cross-posted from: https://yiffit.net/post/1072752
For a moment, it seemed like the streaming apps were the things that could save us from the hegemony of cable TV—a system where you had to pay for a ton of stuff you didn't want to watch so you could see the handful of things you were actually interested in.
Archived version: https://archive.ph/K4EIh
I cancelled all my subscriptions and just pay for a seedbox instead.
Only two subscriptions I have now are Spotify and Game Pass...because they are actually worth it.
It's, in layman's terms, server space you rent out and can use for your downloads. torrent clients like transmission are usually built in. I pay £5 a month for 2tb space and enough bandwidth to keep a good ratio.
So instead of downloading to my pc, I download torrents to the seedbox (at a blazing fast speed) and then download files from there to my pc whenever I feel like it, again at stupid good speeds.
I have FTP access, so I've just added it as a folder/mounted drive on my windows and Linux mint file explorers. Works great. Also have it on my smart TV as a web address for quick streaming of whatever I downloaded.
Edit: this also eliminates the risk of downloading Torrents locally.
Is it advisable to have a VPN though to access the seedbox though?
Shouldn't need one if you trust your seedbox provider to not log. And even if you don't trust them you'd need to find a VPN to trust more and they're almost all super sketchy.
Nah, in the case of Spotify, I've ady lost all my faith on the music industry and remain on the sea for a while now. I rather take times to listen to the music instead of giving even a quid to those mf.
Same for me. Had Netflix and Prime.
Cancelled Prime. Student plan ran out and wanted to spend less (on Amazon and buying random stuff.
Cancelled Netflix. Didn't use it, convinced my mother to let it go (only after saying how much it costs).Renting a seedbox for 15€ per month, Spotify for music and since this month I burried my life long hate for YT premium and now also have that (and wish for a plan without yt music for 3-4€ less).
Reason why I did YT premium was, because I already watched more YT than Netflix anyway. And it's near daily for about 2-3h. Well worth it (for way too much money).For YouTube premium I just did the whole vpn to turkey and pay for a year upfront which was like £12 for the year
Sure and with that trade off I have a rock solid experience with no issues at all.
Sometimes you get tired of android and the jank and want shit that just works so you can get on with your day and just focus on other things.
Apple is a huge mess tbh, you have NOT done tech support for Apple stuff, it's a pain. Android, otoh, is a breeze. I've always found Apple stuff jankier.
I haven't needed to tech support on any of my Apple stuff in the entire time I've owned them, I have at home both a Linux server and a Mac mini running as a headless server. Guess how many times I've had to fix the Mac mini 0.
My iPhone I've had 0 issues with and my M2 Air which I use for work has had 0 issues.
I don't really see a situation where the sorting out a mac would be troublesome it's pretty much all simple as hell.
Oh and fun fact, I have done tech support for apple stuff on a daily basis as part of my job as a store manager of a retail tech store and I'm constantly thrown problems from Android/iOS Devcies as well as MacOS, Linux & Windows Devices and guess which ones give me the most problems.
Sorting out a Mac is troublesome. Errors that give you no information, lack of easy access to advanced utilities, and of course, it bring all in the name of "It Just Works! (TM)". I found myself cursing at a Mac, but never had on literally any other operating system ever. Even TempleOS is easier to troubleshoot.
Errors on every major OS:
Windows: The application could not start because of missing dll X (0xb). Reinstalling the program may fix this problem. Linux: Could not find libfluidsynth.so.1. Reason: No such file or directory! macOS: Could not connect to this network. Android: App not installed. There's also another "There was a problem parsing the package" which either means it's corrupted or your phone is from the Stone Age. iOS: Literally reboots your iPhoney every 3 minutes because the fucking microphone is broken.Now let's see what those errors tell me.
Windows: A DLL is missing. Either it got corrupted or the user fucked up. Linux: App is linking against a super old library. Update the app or compile it to use a newer library. macOS: LITERALLY NOTHING. Super vague, but at least the Android one below only appears when you are sideloading (you should know what you're doing) Android: While the error itself is vague, it usually means "no space left" or "bad signature". Again, if you see this error, you should know what you're doing. iOS: I couldn't tell unless I knew the mic was broken.Guess how many times my Dad had trouble with Bluetooth on macOS. More than I can count, to the point of needing to steal my mic from me.
lack of easy access to advanced utilities
Me and you have very different experiences to this, at work I've found MacOS the easiest of the three to sort out.
I'll give you a recent windows example, A PC comes in for repair with a b450 MSI board no audio on the Front panel or the rear I/O. Naturally we install all the drivers off the MSI web page except windows won't even detect the sound card. Throw on a Linux USB live environment instantly detected.
Naturally we're like no worries let's use the inbuilt Windows tool to reset the PC with a cloud download, nope that doesn't fix it. Required a complete reinstall from a USB. This was windows 10 22h2 iirc.
At work I see Windows/Mac/Linux daily and Windows, gives me the most trouble on a daily basis. With Mac/Linux most things you can fix from the terminal pretty quickly, or with Mac just use the inbuilt reset tool no matter how much a customer fucks up their machine.
The problem is I don't want to reload macOS over every tiny fuckup like in the SymbianOS days.
I thought this was a facetious comment, but you're right https://www.nytimes.com/1981/07/26/arts/will-cable-tv-be-invaded-by-commercials.html
My memories go as far back to when a full commercial block was 60 seconds and only happened once in the middle of a movie and usually around once per hour on regular tv.
Good news for Lemmy. Pirate the fuck out of everything and never ever feel any guilt about it comrades.
🏴☠️ ☠️ 🏴☠️ ☠️ 🏴☠️ ☠️ 🏴☠️
Trusting promises of corporations is like believing that a wild cobra won't bite you. It's definitely possible, highly unlikely they will keep the promise.
Corporations gradually making something worse so they can sustain profits?
🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️🏴☠️
Also love how they're all going to make a cheaper plan with ads so they can either double dip or push you towards the more expensive plan. Nothing but making things shittier for the end user, love that innovation.
Stremio is pretty cool. Allows for streaming torrents with a lot of seeders. Watch most TV series and movies on there nowdays
idk if it has other capabilities, but to use on android basically just install it from the play store then install a bunch of community plugins for various sites. torrient io scrapes most public trackers
can cast to TVs too if your phone/tv has the capability
stremio has gotten way worse after rarbg went down. doesnt seem to scrape torrentgalaxy correctly even with the torrent already cached and i have no idea how to fix it
remembering when cable television didn't have advertisements
