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@eldaking@weirder.earth · activity timestamp 2 months ago

Today my friends were talking about streaming services (is this offer worth it, I find it too much hassle to plug my laptop to the TV, etc).

One thing I mentioned that I think is pretty important is that I totally get the need for convenience, but all of these services also have terrible annoyances and inconvenient requirements - it is just normalized, so people learn to live with them.

Needing an internet connection is a big one. Stuff being removed. Navigating through all the stuff you don't care about. Ads, and the "announcements" and "notifications" that are also mild ads. Being unable to migrate playlists or your stop points. Regional restrictions. Shitty video players. Can't rename stuff. Images keep changing.

And if you ever fall outside their average use, fuck you. Oh you move around a lot or have a weird family, you will get a bunch of restrictions.

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Prof. Elda King

@eldaking@weirder.earth · activity timestamp 2 months ago

I subscribed to Netflix mostly for my parents and sisters (I rarely even use it).

When I moved out of my parents' house and with my sister, I (and she) couldn't use it any longer. The plan covered 4 users at once, but only in the same place.

There is an option to add a "secondary account", but to get two people on that you need four on the first one which is too many. And since my parents and sister are the majority, their house is now the admin house and I can't access my own account from home. And there are other restrictions on whether the secondary account can be ad-free.

Ah yes, the convenience of a streaming service. Certainly beats having a bunch of files in a laptop or USB drives.

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Prof. Elda King

@eldaking@weirder.earth · activity timestamp 2 months ago

And of course, another thing I mentioned: it is by design that "play files from your own computer" is somehow less convenient than "download gigabytes from some remote data center".

They want to sell you something. Who cares whether you can watch your own recorded videos, your independent movies, your legally ripped physical media, your public domain videos? You aren't buying anything, so there is little money to be made. If their restrictions stop those uses, good, you will buy more TV instead (or buy a specialized gadget... Or upload to their centralized service...).

It is bizarre how like, Windows doesn't have a decent media player by default. It used to! Now you have to go and get VLC yourself. Or Apple with "only works with this other expensive thingy". Or Android with "apps are just delivery mechanisms for spyware and adware".

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Federation Bot

@Federation_Bot · activity timestamp 2 months ago

I subscribed to Netflix mostly for my parents and sisters (I rarely even use it).

When I moved out of my parents' house and with my sister, I (and she) couldn't use it any longer. The plan covered 4 users at once, but only in the same place.

Ah yes, the convenience of a streaming service. Certainly beats having a bunch of files in a laptop or USB drives.

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