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Comment by sircastor | Hacker News Reader

This is one of the reasons why I’ve all but sworn-off theaters. It used to mean a lot more to me to see something in the theater but I’ve traded that for subtitles, pausing, multi-day-viewing, picture quality, manageable volume, whatever food and snacks I want, and -surprisingly high up on the list - talking through the movie with my wife.

I guess I’ve gotten old (and also own my own house and can buy whatever equipment I want)

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For the most part this is me. The only reason I go to a theater is if the movie demands it (Dune in IMAX was heavily touted, so I made the trek for that), or the Drive-in. There's a Drive-in movie theater that still runs about 45 minutes from my house. 2 movie double feature for 11 bucks a person. When the weather's nice, I'll drive there with my friends, put lawn chairs in front of my car, pull out the boombox, and make a night of it. I can manage the volume and we can talk to each other without disturbing anyone.

I live in an small (by American standards) apartment and I have a reclining sofa and 65" TV. You don't need to own a house to have a decent viewing experience.

All the other stuff I completely agree with. Movie theaters are obsolete, as far as I'm concerned.

At least in some areas, it's common for rental suites to forbid guests. So if you want to see a movie together with friends, a movie theater is often the best way.

I've never, ever heard of a rental home or apartment or even hotel room that forbids guests. I'm not saying your assertion is false, but can you provide any evidence that it's true?

I think at one time there were women-only boarding houses that forbade male guests, at least there were in old movies, but that's about it.

>I think at one time there were women-only boarding houses that forbade male guests, at least there were in old movies, but that's about it.

These still exist in Japan: there's women-only apartment buildings where men are not allowed in at all (except maybe contractors). I think even delivery people aren't allowed in: they have to meet the resident outside. Women can be evicted if they bring a male guest or relative inside.

These are of course entirely voluntary; any woman who doesn't like this is free to just rent a normal apartment like anyone else, and there's plenty of those. I don't know if there's any price advantage to renting a women-only apartment.

It's common for rental suites. If you rent a whole home, you can usually invite whoever you want. But if you live in a rented room, a sharehouse, a rented basement suite, etc, then no-guest provisions are very common. These rental suites are common in expensive cities.

For example, Surrey BC:

https://vancouver.craigslist.org/rds/roo/d/surrey-upper-leve...

(I just picked this randomly, it didn't take more than a minute to find).

"Single occupancy only, no guests or visitors please."

In the US (and probably Canada as well) that is blatantly false.

They can bar specific individuals with reason, but not a blanket ban like that.

Actually, this is pretty common in the US as well. Generally though, they structure it (more reasonably) around parking provisions, and have visitor parking limited to 2 hours and no overnight guests. This is /incredibly common/ in rental units in the US, partly because landlords charge a fee per occupant for shared services like sewer, trash, etc. and have limited parking.

Nearly any rental, including whole apartments, will have rules around overnight guests in the lease with some limitation if not an outright ban to prevent shadow occupancy or subletting.

I don't know about the US, but this is perfectly legal in Canada for a rental in a shared living space (sharing a kitchen or a bathroom with the landlord). The rules are quite different in that case as you are not legally considered a "tenant". It's a very common arrangement, and I know people who have lost their rental for having a visitor.

> You don't need to own a house to have a decent viewing experience.

My subwoofers disagree

Picture quality? What kind of theaters are you going to? What TV do you have?

I saw a movie in a theater for the first time in forever last weekend. At one point I was distracted by lines in the screen where the sky was projected - it was the actual screen, not part of the projection. This was an iPic, so not cheap tickets

If streaming services could handle busy times without artifacts my LG 4K 77in would always be a better experience for all content

As a recent example, we went to an animated film and could see lots of artifacts on the image. It wasn’t the theater’s fault. But also, picture quality isn’t just a matter of source. I can change the output of my TV to whatever I want. The theater gives me the combination of whatever the staff set up plus the file from the studio.

My local movie theater has a 70mm projector. Not gonna get that at home no matter what setup one has.

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