for it.

Huh I'd never heard of this.

Why would you reply with an anecdote to someone specifically mentioning they’ve heard plenty of anecdotes but want data?

> The Amazon app/UI is HORRIBLE, too.

Zero control over playback speed is the deal killer for me.

I subscribed to watch season 8 of alone. Each show had about eight thirty second commercials that you couldn't skip. Last time I'll try that way to watch something.

I was pretty pissed off to discover the HBO Max Roku app is such garbage - after paying for HBO Max for a year.

If you have a T-Mobile Magenta plan with unlimited data, you get HBO Max for free btw.

Still an anecdote...

And, no qualms of conscience there at all?

Why would I? Most of the content on my PLeX is paid for elsewhere. And, anything I pirate which I like I buy. I watched _Pig_ and immediately went to Amazon and paid $14.99 for it. If I pirate something that is terrible, there's no point.

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