Wow, it's been over two years since I canceled my Netflix subscription‽ Neat!
this post was submitted on 12 Nov 2024
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Technology
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Nice use of the interobang
“Yo ho, yo ho, I’ve never seen an ad.”
It's posts like these that make me realize just how disconnected lemmy is from real life.
We've become an echo chamber where everyone acts like people aren't readily willing to put up with all this enshitification.
Streaming services are just cable services anymore. And it's not gonna change anytime soon because the average person doesn't care enough to find an alternative.
Even though I already pay for my mom, and a different geographical location about an hour away, last week when the kids and I tried to watch Netflix we got an unstoppable prompt to upgrade again for another $6.99. I hit cancel and it didn't do anything. So I closed the app, reopened it, and the pop up again. Couldn't watch Netflix.
A few minutes later I got an email from Netflix saying thanks for upgrading. They charged me anyway. I cancelled my entire account as a result. They're never getting another nickel from me.
It's hard not to say they're correct to though. For all the talk about people saying we'll cut our service, their numbers went up. They got paying members and now they got paying advertisers. Netflix was Victorious here.
Idk I’m watching Arcane S2 and I haven’t paid for Netflix since like 2009. My FIOS went out last night due to that weird East Coast outage and I stayed watching Arcane, while my neighbors were unable to access any streaming services.
There's dozens of us
I feel old for remembering a time when they advertised their service on wii some time after they stopped doing trade in DVDs, which my family was a part of. Back when I'd have the wii set up in my bedroom just to watch my favorite cartoons or the (to me) once new and mysterious Doctor Who (before eventually dropping due to lack of interest). Back when they were pretty much the only streaming service and had just about everything. Back before everything became siloed away into 500 different services that all add up to the price of healthy organs on the black market.
Now you'd be lucky to see me on their platform regardless of whether or not my family has the ad free plan or not (no idea if we do, nor do I care). Let alone any of the other services.
Even ignoring the pricing of these streaming services, having a Jellyfin server these days is basically mandatory for simple convenience sake. You can have everything in a single place on Jellyfin instead of having to deal with multiple services.
If your paid product is worse than free alternative you already failed as a business.
My partner was subscribed to Crave for ages. A little while back she was in the middle of a rewatch of Sons of Anarchy when the app started to act up and wouldn't work, so I grabbed a copy and put it on Jellyfin.
She was floored by how much immediately better the video quality was and cancelled Crave the next day. Shocked at how much worse the experience was with the paid service compared to free.
I currently don't have a spare device or whatever is needed to set up a server, but definitely agree with your point. Best I can do right now is having my shows/movies stored on a 1TB drive that's almost full and a 2TB drive I have yet to touch, which just works for me.
Your jellyfin server can just be your computer, it just needs to be running when you want to watch the content.
My desktop hasn't been shut down other than for quick system updates (and it's Linux so I do mean QUICK) in several months.
For those that have the ad plans you can use this Firefox extension to skip them.
Streaming enhanced: Netflix Disney+ Prime Video
Or, even better, stop giving them your money and get Plex or Jellyfin and return to the seven seas.
A vastly better experience for less money? Never! /s
Addons like the one linked are useful for me to share with friends. I have many friends who have a soft anti-piracy stance. Not due to ideological conflicts — it's mostly that their inexperience combined with knowing that pirating is forbidden makes them feel uncomfortable. Adblocking carries a similar sense of discomfort, but much milder, so it can be useful as a small step for overly anxious family and friends.
I mean, setting up Mullvad too isn't that hard and compared to a Netflix subscription, it's paid for itself several times over in the time I've had it. But I get that that might not be something your friends are willing to fiddle with.
That said, we're on Lemmy, in the technology community -- I'm reasonably confident that almost everyone here who is going to read your comment has the skills necessary to setup Mullvad and Plex; if not the entire *arr suite, a NAS, and Jellyfin.
That said, we're on Lemmy, in the technology community -- I'm reasonably confident that almost everyone here who is going to read your comment has the skills necessary
Yeah, my comment was getting more at the fact I have loved ones whose behaviour I can shift in small ways, such as by sending a link to an add on to block ads.
Especially as the blockage isn't necessarily the skills, but a more nebulous sense of unease that I wonder whether is linked to the "you wouldn't download a car" era of anti-piracy ads
I get this free with T-mobile, so I might as well use it. I use jellyfin for everything else. This is more for family or friends that are not blessed by the omnissiah with technical know how.
In the last couple months it seems like the number of ads has increased dramatically.
I'm shocked.
You know what they're actually advertising for this way? Parrots and rum.
And every second new user is one with the ads plan. Congratulations, not paying (buying) once again worked out.
Welcome to cable* TV!
*With or without wires.