Tech’s broken promises: Streaming is now just as expensive and confusing as cable. Ubers cost as much as taxis. And the cloud is no longer cheap::Some tech is getting pricier and looking a lot like the older services it was supposed to beat. From video streaming to ride-hailing and cloud computing.

  • Moobythegoldensock@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    Is this surprising? The prices were always going to adjust to the market. Any new cheap thing that undercuts the market will eventually become the market as it becomes mainstream, and prices will be increased to what the market will bear to maximize profits.

      • Moobythegoldensock@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        Sure. But torrents are for files which is different from streaming. And Kodi + Trakt is still far beyond Netflix.

        The costs to you with torrents are the relatively small risk you may get sued for a lot of money and/or the cost of covering up your activity with a VPN to make it harder to sue you.

        People who were always going to pirate are still always going to pirate. But companies like Netflix know that people will pay for a convenient, legal service with features they like. But if they start charging too much or make their platform suck, people will be more likely to cancel them and pirate.

        • Strangle@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Well that’s the difference, most people will pirate when it’s more convenient to do so. And as long as prices are so exorbitant.

          I pirate hockey games, because watching hockey is ridiculously inconvenient and/or expensive.

          I do not pirate music anymore, or video games because Apple Music is more convenient and not very expensive and steam has all the games I’d ever want to play, and has enough sales that it’s not that expensive either.

          I don’t pirate movies and tv shows because Netflix and Disney really cover anything I want to watch and anything else I share a crave subscription, like for Game of Thrones

          But I do pirate hockey games.

      • aux@feddit.nl
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        1 year ago

        I use WebTorrent nowadays, since it allows you to stream torrents. But before that, I also used qBittorrent, great application.

    • Mysterious_old_man@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I think the problem comes in with all the copyright and monopolization bs companies like Verizon and apple pull to remove all possible competition and allow them to jack up their prices

    • SkepticalButOpenMinded@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      This is surprising from a naive market based perspective. Think about how TVs and computers have gotten cheaper and better. The hope was that this wouldn’t just be the same product with new players. The idea (or the lie if you prefer) was that the new technologies would lead to efficiencies so we can all get more for less.

      It just didn’t make any sense for something like Uber. It costs money to give someone a living wage and their app wasn’t going to change the fact that someone still had to drive the car. The whole idea made no sense, which is why they were racing to autonomous cars. That hasn’t panned out.

      I actually think streaming is a much better value than cable, even at the same price. Shows are higher quality and more plentiful. Many high quality movies are included. You’re also not required to get every package. Skip Paramount if you don’t want it. I still think streaming easily beats cable.

    • Fades@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      No it’s not surprising, we ALL STILL live in the same fucking capitalist nightmare.

      Anyone surprised is simply naïve and/or a literal child lol