I still use my DVD/Blu-ray by mail subscription from Netflix. Practically everything was available that way. I will be canceling Netflix for a while after that goes away at the end if the month. I plan to just rotate through which services I subscribe to.
It’s like the author never used the search function on a set top box. Most will allow you to add a program to a master queue and then will show you what channel(s) the program is on when you want to watch it. And unlike cable, you don’t have to call to add the channel when you don’t have it, or to cancel when you no longer want it.
That's why I ask myself "What do I want to watch?" and shop for physical option day or two before. When watching a movie once a two-three weeks like me it's cheaper and I can keep it.
(Now someone suggest just pirating, but I don't pirate movies that promises to be good)
"what do I want to watch" is stupid hard, cmon. I spend most of my time watching the roku screen saver.
How? If it's not on my plex it's probably on a friends.
I'm tired of this expensive fragmented bullshit.
Streaming services need to be federated, so there is a central search for content, and services are paid seamlessly for what's watched on their platforms. The customer barely needs to know who delivers the content.
Doesn't Roku, Comcast STB, and other OTT devices do just that? You speak into the remote or search. It spits out all possible streaming options to choose from, preferencing the services you have accounts or subscriptions for?
I don't know much, but Stremio does a fairly good job listing streaming services for anything searched
torrentio is also really helpful
Nebula.
I've heard a lot about setting up a Plex or a Jellyfin server locally, but from what I can tell they are just media storage platforms and in order to watch anything you would have to add your own content. In this age of digital content, it is very unlikely for a simpleton like me to go out and purchase hundreds of movie disks separately and manually load them into my CD drive to even have a fraction of the catalogue these streaming services combined provide. Also torrenting really isn't a viable option for me as I personally use a free tier Proton VPN which doesn't allow P2P, and even if I did get a proper one, I would still be limited to availability of seeds for movies I want to watch, which may or may not exist depending on the popularity of the said movie. I currently use a niche streaming site to watch my movies without any issues. Are self hosted plex/jellyfin servers really for a person like me?
Jellyfin is the way to go. Yes, you'll have to download your own content. It's more work, but I definitely think it's worth it. Use qBitTorrent as your client, and sites like yts.mx are great for movies.
Roku has a great voice search which works across all of the installed apps. I can just ask it for a movie, and it tells me which services have it.
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