Hacker News Reader

Comment by y-c-o-m-b | Hacker News Reader

I'm personally seeing an explosion of people embracing piracy. People that were previously vehemently opposed to it (like my in-laws) are now pirating large amounts of content. The rise in streaming service costs while simultaneously reducing catalog content is pushing a lot of these folks over. What we have now is almost worse than cable TV, so it makes sense.

View on HN

When Amazon introduced adverts, I Cancelled. Went from near $1k a year on Amazon as a whole to nearly zero.

I still pay for Netflix, Disney, Apple, Spotify and bbc. I’m happy to pay for my entertainment, I refuse adverts.

When Clarkson farm came back I looked at re subscribing to Amazon, there were three choices, all with adverts.

I’m sure it makes money, but for me you get greedy and you lose money.

>I still pay for Netflix, Disney, Apple, Spotify and bbc

I have to admit that's a lot of subscriptions. Most people here are relatively rich, but no wonder people are priced out.

My total entertainment budget is 5% of my net income.

That is still cheaper than the average cable bill even a decade ago

Most of my life I was strongly opposed to piracy for moral reasons. Now I... intentionally try to own (download/pirate) content I consume and I also do this for ideological reasons. So yeah, this effect is real.

Almost worse? Cable doesn't have unskippable commercials, we've had the DVR since 1999. In 1999 it was still possible for a new tech product to be user friendly.

Streaming was designed from the ground up to be user hostile with surveillance and reduced control over the video stream. People hold onto old specious ideas and don't update them.

Which is why my parents record they favourite shows on cable, and watch them later, fast forwarding over ads.

If you're under the notion that your digital cable box wasn't surveilling you, then you just weren't paying attention. Of course that box knew what channel you were watching and what time meaning they knew what you watched since your name and address and phone number and email address were all linked to that box.

Best investment I made this year was an old refurbished PC to use as a home server. Having my personal streaming services is actually pretty amazing.

There was a point in time, around 10-12 years ago, that I thought that piracy would eventually die, as the streaming services were pretty cheap and offered good quality/quantity. How wrong I was.

But it is refreshing to be sailing the high seas after such a long time. Brings back memories. Contrary to paid services, piracy actually got much better and convenient. Better quality audio/video, etc

On top of that, as long as big companies don't take the protection of my personal information seriously, why should I worry about violations of copyright laws? It works both ways.

That’s because Walmart is also selling Android piracy site streaming boxes. So boomers/technologically out of the loop think it’s legitimate.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/S6-Elite-Ultra-2024-SuperBox-TV-2...

Tbf, that's a third party selling that box. But Walmart themselves do sell the Onn 4k stick/box which is the current every level pirates HW of choice to replace the firestick.

I have family members that have bought the Superbox in a Walmart physical store.

In fact here’s the conversation transcript of me asking about it:

Me: What was that piracy streaming box Uncle Gary got from Walmart? Superbox?

Them: Yeah

Me: Thanks

Them: I have it and I literally get everything for free. Like it already has the new super smash Brothers on it.

Them: Has every series and everything. I can give you the apps I have

Me: I dont need it haha just was showing people how illegal streaming is being sold in stores.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com