My husband was right about DVDs(slate.com)
slate.com
My husband was right about DVDs
https://slate.com/technology/2023/01/streaming-libraries-dvds-blu-rays.html
427 comments
I lent almost none of my DVDs and VHS tapes(!) back in the day because the fact of the matter is /people never gave them back/. Not even good friends.
It's one of those lessons I learned early in life. If you're going to lend something to someone, do so with the expectation you're never getting it back.
It's one of those lessons I learned early in life. If you're going to lend something to someone, do so with the expectation you're never getting it back.
As the saying goes (more or less)... "One who lends a book is a fool, but one who gives it back is a greater fool"
So maybe we can also apply it to movies and other works
So maybe we can also apply it to movies and other works
One cannot lend books or DVDs, one can only gift them.
I've checked them out on occasion from libraries – and usually returned them.
Yup, tools too. I'll come over and help ya, but nobody is going to borrow my tools.
This is also true of DRM-free files on thumbdrives. More of my friends have devices with USB ports that can run VLC than optical drives these days (not to mention the whole zone thing, which is quickly a pain when you're a movie nerd)... thankfully generating a DRM-free file from a DVD is trivial.
- signed, someone who also owns lots of CDs and DVDs, mostly old non US-produced things that are close to unfindable on streaming services :)
- signed, someone who also owns lots of CDs and DVDs, mostly old non US-produced things that are close to unfindable on streaming services :)
In my family we swap around portable hard drives loaded up with movies. Mostly orchestrated by my aunt who started the tradition. Before then, it was burned DVDs and before then it was copied VHS tapes. When I was a kid my mother showed me how to circumvent copy protection on VHS by connecting a VCR to a VHS camcorder, although I forget which was doing the playback and which was doing the recording. It was a neat way to circumvent macrovision though.
Kids these days share their collections on Plex
I've been doing this for 5+ years at this point. Your post reminds me that I need to finally, at some point, just build a new home server. This E3-1230v1 on DDR3 is getting a little old.
Anyone else rip their DVDs, import them into Plex, then share your Plex library with others?
On that note, what kind of hardware/connection does that require? I run Plex on a rather old Synology NAS at home, and it's great for streaming at home at original quality even up to 4K but can get a bit sluggish when it tries to scale the video one way or another.
Then I go out of my home and it's unwatchable when streaming even original quality, which is odd because I have 20Mbit up with fiber to the premise at home and probably getting 60Mbit+ where I'm trying to watch from.
That's mostly 1080p I've been trying to watch, so 10Mbit should be sufficient. I don't know why the hardware would become a problem only when I leave home.
Then I go out of my home and it's unwatchable when streaming even original quality, which is odd because I have 20Mbit up with fiber to the premise at home and probably getting 60Mbit+ where I'm trying to watch from.
That's mostly 1080p I've been trying to watch, so 10Mbit should be sufficient. I don't know why the hardware would become a problem only when I leave home.
It'll be the transcoding that is the issue. Whether that is because you don't have a direct path, bandwidth issues, or because of codec issues.
Not all devices support all codecs. Any disagreement means that Plex is now going to try transcoding, even if the hardware capability isn't there (and most NASs don't have the grunt to do it).
You have options.
Spend more disk space: You can tell Plex to transcode copies into lower bitrate versions it makes them available via the UI (although this isn't always obvious how, and varies on platform). Note that on a NAS this might take a day to transcode a movie. During which your ability to use the NAS for anything else is greatly reduced.
Spend more effort: Re-rip or re-encode everything into a known supported format. You will need to maintain this. Tools like Tdarr may help here.
More compute power (and some effort):
If your content is in 1080p and you want to view it in 1080p or lower then reasonably-modern Intel CPUs with support for QuickSync are pretty good at handling transcoding for 1080p. Plex Media server has an option to enable hardware-accellerated transcoding if you pay for Plex.
An older Intel NUC or Small-form-factor PC can usually do this job fine. They can also be fairly power efficient.
If you want to start throwing in 4k content, then you are going to need a GPU and the cost and complexity goes up.
Not all devices support all codecs. Any disagreement means that Plex is now going to try transcoding, even if the hardware capability isn't there (and most NASs don't have the grunt to do it).
You have options.
Spend more disk space: You can tell Plex to transcode copies into lower bitrate versions it makes them available via the UI (although this isn't always obvious how, and varies on platform). Note that on a NAS this might take a day to transcode a movie. During which your ability to use the NAS for anything else is greatly reduced.
Spend more effort: Re-rip or re-encode everything into a known supported format. You will need to maintain this. Tools like Tdarr may help here.
More compute power (and some effort):
If your content is in 1080p and you want to view it in 1080p or lower then reasonably-modern Intel CPUs with support for QuickSync are pretty good at handling transcoding for 1080p. Plex Media server has an option to enable hardware-accellerated transcoding if you pay for Plex.
An older Intel NUC or Small-form-factor PC can usually do this job fine. They can also be fairly power efficient.
If you want to start throwing in 4k content, then you are going to need a GPU and the cost and complexity goes up.
I have a vague memory that if your device can't get a direct route to your Plex server (e.g. because of NAT) then it gets relayed via Plex's own cloud servers with significant bandwidth throttling.
This article seems to have some more details and mentions that free tier users get throttled to 1Mbps. https://support.plex.tv/articles/216766168-accessing-a-serve...
This article seems to have some more details and mentions that free tier users get throttled to 1Mbps. https://support.plex.tv/articles/216766168-accessing-a-serve...
I had a friend who had DSL cause it was all they had available, and with 1.5Mbps up I could decently stream a lot of things at 720p which TBH was fine and I did not notice, plus a lot of the source material was older shows like Stargate SG-1 so resolution wasn't that high anyway.
I use my old GTX1060 for transcoding and it does a decent job. Upload speed could be another factor, as well as pointed out elsewhere making sure there is direct internet access to the Plex server so it doesn't use a middle server via Plex themselves.
Blurays instead of DVD’s and I don’t share them with anyone.
So maybe sorta yes. I would be a lot easier with DVD’s though. I don’t want to be uploading 40+GB files constantly.
So maybe sorta yes. I would be a lot easier with DVD’s though. I don’t want to be uploading 40+GB files constantly.
Which, of course, includes gifting them. CDs, DVDs, and Video Games used to make really good gifts for certain people, but gifting digital copies of these is becoming harder and harder to do. At least books still exist in physical form, I guess.
One added bonus of having a limited selection to pick from was the quicker decision making time.
With thousands of options via streaming services some of us become paralysed by choice!
With thousands of options via streaming services some of us become paralysed by choice!
Honestly, this is why broadcast tv still has some appeal to me. Give me a handful (which it still is, really, in the UK) of TV shows to choose from, and I'll probably find something to enjoy. Meanwhile, I can browse 'My List' on Netflix for ages, trying to find something among all these unwatched shows I've set aside, and nothing really appeals.
I keep a list of media that I have heard enough good things about in my notes app to prevent this.
great idea!
I think I'll make a reminder list so I can just get siri to add them as I hear about them.
I have a terrible memory but a large ego that doesn't let me admit it so I often forget about recommendations.
I think I'll make a reminder list so I can just get siri to add them as I hear about them.
I have a terrible memory but a large ego that doesn't let me admit it so I often forget about recommendations.
Absolutely. Another less thought of aspect is simply power consumption and hence ecology. Running so many remote servers for movings and shows one already have at home is absurd I find.
I need some automated streaming-service ripper that will burn DVDs whenever I pop in a blank disk. And maybe generate nice sticker label PDFs from some intermediate scene with the title.
Consider instead: a Plex library backed by a “disk drive” that’s actually a DVD/Blu-Ray jukebox. You can fish the disks out if you really want, but most of the time they’re just “online” as part of your library. Buy a new one? Feed it to the jukebox. Ideally, rip one “into the library” and the jukebox will consume a blank disk to burn it, then file it.
(AFAIK, this last bit is how Amazon Glacier works—just with some online disk drives in between to buffer content up into Blu-Ray-sized chunks.)
(AFAIK, this last bit is how Amazon Glacier works—just with some online disk drives in between to buffer content up into Blu-Ray-sized chunks.)
I'd be real surprised if it was anything beyond tape drives, plus a local cache. Check out the storage capacity on the latest LTO tapes, and the tape storage capacities of the large room-size tape robots.
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'Ex libris'! I just picked up a stack of my grandfathers' (he had the same name).
For sure! Assuming anyone still has a method of playing them that is
In this day and age and that day and age, I’ve had friends offer me ripped DVDs or nowadays a single thumb drive with their entire former DVD collection and then some.
>I still don’t actually use our DVDs and Blu-rays all that often. But every time I see them lining the shelves, I feel a bit of comfort. Because when I do need them, they’ll be there.
The importance of that type of redundancy depends on the viewing habits of a particular person. In the case of my friend, the "don’t actually use our DVDs all that often" really was "never re-watched the DVDs she owned". She had a DVD collection with all the X-Files seasons, James Bond movies, etc.
But she inadvertently learned her true viewing habits when Amazon Prime included video streaming for free. She realized she always preferred watching something new on Amazon rather than play an old X-Files DVD.
But what if Netflix and Amazon Prime Video lets their streaming licenses expire for "X-Files" and it's no longer available? Wouldn't that make the X-Files DVDs a great backup?!? It would, if she actually re-watched the X-Files -- but she never did. Owning DVDs was a waste of money for her particular viewing preferences (new stuff instead of reruns) and she was happy to get rid of the clutter.
The importance of that type of redundancy depends on the viewing habits of a particular person. In the case of my friend, the "don’t actually use our DVDs all that often" really was "never re-watched the DVDs she owned". She had a DVD collection with all the X-Files seasons, James Bond movies, etc.
But she inadvertently learned her true viewing habits when Amazon Prime included video streaming for free. She realized she always preferred watching something new on Amazon rather than play an old X-Files DVD.
But what if Netflix and Amazon Prime Video lets their streaming licenses expire for "X-Files" and it's no longer available? Wouldn't that make the X-Files DVDs a great backup?!? It would, if she actually re-watched the X-Files -- but she never did. Owning DVDs was a waste of money for her particular viewing preferences (new stuff instead of reruns) and she was happy to get rid of the clutter.
And there's even a third option:
Rip the DVDs, keep the digital copies somewhere safe, and discard the physical discs.
If you want to ensure that this remains safe, you'll need to both back up and periodically transfer the digital copies to new physical storage devices (in my case, I just upgraded from the ~4-yr-old 4TB HDD that was holding all my media to a new 16TB HDD). This is, however, kind of a necessity in any case; especially for burned DVDs, for instance of home movies, ripping them and storing the media fully digitally with a plan for long-term archival will have much better longevity. Even pressed DVDs don't last forever (especially if they are used sometimes—scratches happen!), and burned DVDs can have a lifetime of less than 5 years in some cases.
Data, however, if properly treated, can be perfectly saved forever. (Well, barring cosmic ray bit-flips, I guess.)
Rip the DVDs, keep the digital copies somewhere safe, and discard the physical discs.
If you want to ensure that this remains safe, you'll need to both back up and periodically transfer the digital copies to new physical storage devices (in my case, I just upgraded from the ~4-yr-old 4TB HDD that was holding all my media to a new 16TB HDD). This is, however, kind of a necessity in any case; especially for burned DVDs, for instance of home movies, ripping them and storing the media fully digitally with a plan for long-term archival will have much better longevity. Even pressed DVDs don't last forever (especially if they are used sometimes—scratches happen!), and burned DVDs can have a lifetime of less than 5 years in some cases.
Data, however, if properly treated, can be perfectly saved forever. (Well, barring cosmic ray bit-flips, I guess.)
I keep the originals in a box. That way if someone finds put I can prove i'm morally right even though the law doesn't allow it.
Me too, I have a few big cd wallets (like 12 by 12 by 6 inches thick) where I put my dvds as I rip them and discard the cases. They don’t take up much room and prove that I own all of the movies I ripped.
I converted them to mid quality mp4s so can keep a copy on a 512gb usb flash drive so I can take my movie collection anywhere I travel.
I converted them to mid quality mp4s so can keep a copy on a 512gb usb flash drive so I can take my movie collection anywhere I travel.
That’s much more work though than just keeping the DVDs in the basement.
It is. It happens to fit my use case better, though—my viewing habits are very impulse-oriented, and the place I keep the media is my Plex library, so I can just fire up a web browser and watch anything I keep in there any time I want, from anywhere in the house. (I could probably set it up to be able to watch it from other places, too, but I'm working from home, so I'm usually there anyway.)
So if I just kept the DVDs, any time I wanted to watch something on one, I would have to:
1) Physically go to where the DVDs are
2) Locate the specific DVD I'm looking for (can be tricky if I'm looking for a specific episode of a show—I might not always remember what season it's from, and the Plex interface makes it pretty easy to scan through)
3) Get the DVD out
4) Go to the living room, where the DVD player is
5) Take exclusive control of the living room, and also bind myself to being there, for the duration of watching it
6) Put it all back when I'm done
So yes: for simple storage, as long as the DVDs you have will last the length of time you want to keep them, and you have enough physical space to keep them in comfortably, just keeping the DVDs is easier. But for actually using them on a regular basis, for places with less available space, for people who expect to be moving frequently (or just soon), and for collections where the longevity of the physical media is in doubt, digitizing is a better way to go.
So if I just kept the DVDs, any time I wanted to watch something on one, I would have to:
1) Physically go to where the DVDs are
2) Locate the specific DVD I'm looking for (can be tricky if I'm looking for a specific episode of a show—I might not always remember what season it's from, and the Plex interface makes it pretty easy to scan through)
3) Get the DVD out
4) Go to the living room, where the DVD player is
5) Take exclusive control of the living room, and also bind myself to being there, for the duration of watching it
6) Put it all back when I'm done
So yes: for simple storage, as long as the DVDs you have will last the length of time you want to keep them, and you have enough physical space to keep them in comfortably, just keeping the DVDs is easier. But for actually using them on a regular basis, for places with less available space, for people who expect to be moving frequently (or just soon), and for collections where the longevity of the physical media is in doubt, digitizing is a better way to go.
only until you move
See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34468436 for how to avoid that problem.
> discard the physical discs.
Donate to the library at least.
> burned DVDs can have a lifetime of less than 5 years in some cases.
My CD-Rs from '97 are in fine shape, thanks.
Donate to the library at least.
> burned DVDs can have a lifetime of less than 5 years in some cases.
My CD-Rs from '97 are in fine shape, thanks.
Sounds like you happened to get a good batch or a good manufacturer.
I had some from around the same time that were becoming unreadable by the mid-2000s.
The point is, you can't count on them lasting unless you specifically go out and buy the archival type.
I had some from around the same time that were becoming unreadable by the mid-2000s.
The point is, you can't count on them lasting unless you specifically go out and buy the archival type.
All of them are still in good shape. We bought good brands, not the cheapest.
How do you know? Are you reading them? If so, you're just exposing them to more of the elements that will degrade them. They were never designed to last forever.
And if you're not reading them regularly, then you'll only find out they've gone bad when it's already too late.
There is a reason why transferring backups to new media is done on the regular by professionals. They know that the only way to make sure the copies are good is to ... well, make copies.
And if you're not reading them regularly, then you'll only find out they've gone bad when it's already too late.
There is a reason why transferring backups to new media is done on the regular by professionals. They know that the only way to make sure the copies are good is to ... well, make copies.
Yes, I took all of them out, played the music discs (some are now in my car), and consolidated the data discs a year or two ago. But it wasn't because the data discs were bad, simply that CDR doesn't have the capacity for today.
One of my old photo/video backups is on 100GB Verbatim Bluray. Don't know about these in the future so I did a parity scan on each of them so errors can be fixed if need be. Also on external HD. Let's check in, in twenty years.
https://imgur.com/a/I7fokrx
One of my old photo/video backups is on 100GB Verbatim Bluray. Don't know about these in the future so I did a parity scan on each of them so errors can be fixed if need be. Also on external HD. Let's check in, in twenty years.
https://imgur.com/a/I7fokrx
Yep, prefer rips to my actual DVDs. If for no other reason the film starts right away. :-)
DVDs, sure. Is it possible to back up or store Blu-Ray media on hard drives?
MakeMKV is the easiest option.
It's possible, but I have concerns with blu-rays.
1. Bluray drives are becoming increasingly rare. Few people are buying them (because many stream) which is slowly killing the market.
2. Blurays tend to be much more finichy with read errors (unfortunately). A little dust or a bad pressed disk and the entire episode is lost :(
3. Blurays aren't being produced. Sure, you can get bluray movies still, but for tv series it's becoming REALLY rare for a bluray to be produced. Funnily, you'll often find DVDs for tv series before blurays (even for brand new shows).
1. Bluray drives are becoming increasingly rare. Few people are buying them (because many stream) which is slowly killing the market.
2. Blurays tend to be much more finichy with read errors (unfortunately). A little dust or a bad pressed disk and the entire episode is lost :(
3. Blurays aren't being produced. Sure, you can get bluray movies still, but for tv series it's becoming REALLY rare for a bluray to be produced. Funnily, you'll often find DVDs for tv series before blurays (even for brand new shows).
Have you noticed yet that playing most blu-rays in a regular player requires an internet connection for encryption purposes?
Touch wood, but I have never, ever needed to do this. I don't know why. Every time I get something from the video library (yes, we still have one) or buy a new movie I'm worried it'll complain about no internet and want to update ...
... but it never has.
... but it never has.
I don't use a bluray player, I use bluray computer drives and rip my media.
Of course.
Looks like maybe, depending on several factors: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RestrictedFormats/BluRayAn...
Who is trying to store DRM'd content locally? If you're ripping your DVDs/BluRays/HDDVDs striping copy protection and that's a solved issue. See AnyDVD HD, MakeMKV, etc.
Also note that page is referencing releases of Ubuntu from 2008. Maybe take it's information with a pinch of salt.
Also note that page is referencing releases of Ubuntu from 2008. Maybe take it's information with a pinch of salt.
Do you have better references on how to rip bluray?
For the BluRay drive itself I have a "Pioneer BDR-XD07TB"[1]. For great compatibility and can do HD/UHD (and DVD obviously).
For a purely Linux way (as you linked to an Ubuntu Page) this[2] is a reasonable guide (giving it a quick skim) using MakeMKV. This should also work on Windows. (Ignore the Haandbrake steps here).
If you're on Windows (or know how to setup a VM with USB passthru for the Bluray drive) and don't mind paying for a license AnyDVD HD[2] is very good.
Both of the above will strip the DRM and leave you with the raw files from the disk (AnyDVDHD also gives the option to make an ISO). You can keep there as a 1:1 backup of the disk or you can further refine.
Without going to a massive rabbit hole and reproducing some (unfortunately private) guides verbatim you have 3 main things you can do from here if you don't want the raw source files.
1. Straight Remuxing: Take the video/audio as is from the `m2ts` container and stick it in an MKV, this won't save you any real space but makes archiving the film alone easier, you'll save some space from extras etc. by deleting the raw source files here. Takes about as long as a copy operation would. You can do this with ffmpeg on the cli in a single command.
2. Audio transcode remuxing. Take the raw video, transcode the audio to something smaller. You use a bunch of tools to strip the Audio[4][5], then transcode it using eac3to, then remux everything[6]. Realistically you've saving maybe a gig here if you're just transcoding the main audio track and dumping the rest. Some time spend recompressing the audio, then remuxing maybe an hour once you know what you're doing. This is usually what you'll see as a "Remux" on the high seas.
3. Compress Audio/Video: This is where you'd use something like Handbrake[7] to recompress the video, you can use the presets and get a watchable file but not the best quality but usually a significant size reduction. You can also tweak a lot of knobs here for excellent quality with little to no visual fidelity loss (a transparent encode) but this will take a lot of time. If you're using a preset you're probably looking at roughly the film's length encoding (more with slower processors). This is usually what you'll see tagged as a "BluRay" release on the high seas.
Obviously this is all for backing up your legitimately owned media in jurisdictions which allow it.
1. https://forum.makemkv.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=19634 2. https://www.howtogeek.com/161498/HOW-TO-BACKUP-YOUR-DVD-AND-... 3. https://www.redfox.bz/en/anydvdhd.html 4. https://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=125966 5. http://haali.net/mkv/ 6. https://mkvtoolnix.download/ 7. https://handbrake.fr/
For a purely Linux way (as you linked to an Ubuntu Page) this[2] is a reasonable guide (giving it a quick skim) using MakeMKV. This should also work on Windows. (Ignore the Haandbrake steps here).
If you're on Windows (or know how to setup a VM with USB passthru for the Bluray drive) and don't mind paying for a license AnyDVD HD[2] is very good.
Both of the above will strip the DRM and leave you with the raw files from the disk (AnyDVDHD also gives the option to make an ISO). You can keep there as a 1:1 backup of the disk or you can further refine.
Without going to a massive rabbit hole and reproducing some (unfortunately private) guides verbatim you have 3 main things you can do from here if you don't want the raw source files.
1. Straight Remuxing: Take the video/audio as is from the `m2ts` container and stick it in an MKV, this won't save you any real space but makes archiving the film alone easier, you'll save some space from extras etc. by deleting the raw source files here. Takes about as long as a copy operation would. You can do this with ffmpeg on the cli in a single command.
2. Audio transcode remuxing. Take the raw video, transcode the audio to something smaller. You use a bunch of tools to strip the Audio[4][5], then transcode it using eac3to, then remux everything[6]. Realistically you've saving maybe a gig here if you're just transcoding the main audio track and dumping the rest. Some time spend recompressing the audio, then remuxing maybe an hour once you know what you're doing. This is usually what you'll see as a "Remux" on the high seas.
3. Compress Audio/Video: This is where you'd use something like Handbrake[7] to recompress the video, you can use the presets and get a watchable file but not the best quality but usually a significant size reduction. You can also tweak a lot of knobs here for excellent quality with little to no visual fidelity loss (a transparent encode) but this will take a lot of time. If you're using a preset you're probably looking at roughly the film's length encoding (more with slower processors). This is usually what you'll see tagged as a "BluRay" release on the high seas.
Obviously this is all for backing up your legitimately owned media in jurisdictions which allow it.
1. https://forum.makemkv.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=19634 2. https://www.howtogeek.com/161498/HOW-TO-BACKUP-YOUR-DVD-AND-... 3. https://www.redfox.bz/en/anydvdhd.html 4. https://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=125966 5. http://haali.net/mkv/ 6. https://mkvtoolnix.download/ 7. https://handbrake.fr/
Thanks! That's really helpful.
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This is my same conclusion. With books, movies, series and music I like to own physically only my personal favorites that I know will use many times. But that’s less than 10% of my media consumption.
> With books, movies, series and music I like to own physically only my personal favorites that I know will use many times.
I don't own many DVDs, but when I see them in my bookshelf they remind of the story the tell, the context when I watched them, and my theories about society, sci-fi, and utopias that those movies inspired.
With books it's even more extreme. I get the physical copy sometimes more to have a physical representation of an idea than to read the book.
I don't own many DVDs, but when I see them in my bookshelf they remind of the story the tell, the context when I watched them, and my theories about society, sci-fi, and utopias that those movies inspired.
With books it's even more extreme. I get the physical copy sometimes more to have a physical representation of an idea than to read the book.
I have books I've never opened since I read them that is just a marker like that. I have one copy I've never opened: I read it as an e-book but got the physical copy just to complete my set and have it on my shelf.
I also have books I've suddenly taken down to reference 20+ years after I read it, and where the text was not online, so I also like to have physical copies of books where the idea mattered because I know that some day I'll want to pass that idea on and will need a refresher.
I also have books I've suddenly taken down to reference 20+ years after I read it, and where the text was not online, so I also like to have physical copies of books where the idea mattered because I know that some day I'll want to pass that idea on and will need a refresher.
Like a... Antilibrary
> But what if Netflix and Amazon Prime Video lets their streaming licenses expire for "X-Files" and it's no longer available? Wouldn't that make the X-Files DVDs a great backup?!? It would, if she actually re-watched the X-Files -- but she never did.
The problem is that the future is uncertain. It's always possible that she might want to rewatch the X-Files at some point, even if she never actually does.
The problem is that the future is uncertain. It's always possible that she might want to rewatch the X-Files at some point, even if she never actually does.
> … the future is uncertain. It's always possible that she might want to … even if she never actually does.
True, although …
"Difficulty discarding possessions is characterized by a perceived need to save items and distress associated with discarding them. Accumulation of possessions can result in living spaces becoming cluttered to the point that their use or safety is compromised. Compulsive hoarding is recognized by the eleventh revision of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-11) and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th edition (DSM-5)."
True, although …
"Difficulty discarding possessions is characterized by a perceived need to save items and distress associated with discarding them. Accumulation of possessions can result in living spaces becoming cluttered to the point that their use or safety is compromised. Compulsive hoarding is recognized by the eleventh revision of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-11) and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th edition (DSM-5)."
Don’t read too much into the DSM definitions. There’s an (often explicit) caveat that they apply iff the condition distresses the patient or seriously affects their life.
It’s healthy to hang onto a few ratty t-shirts because you might need them to mow the lawn or because they remind you of good times; you can even be a bit bummed when you eventually do throw them out. It’s compulsive hoarding when you do it even though it seriously bothers you or turns your place into a death trap.
It’s healthy to hang onto a few ratty t-shirts because you might need them to mow the lawn or because they remind you of good times; you can even be a bit bummed when you eventually do throw them out. It’s compulsive hoarding when you do it even though it seriously bothers you or turns your place into a death trap.
Or, she might recommend that someone else watch them. If they are no longer on streaming services, she could loan them her DVDs. It is either that or pirate them.
There is absolutely no way to have so much that you will never want something you don’t have.
Pirate bay is that backup option, at least for me. To use your example of the X-Files, you can currently download a 75 GB torrent with every season + extras and it will only take a few hours.
I think people continue seeding torrents for longer than DVDs reliably last.
I think people continue seeding torrents for longer than DVDs reliably last.
Someone has to have it on DVD/BD first for it to get on the Pirate Bay.
That's not true, as the entire categories of releases titled WEB-DL and WEBRip demonstrate.
I've never understood the appeal of downloading pirate movies.
Feels dodgy, always a hassle trying to fight your way through all the scams and malware and porn and when you get the movie it's of questionable quality.
If I buy a DVD then I get perfect quality in a nice case in a day or two without having to visit the seedy red light district of the Internet only to get dud contraband.
Feels dodgy, always a hassle trying to fight your way through all the scams and malware and porn and when you get the movie it's of questionable quality.
If I buy a DVD then I get perfect quality in a nice case in a day or two without having to visit the seedy red light district of the Internet only to get dud contraband.
None of those apply if you put a modicum of effort into it, and then you get access to almost all media in human history unencumbered by the copyright "people". Without having shelves filled with plastic crap.
>I've never understood the appeal of downloading pirate movies.
Oh, that's easy! You want to see <movie>, so you search for "<movie> 1080p" (or better) and after a few minutes you have it on your PC and can watch it 1,000 of times if you want; even when offline (!). It's also free. This is why people like pirate movies.
>in a day or two ...
LOL
Oh, that's easy! You want to see <movie>, so you search for "<movie> 1080p" (or better) and after a few minutes you have it on your PC and can watch it 1,000 of times if you want; even when offline (!). It's also free. This is why people like pirate movies.
>in a day or two ...
LOL
The only reason you see scams, malware and porn is because you don't have an adblocker. Install uBlock Origin. It's mandatory not just for pirating, but even for normal browsing.
It does take a but of time to spot fakes, and you need to give the community time to aggregate good content and weed out the fakes, but it's definitely not the experience you describe. It sounds like you last tried a decade or two ago.
It does take a but of time to spot fakes, and you need to give the community time to aggregate good content and weed out the fakes, but it's definitely not the experience you describe. It sounds like you last tried a decade or two ago.
Or you live outside of USA and there is no store that has X files dvds. Also no streaming service offers that here. Also due to copyright and region locking, I cannot import them from USA.
But somehow if I pirate that, i cause them 'damage'.
Luckily on most sites, pirated videos have keywords in filename (720p, 1080p, 4k,... x264, x265,... ) so you can see the quality and choose what filetype you want/need.
But somehow if I pirate that, i cause them 'damage'.
Luckily on most sites, pirated videos have keywords in filename (720p, 1080p, 4k,... x264, x265,... ) so you can see the quality and choose what filetype you want/need.
> Feels dodgy, always a hassle trying to fight your way through all the scams and malware and porn and when you get the movie it's of questionable quality.
Its actually really easy, it only takes seconds to get the right torrent going. I've never accidentally torrented anything I didn't intend to.
Its actually really easy, it only takes seconds to get the right torrent going. I've never accidentally torrented anything I didn't intend to.
I'm not sure of what are you exactly picturing in your mind about how the experience is of downloading a pirated movie. But opening up the qBittorrent application in your PC or Mac, clicking on the "search" tab, and writing "Pirates of the Caribbean", doesn't feel at all as interesting and creepy as walking at night through the red lights district of amsterdam. That'd be awesome!
Literally none of these things are true.
Get a seedbox, set up sonarr [0] and radarr [1]. Use Plex, or even better, Jellyfin [2] for streaming.
Takes about 1.5 hours to set up - you now have a Netflix-like UI with an easy option of requesting TV Shows and Movies from a nice UX.
You can get any media in any quality you want, without ever stepping into any red light district.
[0] https://sonarr.tv/ [1] https://radarr.video/ [2] https://jellyfin.org/
Takes about 1.5 hours to set up - you now have a Netflix-like UI with an easy option of requesting TV Shows and Movies from a nice UX.
You can get any media in any quality you want, without ever stepping into any red light district.
[0] https://sonarr.tv/ [1] https://radarr.video/ [2] https://jellyfin.org/
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they do a great job at compressing and encoding.
I'll buy the bluray/dvd, then download the torrent for the movie to put into Plex. Like a backup, but MUCH better and easier on the size than I would be able to do myself.
I'll buy the bluray/dvd, then download the torrent for the movie to put into Plex. Like a backup, but MUCH better and easier on the size than I would be able to do myself.
Private trackers solve all of those problems.
I rarely get DVDs any more, for much that reason, but I'm just finishing up stripping the liners and archiving the last of ~1000 DVD's I bought over the years. They now take up one and a half shelf in a book case.
In terms of cost, it wasn't a waste of money to me: I spent the money to watch them that once. With a few exceptions I never bought with the expectation of rewatching in mind. That was a nice bonus. And now I have an archival copy, and while there are many I haven't rewatched, there are are plenty I have, and some I've rewatched many times, and it wasn't always predictable ahead of time. There are series I loved a lot I never rewatched, and movies I didn't know I'd like that I've rewatched half a dozen times.
These days, I don't buy if it's something really mainstream, but I still buy if it's a bit more niche and something I consider might not always remain available. Quite a lot of the DVD's I have are of things that are not available on the streaming services I have.
But separate to all of this, even for a lot of the movies people might never watch again, don't underestimate the value of that feeling of comfort to a lot of people, and the value of the physical artefact as a memento.
In terms of cost, it wasn't a waste of money to me: I spent the money to watch them that once. With a few exceptions I never bought with the expectation of rewatching in mind. That was a nice bonus. And now I have an archival copy, and while there are many I haven't rewatched, there are are plenty I have, and some I've rewatched many times, and it wasn't always predictable ahead of time. There are series I loved a lot I never rewatched, and movies I didn't know I'd like that I've rewatched half a dozen times.
These days, I don't buy if it's something really mainstream, but I still buy if it's a bit more niche and something I consider might not always remain available. Quite a lot of the DVD's I have are of things that are not available on the streaming services I have.
But separate to all of this, even for a lot of the movies people might never watch again, don't underestimate the value of that feeling of comfort to a lot of people, and the value of the physical artefact as a memento.
I thought the layers separate and they are not a good long-term storage medium. Aren't DVDs supposed to decompose after some time? Or is that only true for CDs?
I'd rip them and put them on new hard disks from time to time. AFAIK, that's the best long-term storage strategy for most people.
I'd rip them and put them on new hard disks from time to time. AFAIK, that's the best long-term storage strategy for most people.
I'd be curious in a few years. I don't watch old things anymore and keep consuming youtube stuff, but honestly I don't like it anymore. It's not the same somehow.
ps: I just bought a dvd from CL
ps: I just bought a dvd from CL
Like others, I don't rely on the streamed content being available in the future, so I hoard content.
I wrote a Python app that runs on a Raspberry Pi that continually plays the content that I have accrued. Some of the content I schedule, other content is random.
It just runs on a downstairs TV. I enjoy accidentally catching some old film, or a musical or something I pulled down from YouTube of a guy making furniture....
I wrote a Python app that runs on a Raspberry Pi that continually plays the content that I have accrued. Some of the content I schedule, other content is random.
It just runs on a downstairs TV. I enjoy accidentally catching some old film, or a musical or something I pulled down from YouTube of a guy making furniture....
brilliant
This is why I don't have a DVD/BD player and only use streaming services. I almost never watch the same movie more than once.
Me neither, but there are some exceptions. The original Star Wars trilogy, LOTR, Dune, ...
My wife loves Harry Potter.
So we got these ripped. We ditched her DVD collection after ripping everything. Legal copies, saving space. Don't even think we brought them to some second hand store.
My wife loves Harry Potter.
So we got these ripped. We ditched her DVD collection after ripping everything. Legal copies, saving space. Don't even think we brought them to some second hand store.
IANAL but I don’t think your rips would be legal if you gave the discs to a second hand store or any other person.
Circumvention clause of the DMCA probably makes DVD rips illegal in the US, even if you keep your original copy and don’t otherwise violate copyright law.
Circumvention clause of the DMCA probably makes DVD rips illegal in the US, even if you keep your original copy and don’t otherwise violate copyright law.
In The Netherlands, yes I am quite sure they are legal copies. They'd been even legal copies if you rented them and made a copy. You don't need to own the original, all you need is that the source was both legal and legally in your possession. You're then allowed to make a copy of it for private use. You're not allowed to distribute it further, you don't have a license for that.
My US ex did the same. She'd rent Netflix DVDs, rip them, and bring them back. Tho that was a long time ago as Netflix DVDs suggests (2005).
Furthermore, I do not feel morally bad about the practice, and the chance of getting into legal trouble with such (if it were illegal) is so small that I simply wouldn't care. You'd have to face a civil court, and how would any party know about your collection if you keep it private?
My US ex did the same. She'd rent Netflix DVDs, rip them, and bring them back. Tho that was a long time ago as Netflix DVDs suggests (2005).
Furthermore, I do not feel morally bad about the practice, and the chance of getting into legal trouble with such (if it were illegal) is so small that I simply wouldn't care. You'd have to face a civil court, and how would any party know about your collection if you keep it private?
Fair, I should have said my comments were US-specific.
I'll rewatch when it's been long enough that I have mostly forgotten what happened. Not at all worth keeping DVDs around for that.
Same type. It's urgggg feeling to re-watch a movie. I can say that I never, but I don't remember exactly so almost never is accurate.
Not just DVD's but also music CD's. Plenty of music from the 1960's through early 2000's is no longer online for either contractual disputes, or cultural cancellation and other reasons I have yet to figure out. I assume some of this transition must be the cost issues of producing physical CD's vs. delivering online or renting the music online. When it is only available as a stream online I call it renting and every day that passes there is a risk that some of the music vanishes.
When I moved I compressed my CD collection down from their hard cases to soft cases and kept all the inserts in one of the old hard-case bags minus the hard case plastic holders and I have no regrets.
I assume there may be a similar risk in renting e-Books online vs. having a non-DRM copy of it.
When I moved I compressed my CD collection down from their hard cases to soft cases and kept all the inserts in one of the old hard-case bags minus the hard case plastic holders and I have no regrets.
I assume there may be a similar risk in renting e-Books online vs. having a non-DRM copy of it.
A friend of mine refuses streaming. He buys CDs in bulk from the flea market and rips them to FLAC.
I was just thinking of doing the same for my collection in the attic, assuming the CDs have survived a couple thousand freeze/thaw cycles. :)
I like the idea of ditching the hard cases for space.
I was just thinking of doing the same for my collection in the attic, assuming the CDs have survived a couple thousand freeze/thaw cycles. :)
I like the idea of ditching the hard cases for space.
Yup, I do the same, and can recommend it.
You get the benefits of both physical media, and convenience of soft storage availability. That music is mine, and can never be sold to me again.
In case some might be wondering what the "benefits" of physical media are; it's my belief that having to _commit_ to listening to a CD (not being able to flick through different albums and artists easily on Spotify, as the whim comes) is psychologically sound, and the alternative is damaging.
This goes for films too. Those old enough to remember renting DVDs — or even VHS! — may remember the excitement of getting that film back to their place to watch. The whole thing was an experience, and whether the film was good or bad, you had a good time with whoever you were with, because you had an _experience_. More often than not though, you enjoyed the film, because you wanted to. You invested, so it was worth more to you.
Actually this is more than "my belief", but I can't be bothered to find the research.
You get the benefits of both physical media, and convenience of soft storage availability. That music is mine, and can never be sold to me again.
In case some might be wondering what the "benefits" of physical media are; it's my belief that having to _commit_ to listening to a CD (not being able to flick through different albums and artists easily on Spotify, as the whim comes) is psychologically sound, and the alternative is damaging.
This goes for films too. Those old enough to remember renting DVDs — or even VHS! — may remember the excitement of getting that film back to their place to watch. The whole thing was an experience, and whether the film was good or bad, you had a good time with whoever you were with, because you had an _experience_. More often than not though, you enjoyed the film, because you wanted to. You invested, so it was worth more to you.
Actually this is more than "my belief", but I can't be bothered to find the research.
My personal best example of this is tape-trading (which were mostly CD-Rs, but whatever) underground metal back in the '90s. The sheer amount of work it took to find people to trade with, burn the music, send it through the mail and, best of all, get their package in return made it seem so significant. And it was the best way to find out about new bands. Even bands that eventually became huge, like Metallica after they changed their sound, built their initial fanbase via the trading scene.
I went the other way… back in the day, I ripped my ~400 cds to MP3’s. I still have them on my file server hard drive, but am happy paying Spotify $10/month for the convenience of having access to pretty much any album I want on any device, so I haven’t listened to my own MP3s in years.
I thought by now I’d be doing the same thing with movies, but obviously that hasn’t happened.
I thought by now I’d be doing the same thing with movies, but obviously that hasn’t happened.
I did the same thing with DVDs, Blurays and CDs. Everything got pulled out of the hardcase unless the hardcase was a special design or unique in some way. Kept the inserts for each media type in a couple of small shoebox sized storage boxes, put each disc in to a soft sleeve that I bought in bulk for about two cents each, and then put all that into two banker's boxes. Reduced from eight or nine banker's boxes to nothing at all. The digital contents are stored on my local server and I can stream it to any local device or over the internet to my laptop or phone.
I know it doesn’t replace old recordings, but moving forward there is a lot of great music on Bandcamp, usually available to download in several lossless formats like wav and flac.
Same here, although I no longer have a CD player which is kinda worrying. On my TODO list to convert them all to lossless FLAC or something to replace my previously more conservative lossy settings from when $/GB was far greater. Bookmarked the article posted on HN the other day about doing this in a reliable way.
The other thing about music is it has a far higher re-play value than Film/TV... some specific albums I've listened to thousands of times, and there is simply no way I would rely on some streaming service for that. I'm not sure what the younger generations do for their favourites... or maybe it's not like that any-more, maybe their music is more ephemeral and "trending". Pretty much all of my music with replay value is from way before 2000, back to 80s - I'm not even that old.
The other thing about music is it has a far higher re-play value than Film/TV... some specific albums I've listened to thousands of times, and there is simply no way I would rely on some streaming service for that. I'm not sure what the younger generations do for their favourites... or maybe it's not like that any-more, maybe their music is more ephemeral and "trending". Pretty much all of my music with replay value is from way before 2000, back to 80s - I'm not even that old.
Has this with an album recently. Released in 2012, one day it was just gone from all streaming services.
It's just nice to pop a good CD into a nice CD player and play the whole thing. Also, despite what some people may claim, there can be huge variations in sound quality between different DACs and their associated output stages, whether or not the DAC happens to be inside a CD player, your computer, or an outboard USB device and this can easily be measured and heard by people who know the program material well.
Many people think the best sounding DACs are the multibit jobbers from Philips which haven't even been made in thirty+ years.
Many people think the best sounding DACs are the multibit jobbers from Philips which haven't even been made in thirty+ years.
Beautifully done CD and vinyl packaging is worth keeping physically even if they're sitting on the shelf 99% of their lifetime.
Alternatively consider reducing your addiction to television/movies and stop worrying about where your next fix is coming from. In the golden era of piracy I used to be a huge media pack rat spending hours a day obtaining more media to stash away. One day my ZFS array puked and I lost almost everything. I wasn't even upset. It was a blessing in disguise to be liberated from caring about hoarding media. Never seeing your favorite television/movies again is going to have almost zero impact on your life. It's not worth wasting much of your time and money on.
I have terabytes of movies and series. I've spent like 1 hour in the past 12 months adding some stuff to my collection. HDD space is extremely cheap and keeping a local copy is such low effort that I don't see why I should get rid of my collection. Some of it is also so rare as to be impossible to find unless you're a member of some private sharing sites (try finding a complete archive of Jon Stewart on The Daily Show).
I've also lost terabytes of shows/movies before and wasn't affected by it at all. Shit happens. But I prefer having high quality copies immediately available. I've had a complete rip of the animated show "Hey, Arnold!" for like 3 years and only just started watching the whole thing now, and I'm thankful to my past self for giving me such convenient access to something I enjoyed so much as a kid.
I've also lost terabytes of shows/movies before and wasn't affected by it at all. Shit happens. But I prefer having high quality copies immediately available. I've had a complete rip of the animated show "Hey, Arnold!" for like 3 years and only just started watching the whole thing now, and I'm thankful to my past self for giving me such convenient access to something I enjoyed so much as a kid.
If you're able to horde in a healthy way it's no problem. I just think for a lot of people it tends to become an unhealthy obsession of relying on obtaining media to self medicate. Chasing the dragon trying to obtain more and more media. Then ultimately facing the disappointment when it doesn't provide the dopamine fix or childhood nostalgia you're hoping for. I vividly remember the terrible feeling of opening up Plex with countless terabytes of data and realizing nothing here is going to actually make me feel better. Media is a powerful stimulant and I've reached the conclusion for myself at least it has to be used in moderation.
There's a difference between moderation and abstinence, no? If I notice there's nothing I want to watch in my collection or online, I start to ask myself why that is and what unfulfilled needs might be the cause. Then I know I need to deal with that somehow instead of trying to distract myself with a movie.
Our brains prioritize looking for fixes more than enjoying them. It's the same for most collections, or modding Skyrim.
>One day my ZFS array puked
How does that happen? No redundancy?
How does that happen? No redundancy?
Totally self inflicted. I was using a beta version of OpenZFS on a beta version of OSX. Begging for problems and I finally found one. Maybe I was subconsciously looking for an off-ramp of the burden of managing my horde of data. All my personal data was backed up so I just restored that and let the media horde go.
Her husband ian't right about dvds, the government is wrong about how they are regulating streaming services. The government needs to enforce reasonable content licencing across all the services like they did with music and radio stations decades ago so all content is on all services and the services start competing on vectors that actually matter to consumers like interface design and fast content delivery networks.
It's crazy that you can go to a grocery store as distribution aggregator and buy any type and brand of food in one place.
You should have to go to a Kellog's store or a Quaker store depending what you want to eat next week.
At least, that's what studios and labels think.
You should have to go to a Kellog's store or a Quaker store depending what you want to eat next week.
At least, that's what studios and labels think.
If food was infinitely replicable at basically no cost, you’d only be allowed to eat your cereals at the respective store.
Like a restaurant almost.
You're implying that piracy was killing media markets until physical copies were replaced with streaming, but hasn't that been debunked?
No, I’m saying that food companies would act like media companies do if food was trivially replicable, and therefore the fact that they currently don’t is not an argument for anything.
Retail exclusives including in grocery do exist. They are rare and limited to "high end" brands that are normally low volume, but there are things that I can buy at a Kroger that Walmart does not sell, and things I can buy at a Walmart that Kroger does not sell.
There have been disputes between food brands and UK supermarkets recently that resulted in specific products being unavailable in specific supermarkets.
Radio and streaming isn't equivalent though, streaming is the end product, radio was basically advertising for the music.
We live in pretty much the golden age of content where more is produced than ever before and more is being spent on it than ever before I cannot see how what you're proposing doesn't end up with a decline in both of those things because there would no longer be competition in content.
We live in pretty much the golden age of content where more is produced than ever before and more is being spent on it than ever before I cannot see how what you're proposing doesn't end up with a decline in both of those things because there would no longer be competition in content.
That would only make her husband wrong if it was reasonable to plan on the government being right (even eventually) about streaming. It's not.
I get the point the author is making but keeping all the DVDs also isn't the answer IMHO. At least it wasn't for me, it was just annoying to find a place to store it all, to move it when we moved country would have cost money for basically nothing of value.
I had a purge of pretty much all my physical media a bit over a decade ago. I had a little over 1000 DVDs and Blu-rays. Probably 200 VHS too. God knows how many CDs and tapes.
Rather than ditch them and say "I will just use streaming to watch/listen when I want to" which is very naive IMHO I ripped them all to hard disks and archived them to some LTO tapes I had. Granted not everyone has access to this kind of equipment but these days there are other options anyway. I don't use LTO anymore.
Today I have full access to my entire movie, music, photo, and software collection near instantly from my NAS. Some stuff isn't online (as in not powered up) as it would just be a waste of power but I can switch it on if I ever feel the need to watch something I haven't watched in two decades but don't want to delete forever :)
I have some redundancy via RAID as well as on site/offline duplication should something really go wrong. Plus I have an off site backup. It isn't actually as much space as you would think even for a pretty huge number of movies as old stuff is pretty small. It is only recently with 4K HDR movies that we are looking at ~90GB for some movies. Storage isn't very expensive these days. When I did a quick comparison a while back I worked out it was less for the HDDs than it was to ship them all from one country to another let alone the non-quantifiable cost of my time packing, moving, unpacking, and physical storage space.
Ideally I would share the cost with others as it is kinda stupid for there to be multiple copies of the same movies and TV shows for no reason but sadly there isn't a solution for this and with the copyright laws and all that it is unlikely there ever will be something as reliable as doing it yourself.
I had a purge of pretty much all my physical media a bit over a decade ago. I had a little over 1000 DVDs and Blu-rays. Probably 200 VHS too. God knows how many CDs and tapes.
Rather than ditch them and say "I will just use streaming to watch/listen when I want to" which is very naive IMHO I ripped them all to hard disks and archived them to some LTO tapes I had. Granted not everyone has access to this kind of equipment but these days there are other options anyway. I don't use LTO anymore.
Today I have full access to my entire movie, music, photo, and software collection near instantly from my NAS. Some stuff isn't online (as in not powered up) as it would just be a waste of power but I can switch it on if I ever feel the need to watch something I haven't watched in two decades but don't want to delete forever :)
I have some redundancy via RAID as well as on site/offline duplication should something really go wrong. Plus I have an off site backup. It isn't actually as much space as you would think even for a pretty huge number of movies as old stuff is pretty small. It is only recently with 4K HDR movies that we are looking at ~90GB for some movies. Storage isn't very expensive these days. When I did a quick comparison a while back I worked out it was less for the HDDs than it was to ship them all from one country to another let alone the non-quantifiable cost of my time packing, moving, unpacking, and physical storage space.
Ideally I would share the cost with others as it is kinda stupid for there to be multiple copies of the same movies and TV shows for no reason but sadly there isn't a solution for this and with the copyright laws and all that it is unlikely there ever will be something as reliable as doing it yourself.
You can store them in CD wallets like this one: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/388541-REG/Case_Logic...
I have ~1500 DVDs stored that way in less than a meter of shelf space.
I have ~1500 DVDs stored that way in less than a meter of shelf space.
That is a good compromise however most people I know that collect physical media like to keep the whole package not just the disc in a wallet like that. It is a good alternative to mine though and a lot cheaper :D
This may be space saving, but not a recommended way to store discs for long periods.
Why? They are stored vertically, same orientation as in a DVD case on a bookshelf.
I recently migrated my disc collection from cases. Initially I got binder pages like you linked, but I returned them and got paper sleeves instead, because (1) paper cases are cheaper and more compact, and (2) when I put discs in binders, they rub against the (admittedly soft) backing material, whereas when I put them in paper sleeves, I naturally hold the sleeve such that the discs don’t rub the sleeve when being inserted, and that seems a bit safer.
I do still use a binder for the papers from the cases.
I do still use a binder for the papers from the cases.
If only there were some way to download anything you wanted even if it was never released on DVD or Blu-ray and isn't on streaming anymore....
I think public discussion has moved beyond making people aware of illegal copying / streaming, and how to do it. So the people who don't engage in that probably have their reasons.
If you're trying to move some readers to start doing that, you'll probably need to engage with their reasons.
If you're trying to move some readers to start doing that, you'll probably need to engage with their reasons.
If you're alluding to torrents, it's common that obscure stuff is not being seeded.
Private trackers and usenet generally don't suffer from this issue but it requires a few hours of work upfront, less if you know someone who can help you.
I think you need to go pretty niche before it's not available on even public torrents. Everything mentioned in this article is.
What's the point of seeding content on public trackers?
So if it was never released on DVD or Blu-ray, then where did the source for the torrents come from? If I saw a file with the name of something I knew wasn't available on a shiny round disc, I would be very skeptical and hesitant to download it from fear of it not being what it said it was.
I damn sure don't want to go to the hassle of downloading a VHS transfer
I damn sure don't want to go to the hassle of downloading a VHS transfer
If a VHS transfer is the only way to re-experience something that blew me away as kid, you bet I'll be happier with a VHS transfer than with nothing at all.
Not everything needs to be pixel-perfect.
Not everything needs to be pixel-perfect.
What's really nice are the heroes who take those VHS transfers and SD DVD copies and release AI-upscaled versions. Particularly cartoons that never had blu-ray releases look glorious upscaled.
On YouTube, been watching Siskel and Ebert reviews that are clearly VHS transfers. It works. I'm just watching to enjoy their banter and queue up some films I missed from the 80's and 90's.
For example Final Space got cancelled and while the last season was available on streaming services the physical copy hadn't been released and was also cancelled. (So it is a webrip, got pulled from streaming services)
> So if it was never released on DVD or Blu-ray, then where did the source for the torrents come from?
If it's something old without a DVD/BluRay release these will usually be a WEBRip (literally a screen recording of DRM'd content) or a WEB-DL (someone has cracked the DRM, or it was DRM free).
You'll only find VHS rips on highly specialized trackers (usually).
If it's something old without a DVD/BluRay release these will usually be a WEBRip (literally a screen recording of DRM'd content) or a WEB-DL (someone has cracked the DRM, or it was DRM free).
You'll only find VHS rips on highly specialized trackers (usually).
> downloading a VHS transfer
you kids with your universal formats; we used to have to make camera copies to watch PAL shows on NTSC...
you kids with your universal formats; we used to have to make camera copies to watch PAL shows on NTSC...
You remember when pirate copies were literally some guy with a camcorder in a cinema? Sometimes you'd get unlucky and the guy had to turn it off because the usher was coming, and you'd miss a random chunk of the film :)
"Good" times.
"Good" times.
From its streaming service when it premiered. A LOT of TV has come out on streaming but has never been physically published. A majority of it, I'd guess.
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Availability and ownership aside, Blu-ray is far better quality than what you’ll get on most streaming services. If I really care about a movie or show, I always get it on Blu-ray.
That said, if they could shift 1080 BDs down to DVD pricing and UHD BD down to what BD costs now I would buy a lot more. I’m starting to build up a collection of UHD Blu-rays but Jesus, £20-30 per movie really adds up. Definitely paying the enthusiast tax there.
That said, if they could shift 1080 BDs down to DVD pricing and UHD BD down to what BD costs now I would buy a lot more. I’m starting to build up a collection of UHD Blu-rays but Jesus, £20-30 per movie really adds up. Definitely paying the enthusiast tax there.
1080p Blu-rays are very often single-digit dollars, at least here in the US. UHD does come with a higher price point, especially for new releases; it goes down, but it can take many months for it to do so.
I started buying UHDs (mostly Criterions) recently. I mostly don’t like owning too many things (and even buy most of my 4Ks on iTunes when they go on sale for $5) but for some films the extra quality is worth it (plus you can’t get the Criterions films in 4K anywhere else, and I like having the access to the features).
I always am wondering if I’ll regret it in 10 years when you may be able to stream super high bitrates, but as always, the future is uncertain anyways.
I always am wondering if I’ll regret it in 10 years when you may be able to stream super high bitrates, but as always, the future is uncertain anyways.
We learned after the Universal fire that many Blu-Rays are just high quality rips of Laserdiscs.
[deleted]
I'm a very happy Apple Music subscriber, but I'm also 52 and so own thousands of CDs and hundreds of LPs.
I subscribed to AM for a possibly non-intuitive reason: for me, the "all you can eat" aspect is secondary. The driver was "stop syncing my phone." My library is too large to carry on my main computer, so the "music computer" had to be the one running iTunes and whatnot. Getting something new on there was a hassle, and couldn't be done on the move.
Moreover, while this scenario made sense to ME, my wife found it so off-putting that I discovered she was just not listening to music on her phone at all.
AM solved this problem pretty well. PLUS, AM has a feature where it will give you access via Apple Music to weird, indie, or out of print stuff in your library that might not exist in Apple Music's library.
A case in point is the 1990 Wendy & Lisa record Eroica. It's one of my favorites, and has always been part of my library -- it's even been re-ripped, because the first time I digitized it I only used 128Kbps MP3, and I wanted it at 256Kbps AAC. But it's also 100% not available via any streaming service because of rights issues of some kind.
YOU can't get it from Apple Music, but I can because Apple Music sees it in the library on my music server. That's pretty cool.
I subscribed to AM for a possibly non-intuitive reason: for me, the "all you can eat" aspect is secondary. The driver was "stop syncing my phone." My library is too large to carry on my main computer, so the "music computer" had to be the one running iTunes and whatnot. Getting something new on there was a hassle, and couldn't be done on the move.
Moreover, while this scenario made sense to ME, my wife found it so off-putting that I discovered she was just not listening to music on her phone at all.
AM solved this problem pretty well. PLUS, AM has a feature where it will give you access via Apple Music to weird, indie, or out of print stuff in your library that might not exist in Apple Music's library.
A case in point is the 1990 Wendy & Lisa record Eroica. It's one of my favorites, and has always been part of my library -- it's even been re-ripped, because the first time I digitized it I only used 128Kbps MP3, and I wanted it at 256Kbps AAC. But it's also 100% not available via any streaming service because of rights issues of some kind.
YOU can't get it from Apple Music, but I can because Apple Music sees it in the library on my music server. That's pretty cool.
Interesting. Do you know if this extends to basically all digitized music regardless of the specifics of artist/label streaming preferences? Eg King Crimson’s catalog was never added to Spotify, if I link my ripped CDs to AM, would it make it available for me to stream on my phone?
I believe, yes. I have various live versions of albums that have been ripped from streams and radio, Apple tries to match them to their library to save space and then just lets you wifi sync them. Shows up right next to the other music in your library.
The feature is called iTunes Match- you can actually get it standalone from Apple Music (at least you could, not sure if they have changed anything recently,) but AM includes it:
Links:
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204146 https://discussions.apple.com/thread/253762018#:~:text=Yes%2....
Links:
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204146 https://discussions.apple.com/thread/253762018#:~:text=Yes%2....
Yes. Indie stuff given to me on CD-R and ripped to my iTunes library is available to me via Apple Music, which I think would be the acid test.
YouTube Music also has this adding your own files feature.
I miss Google Play Music: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Play_Music
Looks similar to YouTube Music, from what I can see on the screenshots. What is there that you miss about it?
Google Play Music didn't commingle your uploaded music with YouTube, and their discovery algorithm was much better.
Piracy. This is why piracy is great. Its a tiny digital collection of all the things I care about.
Story time: I was watching Star Trek Voyager. That show is obviously a lot of episodes. So sometime around season 5 it was removed from Netflix. Got pissed, downloaded it, kept watching.
Was recently watching benjamin buttons first time on amazon. Didn't get to finish it that day. Turns out the next day it goes for cash only.
Piracy is honestly the simplest and most consistent way to do this. And if a friend wants it? Bring a USB and it is yours. Sure teeeeechnically we can both watch it, but how often do I re-watch a movie that my friend is currently also watching at home.
Point is that I really hate the current distribution models.
Down side of DVDs is that they degrade.
And to be completely truthful, if everything older than say... 15 years was available in the public domain, we can stop all this wasteful redundant storage everywhere. But due to copyright laws, things so so so old, that they shouldn't be making money anymore continue to be behind "pay walls" of sorts and only because they are protecting a distribution model that hasn't been necessary in over a decade.
Story time: I was watching Star Trek Voyager. That show is obviously a lot of episodes. So sometime around season 5 it was removed from Netflix. Got pissed, downloaded it, kept watching.
Was recently watching benjamin buttons first time on amazon. Didn't get to finish it that day. Turns out the next day it goes for cash only.
Piracy is honestly the simplest and most consistent way to do this. And if a friend wants it? Bring a USB and it is yours. Sure teeeeechnically we can both watch it, but how often do I re-watch a movie that my friend is currently also watching at home.
Point is that I really hate the current distribution models.
Down side of DVDs is that they degrade.
And to be completely truthful, if everything older than say... 15 years was available in the public domain, we can stop all this wasteful redundant storage everywhere. But due to copyright laws, things so so so old, that they shouldn't be making money anymore continue to be behind "pay walls" of sorts and only because they are protecting a distribution model that hasn't been necessary in over a decade.
Years ago, I stupidly got rid of my entire South Park DVD collection because they were on Netflix. Until they eventually weren’t. Chris was right.
A hard drive with movie rips goes much further than a bunch of disks. Copies don't have the adverts, unskippable anti-piracy bullshit, or region locking. And letting go, and adapting to new media goes even further.
On the other hand, when I look something up from my past, I'm always thankful for the random archivist who still has a copy.
On the other hand, when I look something up from my past, I'm always thankful for the random archivist who still has a copy.
This is silly. Just rip them and give them away. You'll spend less on mirrored hard drives than storage for the disks. And you can always BitTorrent movies you already own on DVD/BluRay guilt free.
The only reason I still have my stack of disks is because I haven't had time to rip them and their special features yet. That and we keep the disks for kids movies because the van doesn't have streaming support or AppleTV yet. :)
The only reason I still have my stack of disks is because I haven't had time to rip them and their special features yet. That and we keep the disks for kids movies because the van doesn't have streaming support or AppleTV yet. :)
Ripped all my DVDs in 2010, donated them, and haven't looked back. Nowadays with Plex, I see no reason to ever use physical media again
I strongly suggest that if DVDs are important to you, that you find some convenient mechanic to rip them.
DVDs are durable, but not immortal. I have several that have failed.
I appreciate the ask. Ripping DVDs is just a lot of work, time, storage, and fiddling. I don’t wish ripping 15 seasons of ER on anyone.
But, the truth is, the things break down.
DVDs are durable, but not immortal. I have several that have failed.
I appreciate the ask. Ripping DVDs is just a lot of work, time, storage, and fiddling. I don’t wish ripping 15 seasons of ER on anyone.
But, the truth is, the things break down.
We’re watching Harry Potter with the kids, probably haven’t watched the blu rays since they were born (now 10)
Popped in deathly hallows part 2 this very evening a few minutes before everyone was ready. Couple of kites later I turn on the tv and it’s playing some advert for some rom com or some sort
It reminded me why I stopped buying dvds. They aren’t happy with selling me a product for a cost, they have to double dip by advertising stuff.
Eventually I’m sure streaming will go that way, and once again The High Seas will be the only way to get the product. If there one thing the entertainment industry can be counted on it’s killing the goose.
Popped in deathly hallows part 2 this very evening a few minutes before everyone was ready. Couple of kites later I turn on the tv and it’s playing some advert for some rom com or some sort
It reminded me why I stopped buying dvds. They aren’t happy with selling me a product for a cost, they have to double dip by advertising stuff.
Eventually I’m sure streaming will go that way, and once again The High Seas will be the only way to get the product. If there one thing the entertainment industry can be counted on it’s killing the goose.
> But I also wish that streamers would create Blu-rays of their original content. I should be able to purchase the complete Bojack Horseman on Blu-ray to hold on to it forever—what if something happens to Netflix?
Like you or not, MKV files on your own hard drive and piracy in general is the answer.
Like you or not, MKV files on your own hard drive and piracy in general is the answer.
Same with music streaming. I went back to my offline collection just recently, keeping one service for the occasional discovery of something new or to me unknown. Too many favourites disappeared, or just reuploaded corrupting my playlist. Too much garbage flow at us (mostly means the video streaming where they decide for you what to list in the prime space of the interface, what you want is unimportant) to be comfortable. The quality of the players are decreasing due to bugs and eroding user friendliness. It is not fun anymore.
In a similar vein, once you pirate something you also own it forever. Netflix is never gonna delete Bojack Horseman off my hard drive.
In 2035, your hard drive will have firmware with built-in CSAM filtering, which - after a legal battle in the high court - will get hijacked for copyright enforcement.
If you have the physical hardware, there will be people able to produce their own firmware that disables built in filtering, or at least, disables the internet connecting that reports said filtering. You'll have a server that is disconnected from the internet with all your DRM free content.
They would have to outlaw personal computing, and not allow you to build your own servers with no firmware-enforced filtering, which given the current direction, is not particularly farfetched, but at that point battle is lost anyway and your DVD rips are the least of your problems.
They would have to outlaw personal computing, and not allow you to build your own servers with no firmware-enforced filtering, which given the current direction, is not particularly farfetched, but at that point battle is lost anyway and your DVD rips are the least of your problems.
RoHS and lead-free solder insures that the relatively open hardware we have today won’t function in the future, post-personal computing being outlawed. I don’t think it’s a vast conspiracy, but rather a happy accident.
Guess I'll be relegated to living in a cabin in the woods if we ever get to that point...
That’s eerie. I say almost exactly the same thing. I don’t know if I feel fortunate to have lived thru the period of people having access to personal computers that they actually owned or sad because I will know the pain of having had it.
Yea I feel that. I honestly think that the only reason my goals aren't to just buy a piece of land in rural Canada and live life in peace is because it's not the lifestyle my girlfriend wants. That being said, we still want rural living, just not as extreme as I sometimes dream about
>” I'll be relegated to living in a cabin in the woods”
Welcome to my Ted Talk…
Welcome to my Ted Talk…
That sounds like the onset of a Cory Doctorow story. Armed autonomous Netflix' bots bearing down on your residence to physically delete your Bojack Horseman copies — all legalities taken care of by the newly amended copyright protection laws.
The sequel to Fahrenheit 451: Oersted 5000.
You say 'never' but I see the capacity for companies to remotely delete things on users drives that feel like may be in copyright violation as a foregone conclusion at this point. It is an inevitability. Since both TVs and computers are usually internet enabled, you'd have to super careful to never expose that drive to the net. I mean who is going to stop them? Lawmakers? chuckle-snort. The supreme court? giggle.
You would either download the content encrypted or use Linux, I suppose.
But a strong solar flare might.
That's the other benefit of offline backups; you can have as many as you want. If a solar flare wipes out every hard drive I own simultaneously, I think I might have bigger problems than a lack of TV shows to watch.
Quick plug for "Mr. Burns: a Post-Electric play", where an event wipes out the electric grid and people start trying to recreate an old Simpsons episode.
There are multiple productions on YouTube, such as: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuL7EbjFBBw
Description on wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._Burns,_a_Post-Electric_Pla...
There are multiple productions on YouTube, such as: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuL7EbjFBBw
Description on wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._Burns,_a_Post-Electric_Pla...
This goes back to the classic backup calculation. Never spend more to protect the data than the data is worth, right? That means the husband will be right or wrong on a user by user basis. If you have room to keep binders and binders of DVDs in your house, you need to calculate - is that space worth it for the data on there? Me, personally, once I've seen a movie or a TV show I rarely watch it again. There are a few that I do repeat watch, enough that I have a backup of those movies or shows even though I can get it on my streaming subscription today. But I'm not keeping binders or DVDs because that data is not important enough for me to back up.
Every time I want to watch a specific movie I have to search all the streaming services I have access to and often its not there.
So these days I just buy the DVD from ebay from a few bucks, it arrives in a couple of days. Feels no different to the 1980's when I went to the video shop and brought home a VHS.
I've gone back to physical media. Streaming has shot itself in the foot.
I've cancelled most of my streaming services cause in Australia the free to air streaming services are really great anyway.
I do pay for Britbox for the classic Doctor Who, Blakes Seven and other dorky delights.
So these days I just buy the DVD from ebay from a few bucks, it arrives in a couple of days. Feels no different to the 1980's when I went to the video shop and brought home a VHS.
I've gone back to physical media. Streaming has shot itself in the foot.
I've cancelled most of my streaming services cause in Australia the free to air streaming services are really great anyway.
I do pay for Britbox for the classic Doctor Who, Blakes Seven and other dorky delights.
And now it feels like 2/3rds of media doesnt have a dvd or blu-ray release! So awful.
This has been such an ever enmissserating situation. Started as a high & mighty &bgood convenience, but we're ending up worse than where we started; fragmented & ephemeral.
This has been such an ever enmissserating situation. Started as a high & mighty &bgood convenience, but we're ending up worse than where we started; fragmented & ephemeral.
I remember the middle section of shelves at Blockbuster. I'm quite content not having access to a lot of that schlock any more. A lot of it didn't deserve to be put on DVD!
I'm reading the "so awful" within the context of this thread more of an accusation for someone making the decision to not allow content vs I just wish it were on DVD for my convenience. It's not all conspiracy theories. Sometimes, it's just financial. Some older content was done on such a cheap budget and companies that we'll just call fly by night. These types of places might not be able to remaster their content for blu-ray either because they no longer exist, don't have the funding to re-transfer the film to a higher scan, or just physically no longer have the materials.
I'm reading the "so awful" within the context of this thread more of an accusation for someone making the decision to not allow content vs I just wish it were on DVD for my convenience. It's not all conspiracy theories. Sometimes, it's just financial. Some older content was done on such a cheap budget and companies that we'll just call fly by night. These types of places might not be able to remaster their content for blu-ray either because they no longer exist, don't have the funding to re-transfer the film to a higher scan, or just physically no longer have the materials.
I have been buying DVDs at the thrift store and ripping them to my personal Plex server. I do not feel bad, I paid for the media and I am the only person with access to this server -- its pretty much the same as me watching that DVD alone.
Still need a VHS to watch Star Wars
2006 Limited Edition DVD [0], it has the original theatrical versions on bonus discs (Yes, Han shot first).
0, https://savestarwars.com/images/goutboxes.jpg
0, https://savestarwars.com/images/goutboxes.jpg
Which are transferred from the 1993 LaserDisc release, aside from the text crawl of A New Hope. The 1993 LD did use the subtitle "Episode IV: A New Hope", the 2006 DVDs took it from the original film again, but the rest of the movie is a LaserDisc transfer.
Yeah I have the DVDs here right next to me. What I always disliked though is the butchered format, they letterboxed the 2.39:1 original into a non-anamorphic 4:3 frame. Wasted quality and you have to auto-crop by your video player. Maybe one day we will get a proper digital scan from the original cinema reel.
Looks like someone never heard of Harmy's Despecialized.
I didn’t realize how many small changes were added to the BluRay version. The worst part for me is the re-colorization into cooler tones to make it look more modern. 4K77 version looks more goofy - just like I remember it from my childhood!
laserdisc will do.
why would anyone choose VHS over laserdisc I'll never understand
Lots of comments here about whether or not the author’s husband is right or wrong. What about the author herself?
> My beloved Beforeigners—a deeply weird and delightful show in which suddenly people from the Stone Age, Viking era, and 19th century begin appearing around the world—is gone.
You can still watch this on Apple TV. You just need to pay a few dollars to rent it. How much is shelf space worth?
> My beloved Beforeigners—a deeply weird and delightful show in which suddenly people from the Stone Age, Viking era, and 19th century begin appearing around the world—is gone.
You can still watch this on Apple TV. You just need to pay a few dollars to rent it. How much is shelf space worth?
It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia was butchered on streaming platforms, so I agree with you OP! Taiwan Tammy? GONE! Martina Martinez? GONE! Santa asking: "Is he retarded?" when Charlie just stares at him frozen in rage? GONE! Lots of funny moments missed by new fans unfortunately.
Related: Why have hard drive sizes stagnated? It feels like 8TB has been the golden standard going on 8 years now.
I'm very close to doing the following: Putting 6 drives in a portable RAID device, and ripping my movies to 720p x265 for storage. I can store a near limitless amount of movies and TV shows this way, and honestly I don't notice 720p. At least not enough to trade a 1GB movie for a 45GB 4k Remux. And I own a latest brand new 65 inch LG OLED and Sony OLED.
Added benefit is that its trivial to stream this anywhere at home or remotely. The files are so small that even scanning around the movie is instant.
The only thing holding me back is 8TB hard drives. So I wait patiently and continue to pay for a plexserver some guy manages for me.
Related: Why have hard drive sizes stagnated? It feels like 8TB has been the golden standard going on 8 years now.
I'm very close to doing the following: Putting 6 drives in a portable RAID device, and ripping my movies to 720p x265 for storage. I can store a near limitless amount of movies and TV shows this way, and honestly I don't notice 720p. At least not enough to trade a 1GB movie for a 45GB 4k Remux. And I own a latest brand new 65 inch LG OLED and Sony OLED.
Added benefit is that its trivial to stream this anywhere at home or remotely. The files are so small that even scanning around the movie is instant.
The only thing holding me back is 8TB hard drives. So I wait patiently and continue to pay for a plexserver some guy manages for me.
I'm not sure of prices in your region, but I see 20TB drives priced competitively to 8TB drives in terms of price/terabyte. I've been thinking of building a new media array to replace my existing 8TB drives and similar storage capacity would cost me less now than 3 years ago, for arguably better drives too. I've been thinking of using the Seagate Exos X18 (18TB drives) but haven't made the purchase yet to form an opinion.
Here's the real question: why have backup disc sizes stagnated? We went from CD to slightly larger CDs, to DVDs, then double-layer DVDs, but BD-Rs haven't really taken off and we ought to be at something much, much larger by now.
And this is why I've rebuilt my digital music, tv, and movie collections. For the media I care about, I want to own it, not license it, thank you very much.
When streaming first came out I ended this practice. Then, the licensing disputes started and content started moving or disappearing. That's a trust they won't earn back.
When streaming first came out I ended this practice. Then, the licensing disputes started and content started moving or disappearing. That's a trust they won't earn back.
I recently went through this. Every TV channel having a streaming service is just nuts.
Particularly flagrant is the likes of Disney, who owns Hulu, Disney+, ESPN+ and will happily sell subscriptions to all 3 + addons throughout.
Also abhorrent is the fact that these slimy companies are constantly moving content around the services, trying to get you subscribe to everything under the sun just to follow a favorite TV show. "Oh, it's on amazon, now netflix, now hulu, now disney+, now paramount+, now peacock, now britbox, now acorn"
Particularly flagrant is the likes of Disney, who owns Hulu, Disney+, ESPN+ and will happily sell subscriptions to all 3 + addons throughout.
Also abhorrent is the fact that these slimy companies are constantly moving content around the services, trying to get you subscribe to everything under the sun just to follow a favorite TV show. "Oh, it's on amazon, now netflix, now hulu, now disney+, now paramount+, now peacock, now britbox, now acorn"
I did a physical media purge a few years back, and kept just a drawer-ful of my absolute favorites. This past Christmas I thought I'd watch one of them - but then I realized I don't even own a DVD player. I don't think I ever did. Some game console would play it, or my PC. But now the PC has no 5.25" bays, and the game consoles are all-digital.
My conclusion is not that the author's husband is right. But rather that I should get rid of these remaining DVDs. I've never thought much about digital nomadism, but I suppose I practice it. There's always something new to watch.
My conclusion is not that the author's husband is right. But rather that I should get rid of these remaining DVDs. I've never thought much about digital nomadism, but I suppose I practice it. There's always something new to watch.
I learned that quite early, mostly because I'm from Quebec, there's so many of our translation that get lost (I guess it's a question of rights, the translation and original content have 2 different owners). The one that made me realize that first is Pokémon, there's just no way to get the original Quebec version (and funnily enough, it's the same French translation, just with the English Pokémon names). I had to buy the original VHS to be able to get it, and still just the first season seems to have been made in VHS.
Piracy doesn't help much either as theses translations were never digital in the first place. There's many show from my youth that I can't find with Quebec translation, even some that I can't find in their original language.
If I had the cash and time it's something that I would wish to try, getting the distributions rights of a few of theses old shows. There's no way it would be that expensive (probably take quite a bit of time though) and nostalgia would works quite well I believe to attract enough viewership to support it.
Piracy doesn't help much either as theses translations were never digital in the first place. There's many show from my youth that I can't find with Quebec translation, even some that I can't find in their original language.
If I had the cash and time it's something that I would wish to try, getting the distributions rights of a few of theses old shows. There's no way it would be that expensive (probably take quite a bit of time though) and nostalgia would works quite well I believe to attract enough viewership to support it.
Agreed. We have small number of movies and TV shows which is growing.
Pro tip: thrift store DVDs and "friends of the library" sales.
I got every season of ST:TNG for about $40 ($1/disk)
Pro tip: thrift store DVDs and "friends of the library" sales.
I got every season of ST:TNG for about $40 ($1/disk)
This is ycom, so the replies are of course biased towards the "I always have good internet" paradigm.
I live about 5 months per year in my RV in the middle of a desert. Internet is a phone-tethered experience. What is this "streaming" thing you talk about? I'd be buffering all night.
And so, yes, there are good reasons for many of us to retain, in some form, all the DVD's we can get.
I live about 5 months per year in my RV in the middle of a desert. Internet is a phone-tethered experience. What is this "streaming" thing you talk about? I'd be buffering all night.
And so, yes, there are good reasons for many of us to retain, in some form, all the DVD's we can get.
I have a completely different perspective.
I rarely watch anything twice.
I have also found there are many things to occupy my time other than watching things I have already seen.
I rarely watch anything twice.
I have also found there are many things to occupy my time other than watching things I have already seen.
I have a hard time agreeing.
We live in a world of media superabundance, and life only goes on for so long. I can't possibly consume even a tiny fraction of what's out there in my time on this world. I find that to be an incredible relief: I will always be able to find something interesting to read, watch, or listen to, regardless of whether I choose to fill my living space with shelves full of media. It's just not something I need to worry about.
If anything, I find I have the opposite problem: too many options makes it hard to decide. A year or two ago I got rid of almost all my books, including many dearly loved favorites. My personal library would now fit in a laundry basket. (Still too many, but I have a sizable backlog of books I haven't read yet and that would be difficult or expensive to replace.) And the most notable consequence is that I now spend more time actually reading, and less time trying to decide what to read.
We live in a world of media superabundance, and life only goes on for so long. I can't possibly consume even a tiny fraction of what's out there in my time on this world. I find that to be an incredible relief: I will always be able to find something interesting to read, watch, or listen to, regardless of whether I choose to fill my living space with shelves full of media. It's just not something I need to worry about.
If anything, I find I have the opposite problem: too many options makes it hard to decide. A year or two ago I got rid of almost all my books, including many dearly loved favorites. My personal library would now fit in a laundry basket. (Still too many, but I have a sizable backlog of books I haven't read yet and that would be difficult or expensive to replace.) And the most notable consequence is that I now spend more time actually reading, and less time trying to decide what to read.
A lot of movies I want to see aren't on any streaming platform, plus the quality is pretty damn poor on a larger screen. Compression artifacts and color banding are just too damn annoying in a lot of shows or movies, especially ones with a lot of dark scenes.
I also still buy CD's for many reasons, but the main one is that more often than not, most streaming services offer only modern remasters that are loud as hell and have no dynamic range whatsoever. Yes, there are some remasters that are loads better than 80s CD's, but often not, especially if they're from the 00s during the iPod era.
https://dr.loudness-war.info/
I also still buy CD's for many reasons, but the main one is that more often than not, most streaming services offer only modern remasters that are loud as hell and have no dynamic range whatsoever. Yes, there are some remasters that are loads better than 80s CD's, but often not, especially if they're from the 00s during the iPod era.
https://dr.loudness-war.info/
My understanding was there's a risk of disc degradation, is this a concern?
How do you "back up" a CD/DVD?
How do you "back up" a CD/DVD?
For Audio CDs you want to rip it lossless with something that support AccurateRip so you can be sure that others made the same copy byte-to-byte. Fortunately there are several options https://wiki.hydrogenaud.io/index.php?title=AccurateRip#Soft...
For DVDs you can use the infamous DVD Decrypter to make ISO files https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DVD_Decrypter
or MakeMKV which straight copies the MPEG2 files (.vob) into a nice MKV container https://www.makemkv.com/
For DVDs you can use the infamous DVD Decrypter to make ISO files https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DVD_Decrypter
or MakeMKV which straight copies the MPEG2 files (.vob) into a nice MKV container https://www.makemkv.com/
DVDs are easy to backup. Lots of software out there, and there's nothing low level to worry about. Audio CDs also have lots of software out there, but you have to be a bit more picky if you're concerned about getting a bit for bit copy rather than just a sounds the same copy. If your discs have hidden tracks and all that kind of weird stuff, care is needed.
Once you have things onto your filesystem, the usual rules of backups apply.
Once you have things onto your filesystem, the usual rules of backups apply.
>the usual rules of backups apply.
which would include keeping the original disc ripped to make this new copy that needs backing up. more than one copy. more than one format. more than one location.
which would include keeping the original disc ripped to make this new copy that needs backing up. more than one copy. more than one format. more than one location.
For a CD, you need a program that uses libcdparanoia. Luckily, there are many.
DVDs contain a proper filesystem, so you can just mount and copy that.
DVDs contain a proper filesystem, so you can just mount and copy that.
Rip it to a hard drive or S3 bucket. Hard drive bonus is you can use Plex or Jellyfin to stream.
Handbrake makes it easy.
[deleted]
Similar to music whether steamed or downloads to your device, the issues are similar for kindle books that you think you’ve purchased and owned at anytime but that can also disappear at any time.
> Y: X was right.
Why are we always in the cycle where X is the contrarian and minority but was pushed aside while Y enjoy all the frames and glories but is fundamentally wrong.
I am putting X and Y here simply because this observation hold true not just in tech, in streaming but everywhere else.
It is not like they were not warned.
Back to the subject. We really something better than BluRay. Smaller but also much higher in storage capacity, and when stored properly that could last a hundred year. While being cheap to produce.
Why are we always in the cycle where X is the contrarian and minority but was pushed aside while Y enjoy all the frames and glories but is fundamentally wrong.
I am putting X and Y here simply because this observation hold true not just in tech, in streaming but everywhere else.
It is not like they were not warned.
Back to the subject. We really something better than BluRay. Smaller but also much higher in storage capacity, and when stored properly that could last a hundred year. While being cheap to produce.
Because 1. most ideas start as fringe hypotheses, and 2. survivorship bias.
People will have 1001 ideas and hypotheses, ranging from "hey, smoking might be unhealthy" to "the government is controlling us with 5g" and "aliens walk among us".
For the ones that make it through, like smoking, people can say "see, I told you so, we warned you". The other 999, you will, mostly, never hear from again.
People will have 1001 ideas and hypotheses, ranging from "hey, smoking might be unhealthy" to "the government is controlling us with 5g" and "aliens walk among us".
For the ones that make it through, like smoking, people can say "see, I told you so, we warned you". The other 999, you will, mostly, never hear from again.
I don't relate to the author's sentiments at all. If something isn't available for streaming, then that's my cue to watch something different
I put all my old disks in sleeves or stacked on spindles, organized alphabetically. They take up almost no space and it's practical enough for infrequent use.
I completely agree but one unfortunate reality I've noticed as a still-active dvd collector / aficionado is where the heck to buy them.
$4+ on ebay for an 80% chance low-res bootleg stopped working for me 3ish years ago and I still haven't found a preferable method without resorting to full on pirating which feels like a little too time-consuming of a hobby for more mainstream titles at least.
$4+ on ebay for an 80% chance low-res bootleg stopped working for me 3ish years ago and I still haven't found a preferable method without resorting to full on pirating which feels like a little too time-consuming of a hobby for more mainstream titles at least.
We just got a DVD player again, because my wife wanted to watch 'The Wonder Years' and because of all the music in it (which is great, btw) my understanding is it can't stream anywhere anymore.
(Or that is the theory I heard why no one is streaming it.)
Other shows got redone with other music so they could release it, but music is pretty heavily used in the wonder years.
(Or that is the theory I heard why no one is streaming it.)
Other shows got redone with other music so they could release it, but music is pretty heavily used in the wonder years.
> Other shows got redone with other music so they could release it
WKRP in Cincinnati is another example. I don't know if they still exist, but there used to be torrents of VHS rips of WKRP so that it could be viewed with the original music.
WKRP in Cincinnati is another example. I don't know if they still exist, but there used to be torrents of VHS rips of WKRP so that it could be viewed with the original music.
I'm somewhat sympathetic to this, but media is a ridiculous money pit for folks. Don't get me wrong, I've done it. And I'll probably continue to buy some physical media for a while. But I have a hard time justifying the cost of giant personal libraries. They are almost certainly destined for a landfill after an estate sell.
Paramount+ was kind of the last straw for me on streaming. A streaming platform entirely made from licenses they ripped back from existing platforms. And the new shows are trashy and lazily written.
I don't need to be on the zeitgeist any more. For all the old shows I want to catch up on, DVD box sets cost less than the streaming services to watch them on.
I don't need to be on the zeitgeist any more. For all the old shows I want to catch up on, DVD box sets cost less than the streaming services to watch them on.
although i love the cinema and watch a lot of tv, i'm kind of indifferent to the problem of streaming content disappearing. before streaming content i watched a lot less and read a lot more, and i think i was better for it. so if they took it all away and made it harder to find it might be to my benefit
People tend to shit on Spotify (while still using it), but they did manage something that we all want: Access to (almost everything), for a nominal monthly fee.
We need the same, but for movies and tv shows. Globally. It's an economical problem that currently has a suboptimal solution.
We need the same, but for movies and tv shows. Globally. It's an economical problem that currently has a suboptimal solution.
I think the era of Spotify dominance and music availability is coming to an end. Not sure what the next stage is going to look like - but I personally just canceled my subscription after over a decade of using Spotify exclusively. There is a lot of music that has never been available on Spotify, plus some music is disappearing due to artists and labels realizing they are not making any money from Spotify streaming. Plus no lossless, plus the relentless upsell of podcasts and now audio books.
I would be fine subscribing to a specialized streaming music service, or two.
I would be fine subscribing to a specialized streaming music service, or two.
I'm super happy with my Spotify subscription. Sure, maybe 5% of the things I want are missing, but 95% is pretty good.
I left for 2 reasons:
1. Their recommendations became unbearable. I love discovering music but Spotify is not the right service for that anymore. Daily playlists are just several of my favorite artists shuffled. Genre playlists are just several of my favorite artists shuffled. Track radio is just several of my favorite artists shuffled. “Best of techno” playlist? Floating Points and Four Tet - both artists I listen to a lot, but they are not techno, and are not “best techno” - a genre that spans decades.
I don’t know if they overfitted their models and at this point I don’t care.
2. I am fed up with the podcast and audio book push. Not interested in either, don’t want to see it anywhere.
1. Their recommendations became unbearable. I love discovering music but Spotify is not the right service for that anymore. Daily playlists are just several of my favorite artists shuffled. Genre playlists are just several of my favorite artists shuffled. Track radio is just several of my favorite artists shuffled. “Best of techno” playlist? Floating Points and Four Tet - both artists I listen to a lot, but they are not techno, and are not “best techno” - a genre that spans decades.
I don’t know if they overfitted their models and at this point I don’t care.
2. I am fed up with the podcast and audio book push. Not interested in either, don’t want to see it anywhere.
There is a ton of stuff not on Spotify. It might align well with your tastes, but they are subject to licensing issues. I’m not even talking about live versions or sessions, but bog-standard albums.
But if they are not on spotify then where are they? I don't know anyone who buys CDs these days and torrent sites definitely don't pay artists anything.
Sometimes directly from the publisher. Anecdotal example, I like an album by a band Tap Tap. They were short lived and based out of the UK. US Spotify does not have that album, but I can purchase it from their publisher at the time (ironically named Stolen Records).
But how many people buy directly from publishers? Maybe some hardcore fans - but who else?
And another thing - I've discovered lots of artists through Spotify and Youtube. If they weren't there - I would't even know that they existed.
And another thing - I've discovered lots of artists through Spotify and Youtube. If they weren't there - I would't even know that they existed.
>We need the same, but for movies and tv shows.
And audiobooks! Audible is stupid.
And audiobooks! Audible is stupid.
How is it stupid? I haven't paid attention, but I thought audiobooks were now on a Spotify-like system?
If only! Audible is like Amazon Prime Videos - selection of free access books and then, depending on how much you pay per month, one or two "premium" books. Of course most of the books you really want to listen to are "premium." So essentially, you get to rent one book for ~$15/month or two for ~$23/month.
IOW - stupid.
IOW - stupid.
My husband was right about piracy.
And this is why I have a NAS with a dozen 12tb drives on two raid 6 arrays. Most of it is h265 encoded, which is smaller, and the blur of h265 doesn't annoy me like the blockiness of h264.
I am only using about 22tb currently, upgraded about two years ago.
I am only using about 22tb currently, upgraded about two years ago.
Besides being pulled from streaming, what if they altered the movie or show, to add on to it or censorship past views to fit modern views. I don't like original content being altered, especially the original star wars. :)
I've started browsing second hand blue rays and picking up some every week. Lots of special editions and other extra material you don't get on streaming and tons of movies I can not even find on either Netflix, HBO or Prime.
You can have both hard copies and streaming by ripping your DVDs and putting them on a NAS with Jellyfin.
https://youtu.be/RZ8ijmy3qPo
In my opinion the true advantage of discs is all the extra content. Sure, I can download or stream a copy of any movie I want but it's pretty damned hard to get it with the commentary track without buying a disc.
In the old days it was legal to record shows on your VCR.
What happened to the laws around that?
What happened to the laws around that?
You can still record broadcast TV all you want, a popular solution is the Channels app using a HDHomeRun box - https://getchannels.com https://www.silicondust.com
Decrypting the shows downloaded from streaming services, however, is likely a violation of the DMCA.
Decrypting the shows downloaded from streaming services, however, is likely a violation of the DMCA.
The laws didn't change, but what happened is almost everybody threw out their VCRs. Or never had them.
Surely the laws are more general than VCRs? Or should I add a tape drive to my computer to make it legally a VCR?
If you want to save physical space, you can rip them all and store them on a drive that's smaller then the DVD player you use to play your DVDs. That's what I do.
The DVDs actually doesn't take up a ton of space. What we did was buying the cheapest version of a movie and just throw away the cover. You can get DVD/BluRay binders that will hold 200 - 400 discs in the space of a few large books.
I find ripping movies a little tiresome. Getting the quality, sound and subtitles right can be challenging.
I find ripping movies a little tiresome. Getting the quality, sound and subtitles right can be challenging.
Our legal department has stores of blank DVDs. It turns out that some legal artifacts must be stored in a permanent medium.
Yikes, Writable DVDs/CDs are not permanent, far from it! The dyes in writable DVDs degrades over time. If your storage requirements are more than a couple of years you might have already experienced some pretty major data losses.
> Yikes, Writable DVDs/CDs are not permanent, far from it! The dyes in writable DVDs degrades over time.
They do degrade, but a "couple of years" is pessimistic. My earliest CD-Rs are from 1994 and they're still good.
They do degrade, but a "couple of years" is pessimistic. My earliest CD-Rs are from 1994 and they're still good.
CD-Rs will last longer than DVDs because the pits being written are larger. Further, audio can experience more degradation without perceptible impact.
I've had DVD-Rs fail in 2 years.
The type of DVD matters, of course. Here's a handy guide:
https://www.canada.ca/en/conservation-institute/services/con...
I've had DVD-Rs fail in 2 years.
The type of DVD matters, of course. Here's a handy guide:
https://www.canada.ca/en/conservation-institute/services/con...
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He was wrong, digitise and discard
In the genre of “Stallman was right”
I have started ordering Kindle books that I really like as hardcopies. You never know…
Soon there won't be any DVDs or BluRays to buy and collect.
Does is bother anyone else that a column named "future tense" has story titles, none of which seem to be in the future tense? Talk about bait and switch . . .
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Music too! Oh god my music...
no, you were both wrong. rip the discs to an external drive and play it over your local network. or even better, over the internet with plex/emby/jellyfin.
how are these articles getting up voted? what boomers are reading HN on a Saturday and going 'yeah I miss my DVD collection'?
how are these articles getting up voted? what boomers are reading HN on a Saturday and going 'yeah I miss my DVD collection'?
One real danger of putting all historical video media on streaming sites is that it makes it far too easy to introduce an Orwellian Ministry of Truth that is empowered to rewrite the past to make it conform to today's acceptable social norms, academic ideologies, government agendas and so on.
For example, one could make the argument that Alfred Hitchcock's entire library promotes negative stereotypes of women - and it's true, women in Hitchcock films are not the strong types, they're more often helpless victims who have to be rescued by male characters. This clearly, one could say, promotes negative female stereotypes which are damaging to young women so all those movies should be removed from streaming services.
One could continue in this manner, selectively pulling anime movies because they promote excessive violence and sexuality to a teenage audience, or war movies like Apocalypse Now and Dr Strangelove that portray military generals as clueless maniacs, or if the pendulum swings back to the social conservative end, pulling all horror movies that don't portray Christianity in a positive light or have too many Satanic themes, and on and on.
Keeping hard copies in your personal possession is one way around this, but since the copyrights and hence distribution rights are held by these conglomerates that don't want to get in trouble with some political group or other by making them available, nobody else can view them without going through pirate sites - a very unfortunate situation.
For example, one could make the argument that Alfred Hitchcock's entire library promotes negative stereotypes of women - and it's true, women in Hitchcock films are not the strong types, they're more often helpless victims who have to be rescued by male characters. This clearly, one could say, promotes negative female stereotypes which are damaging to young women so all those movies should be removed from streaming services.
One could continue in this manner, selectively pulling anime movies because they promote excessive violence and sexuality to a teenage audience, or war movies like Apocalypse Now and Dr Strangelove that portray military generals as clueless maniacs, or if the pendulum swings back to the social conservative end, pulling all horror movies that don't portray Christianity in a positive light or have too many Satanic themes, and on and on.
Keeping hard copies in your personal possession is one way around this, but since the copyrights and hence distribution rights are held by these conglomerates that don't want to get in trouble with some political group or other by making them available, nobody else can view them without going through pirate sites - a very unfortunate situation.
There are already incidences of this:
The TV show Community is missing an episode on Netflix for some reason (edit: reason was Ken Jeong in what could be interpreted as blackface).
The IT Crowd is missing one in some geos because it was considered anti-Trans by some - that episode also has the unrelated and hilarious plot where Roy and Moss convince Jen that they're loaning her a "black box that holds the entire internet".
The TV show Community is missing an episode on Netflix for some reason (edit: reason was Ken Jeong in what could be interpreted as blackface).
The IT Crowd is missing one in some geos because it was considered anti-Trans by some - that episode also has the unrelated and hilarious plot where Roy and Moss convince Jen that they're loaning her a "black box that holds the entire internet".
That's sad. That internet black box plot line is one of the best known and most beloved about the series.
That episode of Community also explicitly referred to the black face as a "hate crime." I don't think it's so much a matter of interpretation as that was the direct gag they were going for.
Do we know who actually pulled the content? Netflix clearly doesn't have a policy against streaming partial amount of content when they can't get it all from a provider but it's not clear to me if Netflix pulled a single episode of Community or if the licensers maybe refused to license that episode. I think I read that Sony was supportive of the episode being pulled.
I think most of this content will come back once the industry as a whole sort of figures out the positioning. There are something the creators are embarrassed by and it might never come back but I expect there to be a new rating or something similar (Disney+ does this already) where they'll indicate before the media plays that it may be offensive or insensitive. News shows do this when covering certain types of crimes.
Do we know who actually pulled the content? Netflix clearly doesn't have a policy against streaming partial amount of content when they can't get it all from a provider but it's not clear to me if Netflix pulled a single episode of Community or if the licensers maybe refused to license that episode. I think I read that Sony was supportive of the episode being pulled.
I think most of this content will come back once the industry as a whole sort of figures out the positioning. There are something the creators are embarrassed by and it might never come back but I expect there to be a new rating or something similar (Disney+ does this already) where they'll indicate before the media plays that it may be offensive or insensitive. News shows do this when covering certain types of crimes.
The story about the pulled IT Crowd episode is covered here: https://screenrant.com/it-crowd-controversy-graham-linehan-a...
With a very heavy perspective. Among the recurrent signs, the following suffices:
> inviting laughter and derision toward the... community
No. Just finding an occasion for the selected direction in creativity. Which the writer of the article seems to want to make ideological, with the exception of one use of the expression "«cheap laugh»" (which, for that matter, may bring attention to the other "celebrated" subplot of "the elders of the Internet" - using the same perspective, it would be as if "making cheap laughs through a sort of "ableism"").
> inviting laughter and derision toward the... community
No. Just finding an occasion for the selected direction in creativity. Which the writer of the article seems to want to make ideological, with the exception of one use of the expression "«cheap laugh»" (which, for that matter, may bring attention to the other "celebrated" subplot of "the elders of the Internet" - using the same perspective, it would be as if "making cheap laughs through a sort of "ableism"").
Nah dude. I recently re-watched the whole show, and while I liked certain parts of it... it's a very transphobic show. And it's not just that episode; that episode gets callbacks in future episodes all the time.
It's a mean spirited gag, and the mere fact of being transgender is the punch line, over and over. It sucks. It makes revisiting the show more cringey and less fun.
It's a mean spirited gag, and the mere fact of being transgender is the punch line, over and over. It sucks. It makes revisiting the show more cringey and less fun.
Since you raised your doubts, I just re-watched it - series 3, episode 4. And I confirm the view.
The whole episode is about the clumsiness of living, consistently with the project idea ("the IT crowd", outcast specialists with little interface to the public, which is a mass of people thrown into some role "«not doing much work but constantly having affairs»" - confused humans -, with a link which is the portrait of incompetence trying to make a living - trying to live - into something she does not understand). All the characters do is "attempting", trying to fit a role. The difficulties of living roles could be a trigger for the development of the substory involving Douglas Reynholm and April (and the gender instrumental to that). The whole idea climaxes in the "collapse of civilization" when the "stakeholders", as "topmost layer of the role-players", are in front of the catastrophic loss of the Internet, and the "punchline from above" is that of Moss: «It really isn't that funny» - of course, because it is tragic.
While I could see that the "It's over" scene could be to some extent insensitive, given that the writers may have supposed that it would be something lived by a number in such group, it was instrumental to the fight scene, which is a consolidated topos. And the "victory" seems to be on the other side, since the "punchline from inside" is that of Douglas, which ends the episode crying, going "It's not the same!" (It's not the same without her, or him - as she was both the "other half" and the "pal"). So, not only I do not see a phobia, but on the contrary, I see the opposite message, towards seeing people for what they are, and to love that whatever they are (also since the premise of the whole is, as said, that they will be confused imperfect players) - Douglas could not and he is alone crying.
The whole episode is about the clumsiness of living, consistently with the project idea ("the IT crowd", outcast specialists with little interface to the public, which is a mass of people thrown into some role "«not doing much work but constantly having affairs»" - confused humans -, with a link which is the portrait of incompetence trying to make a living - trying to live - into something she does not understand). All the characters do is "attempting", trying to fit a role. The difficulties of living roles could be a trigger for the development of the substory involving Douglas Reynholm and April (and the gender instrumental to that). The whole idea climaxes in the "collapse of civilization" when the "stakeholders", as "topmost layer of the role-players", are in front of the catastrophic loss of the Internet, and the "punchline from above" is that of Moss: «It really isn't that funny» - of course, because it is tragic.
While I could see that the "It's over" scene could be to some extent insensitive, given that the writers may have supposed that it would be something lived by a number in such group, it was instrumental to the fight scene, which is a consolidated topos. And the "victory" seems to be on the other side, since the "punchline from inside" is that of Douglas, which ends the episode crying, going "It's not the same!" (It's not the same without her, or him - as she was both the "other half" and the "pal"). So, not only I do not see a phobia, but on the contrary, I see the opposite message, towards seeing people for what they are, and to love that whatever they are (also since the premise of the whole is, as said, that they will be confused imperfect players) - Douglas could not and he is alone crying.
I don't recall the episode, been probably 10 years since I watched the show, but lots of things "suck" if you watch them through your 2023 eye. Whether a show came out in 1955 or 1999, I just enjoy it as a product of it's time.
Definitely true. I'm not here to say that no one else can or should enjoy the show, or that it's unique in having aged poorly in some respects. But the problems with that episode and later ones (which are not entirely one note about Douglas' relationship with the transgender woman, despite the very painful fight scene and the overwhelming fact that being transgender is the punchline) are real and not made up, and I can understand why they'd be deeply uncomfortable to many people.
> Whether a show came out in 1955 or 1999, I just enjoy it as a product of it's time.
This is great when one can do it, and I think it's a fine approach. But of course, if you were gay in 1955 or trans in 1999, there's probably a lot of shows where certain issues— common enough at the time— would have really diminished your enjoyment and maybe even triggered some dysphoria, even 'at the time'.
> Whether a show came out in 1955 or 1999, I just enjoy it as a product of it's time.
This is great when one can do it, and I think it's a fine approach. But of course, if you were gay in 1955 or trans in 1999, there's probably a lot of shows where certain issues— common enough at the time— would have really diminished your enjoyment and maybe even triggered some dysphoria, even 'at the time'.
A couple of episodes of 30 Rock as well.
Doesn’t Always Sunny have this issue as well?
Yes [1], mostly the episodes that involve Kaitlin Olson's character, Dee Reynolds, who aspires to a career in comedy, herself inventing and portraying racially insensitive characters within the story of the show.
I'm not the type to rail against such things generally, but IMO it was unnecessary and misguided to remove these episodes: their humor came deliberately from how oblivious Dee was to the offensiveness of her act.
Indeed, her portrayals are usually immediately and explicitly critiqued by her fellow characters as being racist and insane.
[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/IASIP/comments/hflb6t/list_of_its_a...
I'm not the type to rail against such things generally, but IMO it was unnecessary and misguided to remove these episodes: their humor came deliberately from how oblivious Dee was to the offensiveness of her act.
Indeed, her portrayals are usually immediately and explicitly critiqued by her fellow characters as being racist and insane.
[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/IASIP/comments/hflb6t/list_of_its_a...
This is somehow the most mindnumbing. It's a show about terrible people doing terrible things. Like, they can only display certain, acceptable, forms of terribleness?
I think about 4 or 5 episodes.
Or the SpongeBob SquarePants "Panty Raid" episode.
There are some episodes like that where... like, I am against censorship in general especially considering the state of our world right now, but it is still weird to me that a cadre of writers thought that would be a good idea to make - and network executives agreed!
I bought a copy of ‘Tropic Thunder’ for exactly this reason. One day it will be pulled from all streaming platforms due to RDJ playing a black man.
There really isn't another movie like tropic thunder Imo
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If a streaming service is concerned about this, instead of dissappearing an episode, they could put a disclaimer slide at the beginning: "<Streaming Service> does not approve of the views made within this episode. Click <here> to skip to the next episode."
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I wonder if the reverse is true. Anyone remember the Wayans Bros. Movie "White Chicks"?
My overriding memory of Shawn and Marlon Wayans will always be an MTV Movie Awards (or some such) from the 90s, where they were hosting.
Some smart-ass comic gets up on the stage and leads with "I always said you were the two talented ones in the family."
Ouch. And double-ouch at the big laugh it got from the audience.
Some smart-ass comic gets up on the stage and leads with "I always said you were the two talented ones in the family."
Ouch. And double-ouch at the big laugh it got from the audience.
How can you forget the bit with Terry Crews singing Thousand Miles?
I've heard that the official clips of Saturday Night Live on YouTube are routinely posted with edits in which significant chunks are excised for "problematic" jokes, without any notice.
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Frank Zappa's albums had one particular song removed from their track list on Google's search results.
That’s not an instance of the Ministry of Truth. My brother in Christ, that’s a corporation doing that.
It’s worse than a government censorship org, because it’s all backroom pressure. It enables right-wing idiots to invent conspiracy.
60s cartoons are contraband. Stupid.
60s cartoons are contraband. Stupid.
The IT Crowd is missing one in some geos because it was considered anti-Trans by some
I have a lot of mixed feelings about this one; though I don't think the ep should be removed, it is in poor taste and arguably defeats its own comic intentions. I suspect the deeper objection is not to the content per se but how it reads in the context of Graham Linehan subsequently aligning himself as a massive transphobe and making it into a political cause.
I don't know Linehan personally, but grew up near him and followed his career since long before he went into television, when he was writing film and TV reviews in an alt-weekly paper for beer money. He has always been a comic genius, able to turn excruciating social pain into hilarious farce, while also being willing to cheer on success. I remember he once opened a movie review for a film called Eat the Peach with 'At last, an Irish movie that does not make me want to run to the toilets and lick all four walls.'
That kind of self-criticality and emotional nakedness has deep roots in the Irish identity, and it is what makes Roy, an Irish man working for an incomprehensible and irrational corporation in London, such a compelling character. I find the show especially entertaining because I've been that person, doing that exact job, working for those kind of companies in London, often under bosses like Jen or Denholm/Douglas Reynholm. Linehan's character portraits, even for a single episode or scene, are incredibly sharp and truthful. In The Work Outing, where Roy and Moss unwillingly accompany Jen to the theater, there's a scene where Jerome, an extroverted PR guy, is introduced to Roy & Moss. No sooner has Roy diffidently said hello than Jerome exclaims 'Oh my god you're Irish! I love Irish people! They're all mad aren't they! They're just mad!' and the exchange spirals downward into cringe. The whole episode is a comic masterpiece, but this brief scene has a special place in my heart as I've had that conversation hundreds of times in my life.
In this scene but also in general, the engine of comedy is the mismatch between characters who are quirky and self-conscious (like Roy and Jen) and those who are quirky but oblivious (like Moss, Douglas Reynholm, and here, Jerome). When characters go against their 'natural' type they get punished in hilarious ways, by being stuck with the baggage of their transgression which then multiplies itself exponentially. The plot frame for this episode is that Jen tries to be oblivious in pursuit of a date with another oblivious-seeming person, who turns out to be even more painfully self-aware than she is. As in all restorative comedies, the characters who transgress end up feeling worse but wiser, nothing really bad happens, and everything returns to normal.
In The Speech (the 'banned' episode), hopelessly insensitive CEO Douglas Reynholm meets an attractive lady journalist, April, and romance blossoms. Despite her repeated advisories that she used to be a man, Douglas thinks he's found the perfect woman who not just tolerates but admires and enjoys his shallow hyper-masculinity, sharing and even exceeding his love of bad action movies, heavy drinking, and competitive sports. But gradually reality gets through even his dense skull and he ends the relationship - briefly taking responsibility for the situation, before reverting to type and deflecting blame back onto April. Mutual recriminations quickly escalate into a fist fight straight out of a bad action movie, with Douglas wins - thereby regaining his 'boss' status - by knocking April out. He is subsequently shown as being vilified in the press and sobbing over the loss of his erstwhile companion, with whom he was actually compatible.
(Roy, Moss, and Jen are relegated to the less-important plot frame story in this episode, which sets up but is peripheral to the emotional conflict of the main story. In dramatic and thriller forms, the emotional conflict sets up but is peripheral to the main plot action; John Wick is the purest distillation of this.)
The Speech breaks two comedy rules in that the climactic suffering is not just emotional but physical, and something really bad does happen (the knockout). While it's implied that April recovers (going on to write a negative magazine article about Douglas) and Douglas actually feels bad, the comedically awkward social conflict of incongruous gender expectations crosses a line into physical violence which writers normally avoid. The violence is also intense; while this is meant to parody the bad action movies both Douglas and April enjoy, most comedy violence involves characters either flailing around, missing their punches, and blundering into the furniture or escalating quickly to absurd extremes like explosions or natural disasters. Though there are multiple comic touches in the fight scene, it's choreographed as a conventional aggressive fistfight, with a lot of punches to the head in both directions.
This was a bit too close to reality for a lot of people, because transgender women do suffer a disproportionate amount of physical violence up to and including murder, and this often takes place in the context of relationships. Perpetrators often defend themselves in court by insisting that they were deceived by a transgender romantic or sexual partner and acted violently out of fear and panic, which many find wildly implausible. Complaints gradually mounted over a 12 year period and in 2020 the UK broadcaster of the show announced they were dropping the episode from reruns.
Graham Linehan, who wrote and directed the episode, reacted badly, announced he was cutting ties with the broadcaster (after years of fruitful partnership), and went on a vicious tirade on social which eventually led to the suspension of his Twitter account - strangely parallel to the trajectory of the fictional Douglas. Rather than compromising or de-escalating, he raised it to the level of a political issue asserting that his civil rights (of free speech) were under attack and going on to attack transgender people in general in the most vituperative terms. In the context of an ongoing trend of escalating violence towards trans people (nearly doubling in the last year) his increasingly strident position has alienated a great many of his former fans.
I have a lot of mixed feelings about this one; though I don't think the ep should be removed, it is in poor taste and arguably defeats its own comic intentions. I suspect the deeper objection is not to the content per se but how it reads in the context of Graham Linehan subsequently aligning himself as a massive transphobe and making it into a political cause.
I don't know Linehan personally, but grew up near him and followed his career since long before he went into television, when he was writing film and TV reviews in an alt-weekly paper for beer money. He has always been a comic genius, able to turn excruciating social pain into hilarious farce, while also being willing to cheer on success. I remember he once opened a movie review for a film called Eat the Peach with 'At last, an Irish movie that does not make me want to run to the toilets and lick all four walls.'
That kind of self-criticality and emotional nakedness has deep roots in the Irish identity, and it is what makes Roy, an Irish man working for an incomprehensible and irrational corporation in London, such a compelling character. I find the show especially entertaining because I've been that person, doing that exact job, working for those kind of companies in London, often under bosses like Jen or Denholm/Douglas Reynholm. Linehan's character portraits, even for a single episode or scene, are incredibly sharp and truthful. In The Work Outing, where Roy and Moss unwillingly accompany Jen to the theater, there's a scene where Jerome, an extroverted PR guy, is introduced to Roy & Moss. No sooner has Roy diffidently said hello than Jerome exclaims 'Oh my god you're Irish! I love Irish people! They're all mad aren't they! They're just mad!' and the exchange spirals downward into cringe. The whole episode is a comic masterpiece, but this brief scene has a special place in my heart as I've had that conversation hundreds of times in my life.
In this scene but also in general, the engine of comedy is the mismatch between characters who are quirky and self-conscious (like Roy and Jen) and those who are quirky but oblivious (like Moss, Douglas Reynholm, and here, Jerome). When characters go against their 'natural' type they get punished in hilarious ways, by being stuck with the baggage of their transgression which then multiplies itself exponentially. The plot frame for this episode is that Jen tries to be oblivious in pursuit of a date with another oblivious-seeming person, who turns out to be even more painfully self-aware than she is. As in all restorative comedies, the characters who transgress end up feeling worse but wiser, nothing really bad happens, and everything returns to normal.
In The Speech (the 'banned' episode), hopelessly insensitive CEO Douglas Reynholm meets an attractive lady journalist, April, and romance blossoms. Despite her repeated advisories that she used to be a man, Douglas thinks he's found the perfect woman who not just tolerates but admires and enjoys his shallow hyper-masculinity, sharing and even exceeding his love of bad action movies, heavy drinking, and competitive sports. But gradually reality gets through even his dense skull and he ends the relationship - briefly taking responsibility for the situation, before reverting to type and deflecting blame back onto April. Mutual recriminations quickly escalate into a fist fight straight out of a bad action movie, with Douglas wins - thereby regaining his 'boss' status - by knocking April out. He is subsequently shown as being vilified in the press and sobbing over the loss of his erstwhile companion, with whom he was actually compatible.
(Roy, Moss, and Jen are relegated to the less-important plot frame story in this episode, which sets up but is peripheral to the emotional conflict of the main story. In dramatic and thriller forms, the emotional conflict sets up but is peripheral to the main plot action; John Wick is the purest distillation of this.)
The Speech breaks two comedy rules in that the climactic suffering is not just emotional but physical, and something really bad does happen (the knockout). While it's implied that April recovers (going on to write a negative magazine article about Douglas) and Douglas actually feels bad, the comedically awkward social conflict of incongruous gender expectations crosses a line into physical violence which writers normally avoid. The violence is also intense; while this is meant to parody the bad action movies both Douglas and April enjoy, most comedy violence involves characters either flailing around, missing their punches, and blundering into the furniture or escalating quickly to absurd extremes like explosions or natural disasters. Though there are multiple comic touches in the fight scene, it's choreographed as a conventional aggressive fistfight, with a lot of punches to the head in both directions.
This was a bit too close to reality for a lot of people, because transgender women do suffer a disproportionate amount of physical violence up to and including murder, and this often takes place in the context of relationships. Perpetrators often defend themselves in court by insisting that they were deceived by a transgender romantic or sexual partner and acted violently out of fear and panic, which many find wildly implausible. Complaints gradually mounted over a 12 year period and in 2020 the UK broadcaster of the show announced they were dropping the episode from reruns.
Graham Linehan, who wrote and directed the episode, reacted badly, announced he was cutting ties with the broadcaster (after years of fruitful partnership), and went on a vicious tirade on social which eventually led to the suspension of his Twitter account - strangely parallel to the trajectory of the fictional Douglas. Rather than compromising or de-escalating, he raised it to the level of a political issue asserting that his civil rights (of free speech) were under attack and going on to attack transgender people in general in the most vituperative terms. In the context of an ongoing trend of escalating violence towards trans people (nearly doubling in the last year) his increasingly strident position has alienated a great many of his former fans.
> Rather than compromising or de-escalating, he raised it to the level of a political issue asserting that his civil rights (of free speech) were under attack
Curiously, in doing so, Linehan chanced upon an actual civil rights movement, of women losing single-sex spaces to males who choose to identify as women, and started championing this instead.
Though, many gender critical feminists find Graham's unasked-for presence in their activism rather embarrassing and irritating due to his generally quite aggressive behavior and his occasional bouts of sexism.
Curiously, in doing so, Linehan chanced upon an actual civil rights movement, of women losing single-sex spaces to males who choose to identify as women, and started championing this instead.
Though, many gender critical feminists find Graham's unasked-for presence in their activism rather embarrassing and irritating due to his generally quite aggressive behavior and his occasional bouts of sexism.
BBC is notorious for black face on their programs even in recent decades.
The main character in Noel Fielding's Luxury Comedy is a black face, but do people honestly say any face painted in black is racist? Noel is clearly using a black face in his show for artistic reasons and isn't racist in the slightest... IMO.
In fact, there had been censorship of the Mighty Boosh episode with "the Spirit of Jazz".
In particular the one that frustrates me frequently is Mitchell and Webb. Why in **s name did they have to lean on blackface?
Mustn't forget tidying up the wrist-slitting in 13 Reasons Why.
Nor should we forget the social contagion risk of suicide
> After the series' release, a study published in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry found that suicide among teenagers rose by 28.9% in the month after Netflix launched the show.
> After the series' release, a study published in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry found that suicide among teenagers rose by 28.9% in the month after Netflix launched the show.
While 28.9% sounds like a shocking number, it was only a few dozen additional deaths.
A few additional concerns with the paper:
-The authors made no effort to try and determine if any of the people who died had seen the show, or even had heard of it.
-Suicides were up the month before the show was released as well.
-In fact, suicides in that age group had been trending up for years according to their data, which is not mentioned in the discussion of results at all.
A few additional concerns with the paper:
-The authors made no effort to try and determine if any of the people who died had seen the show, or even had heard of it.
-Suicides were up the month before the show was released as well.
-In fact, suicides in that age group had been trending up for years according to their data, which is not mentioned in the discussion of results at all.
Nor should we forget to beware the man of one study.
Who's the "man" in this case? Not me. Not a man, and I see that study as a single data point associated with a single event. There are many studies on the social contagion effect of suicide, enough that it's worth considering the possible impact of how suicide is depicted in media.
The Werther Effect is thoroughly studied effect. There are plenty of studies on the issue.
I mean, "was considered anti-Trans by some" is pretty charitable for that episode. It is pretty overtly anti-trans, and the show as a whole was written by grahan linnehan who has also been vocally anti-trans
A very "semantically open" use of 'anti-', as some may be surprised to know that there are people who watched that episode and did not judge it the least deprecatory towards any category.
"I mean", as if Douglas Reynholm (the "phobic" - finally, a literal case - in the episode) was drawn as an exemplary character, a model of a human being... "I mean II", I checked on a search engine for the spelling of the surname, and the first under-link stub that resulted is «Douglas Reynholm was an incredibly arrogant, self-righteous, pompous, cruel and elitist egomaniac who considered himself to be somewhat above everybody else. He viewed women as objects to feel and manipulate to his incredible sexual mania»...
--
Edit: Furthermore. As "everyone" knows, Graham was a humble watchman in the hospital where Dr. Rick Dagless worked (the "Darkplace"), and probably does not even speak TCP today. So, when he wrote the scene of the people who believe they have in front of them "the Internet" - like the one called "«stupid cow»" by an adlibber because she did not realize "the internet is weightless" (and so also must be "the box which is the Internet" in the scene) -, when he wrote that, did he mean to diminish and elicit contempt for all the non technically inclined, probably including himself?
"I mean", as if Douglas Reynholm (the "phobic" - finally, a literal case - in the episode) was drawn as an exemplary character, a model of a human being... "I mean II", I checked on a search engine for the spelling of the surname, and the first under-link stub that resulted is «Douglas Reynholm was an incredibly arrogant, self-righteous, pompous, cruel and elitist egomaniac who considered himself to be somewhat above everybody else. He viewed women as objects to feel and manipulate to his incredible sexual mania»...
--
Edit: Furthermore. As "everyone" knows, Graham was a humble watchman in the hospital where Dr. Rick Dagless worked (the "Darkplace"), and probably does not even speak TCP today. So, when he wrote the scene of the people who believe they have in front of them "the Internet" - like the one called "«stupid cow»" by an adlibber because she did not realize "the internet is weightless" (and so also must be "the box which is the Internet" in the scene) -, when he wrote that, did he mean to diminish and elicit contempt for all the non technically inclined, probably including himself?
The classic issue with censorship. "I don't enjoy it, therefore, nobody should be allowed to enjoy it. And I won't be happy until nobody else can enjoy it. If you enjoy it, that makes you <insert moral judgement here>. And because I am not that, and nobody who is <insert moral judgement here> is for that content, it should be removed."
Now... I will admit, it isn't always wrong (CP). But it often is the fruit of an unwitting narcissism.
Now... I will admit, it isn't always wrong (CP). But it often is the fruit of an unwitting narcissism.
The person you're engaging with wasn't making an argument about whether it should be censored, just that the pulled episode was clearly anti-trans
There is also a possibility that the poster subtly willingly replaced 'anti-' with "[all that in actual evidence from this side appears is that apparently,] you don't enjoy it", and on that basis returned to (an argument about) the original point of censorship.
so don't watch it.
with censorship nobody can watch it.
with censorship nobody can watch it.
Right, why is it I can stream Hitler's speeches as much as I want, but this one episode is apparently too dangerous?
we are beset with tiny Hitlers wielding small amounts of power in every organization.
> One real danger of putting all historical video media on streaming sites is that it makes it far too easy to introduce an Orwellian Ministry of Truth that is empowered to rewrite the past to make it conform to today's acceptable social norms, academic ideologies, government agendas and so on.
I see such rewriting of the past, or at least attempts of that, on Wikipedia. It's not really hidden as there is a (hopefully!) integer edit history, but who reads the edit history anyway? Usually you just look at articles as they are at the current moment.
As we don't have much "hard copies" of a lot of stuff any more around the possibility to "rewrite the past" for significant amounts of people becomes a real thread as we rely more and more on digital and purely online data.
Given how "durable" our digital data is future historians will have a very hard time. Maybe our time will become a dark age when seen form the future. Have you tried lately to open some files from the 80'es that reside on some storage medium form that time? And that's only a few years in the past. Imagine 500 yeas in the future. What will be left of all the cat videos on YouTube (and maybe some more important data)?
I see such rewriting of the past, or at least attempts of that, on Wikipedia. It's not really hidden as there is a (hopefully!) integer edit history, but who reads the edit history anyway? Usually you just look at articles as they are at the current moment.
As we don't have much "hard copies" of a lot of stuff any more around the possibility to "rewrite the past" for significant amounts of people becomes a real thread as we rely more and more on digital and purely online data.
Given how "durable" our digital data is future historians will have a very hard time. Maybe our time will become a dark age when seen form the future. Have you tried lately to open some files from the 80'es that reside on some storage medium form that time? And that's only a few years in the past. Imagine 500 yeas in the future. What will be left of all the cat videos on YouTube (and maybe some more important data)?
>but who reads the edit history anyway?
Every time I look at a controversial article, and I'm unconvinced by the implicit narratives, I will look at the history, and more often than not there are interesting details lurking in the past versions.
And sometimes it's just fascinating looking at how details on a situation unrolled over time. Like for instance, go look at Jeffrey Epstein's Wikipedia history: there was an article on him preceding the publicity of his abuse.
I am under the impression right now that Wikipedia history is quite permanent unless an article is totally deleted, and that people do not prune the history of content they wish to censor. I hope it remains this way, cynically I don't think this will always be so, prove me wrong Wikipedia!
Every time I look at a controversial article, and I'm unconvinced by the implicit narratives, I will look at the history, and more often than not there are interesting details lurking in the past versions.
And sometimes it's just fascinating looking at how details on a situation unrolled over time. Like for instance, go look at Jeffrey Epstein's Wikipedia history: there was an article on him preceding the publicity of his abuse.
I am under the impression right now that Wikipedia history is quite permanent unless an article is totally deleted, and that people do not prune the history of content they wish to censor. I hope it remains this way, cynically I don't think this will always be so, prove me wrong Wikipedia!
Could you give some examples of a page on Wikipedia being rewritten? I’m familiar with the incident of redefining what a ‘recession’ is but I’m always curious for more examples.
Sort of like the anniversary edition of ET where Spielberg replaced the guns with walkie talkies, and other digital edits. Ironically he was criticized for too much smoking in the West Side Story remake. And sometimes a film I want is nowhere to be found, even a mainstream, older hit. I keep a few boxes of DVDs to make sure I can show them to the people stuck in the Matrix in the future!
This fact always reminds me of that funny video cut of Stallone where his machine gun is edited out so it looks like he is thumbs up-ing relentlessly.
The lack of smoking is something to ponder. It's always so glaring to me when TV shows that take place in the '80s and '90s show almost no one smoking, when in fact if you went into any public place, probably 30-50% (or more, if it's eg a pub) would be smoking, including in people's homes, offices and so forth. I wonder if the huge and realistic amounts of smoking seen in shows like Mad Men will be edited out one day.
I grew up when there was a smoking section on the plane (BTW, why do modern aircraft still have ashtrays? Are there any airlines that allow smoking?). I miss All in the Family. Is it even available anymore?
The ashtray is actually mandatory even in new planes per FAA rules.
Modern aircraft still have ashtrays in the washrooms because they’d much prefer that somebody choosing to sneak a smoke puts their cigarette somewhere other than the washroom trash bin where there’s a history of them starting fires.
Modern aircraft still have ashtrays in the washrooms because they’d much prefer that somebody choosing to sneak a smoke puts their cigarette somewhere other than the washroom trash bin where there’s a history of them starting fires.
The ashtray in the washrooms makes sense, but I was just on a newer plane with ashtrays at each passenger seat armrest. It was Saudia.
Rail travel is one of the last places that you still see this in the US.
I took a cross-country Amtrak trip right before the pandemic, and most of the conductor's announcements were just to tell us when the next smoke break would be.
When the train got stuck waiting for cross traffic at a freight yard in rural North Dakota, an incipient passenger mutiny forced them to break the rules and let everyone pop out for some light trespassing and nicotine consumption.
It felt strange in a similar, but opposite way to what you're describing.
I took a cross-country Amtrak trip right before the pandemic, and most of the conductor's announcements were just to tell us when the next smoke break would be.
When the train got stuck waiting for cross traffic at a freight yard in rural North Dakota, an incipient passenger mutiny forced them to break the rules and let everyone pop out for some light trespassing and nicotine consumption.
It felt strange in a similar, but opposite way to what you're describing.
It’s close but not quite. If it were truly ‘80s, there would be no need for stops because everyone would be smoking in the train. Probably the worst example of this was when I travelled through Turkey in the ‘90s, mostly by bus and train. The air was so thick you could cut it with a knife.
Growing up in CA in the 90s I didn't see that much smoking. It was even banned in 1998, which means probably it wasn't that popular by then.
Or you can torrent them...
One person's collection serves that one person, but there are some really cool groups out there like DocuWiki[0] that try to archive every documentary out there and serve them on the eDonkey network. There's been numerous times I've failed to find a documentary by even the original publisher. Like I literally couldn't give them my money no matter how much I tried. And even libraries didn't have it. But good old DocuWiki always had my back
Torrents are kind of like a community archive
[0] https://docuwiki.net/index.php?title=Special:Newpages
One person's collection serves that one person, but there are some really cool groups out there like DocuWiki[0] that try to archive every documentary out there and serve them on the eDonkey network. There's been numerous times I've failed to find a documentary by even the original publisher. Like I literally couldn't give them my money no matter how much I tried. And even libraries didn't have it. But good old DocuWiki always had my back
Torrents are kind of like a community archive
[0] https://docuwiki.net/index.php?title=Special:Newpages
Who knew dirty pirates would become the worlds archivists of culture.
A related, but different phenomena: Streaming episodes have been edited to inject product placement.
I read an article a while back about how old Friends episodes have movie posters in the background of films which were released after 2010.
I read an article a while back about how old Friends episodes have movie posters in the background of films which were released after 2010.
I would be interested to see that article. I tried googling for it but could only find some articles about censorship on Chinese streaming sites and Netflix missing some scenes from the DVD release due to issues with the master copies.
[citation needed]
Can't find any evidence of this at all.
Can't find any evidence of this at all.
There was a case of it just recently—the Amazon Jack Reacher series was released in February (around tax time) and had a TurboTax ad edited onto the side of a building when viewed in America.
https://gizmodo.com/digital-ads-streaming-netflix-amazon-nbc...
https://gizmodo.com/digital-ads-streaming-netflix-amazon-nbc...
Not the article I was looking for, but this talks about a company doing this exact thing as a service for media companies:
https://www.outsourcemarketing.com/blog/help-product-placeme...
https://www.outsourcemarketing.com/blog/help-product-placeme...
It was probably 10ish years ago I read about it. Most likely on BoingBoing.
Will see if I can find it. Indeed it is not easily dug up.
There are many ads about the coming trend of "Virtual Product Placement" but none that I can find which acknowledge the early attempts at it which I read about way back.
Will see if I can find it. Indeed it is not easily dug up.
There are many ads about the coming trend of "Virtual Product Placement" but none that I can find which acknowledge the early attempts at it which I read about way back.
Maybe you were thinking of How I Met Your Mother?
https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/iiay9/digitally_inser...
https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/iiay9/digitally_inser...
Nailed it. That was it 100%. Thank you!
https://medium.com/everything-80s/why-are-streaming-services...
They already do this frequently. 4chan has been tracking it for ages now.
They already do this frequently. 4chan has been tracking it for ages now.
Netflix actually removed a segment from an early 90s bill Nye episode because it said there are two genders.
This seems weird. No one disagrees that there are 2 biological (genetic) genders. Gender identity is something entirely else that is being actively researched.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6677266/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6677266/
This is incorrect. According to NIH there is no such thing as “biological (genetic) gender”. You’re thinking of biological sex.
https://orwh.od.nih.gov/sex-gender
https://orwh.od.nih.gov/sex-gender
In many languages, like German (which may be GPs native language), those two things share the same exact word, requiring modifier words like "biological" to differentiate between the two, making everything a bit confusing when crossing the language barrier.
You're right, apologies for the mistake.
Even that's not really cut-and-dry. I don't normally like linking to twitter, but this thread is amazing (scientific) content: https://twitter.com/rebeccarhelm/status/1207834357639139328?...
It appears that way, but skirts around the gametic model of discerning biological sex that is the golden standard for other species, while elevating the status of chromosomal defects.
It’s a good example how selective presentation of scientific realities can be abused to mislead.
Chromosomal defects in a binary system don’t constitute a new or between-state, and it also isn’t commonly described that way: XXY (Kleinfeltner) affecting males is the mainstream position.
It’s a good example how selective presentation of scientific realities can be abused to mislead.
Chromosomal defects in a binary system don’t constitute a new or between-state, and it also isn’t commonly described that way: XXY (Kleinfeltner) affecting males is the mainstream position.
Totally agree, I was responding to the twin assertions that gender is based in genetics and that there only being two is widely accepted.
[deleted]
It really isn’t quite that simple. There are Intersex people who have ambiguous genitalia and there are several viable chromosome combos besides XX and XY.
In sexually dimorphic mammalian species sex is most commonly by the ability to produce either the small or big gametes, not chromosomes.
In humans syndromes that lead to ambiguous (“intersex”) presentation and/or chromosomes are still operating in a binary system, eh Klinefelter affects boys.
The same is true for (very) rare hermaphroditism: in this case both gametes could in theory be produced, in practice though individuals are sterile.
In humans syndromes that lead to ambiguous (“intersex”) presentation and/or chromosomes are still operating in a binary system, eh Klinefelter affects boys.
The same is true for (very) rare hermaphroditism: in this case both gametes could in theory be produced, in practice though individuals are sterile.
Those are birth defects though. For instance, we still understand humans as being bipedal despite anomalies that prevent a tiny fraction of humans from being bipedal.
`XXY` is a valid combination of sex chromosomes. The person has two `X` chromosomes so is female. The person also has one `Y` chromosome so is male. Which sex is the person? Is it a birth defect?
The term “birth defect” fell out of use because of its stigmatizing word construction.
Chromosomal abnormalities would be the modern term, it applies to both sexual as well as other chromosomal abnormalities like Down.
But to answer the question as asked: Yes, it fulfills the definition of the older term.
Chromosomal abnormalities would be the modern term, it applies to both sexual as well as other chromosomal abnormalities like Down.
But to answer the question as asked: Yes, it fulfills the definition of the older term.
XXY is Klinefelter syndrome. By definition it's a condition where boys and men are born with an extra X chromosome. Their sex is male because, also by definition, the presence of a Y chromosome means male.
[deleted]
> Is it a birth defect?
You are incorrect in two ways. First, you are conflating sex and gender. Second, sex is a bimodal distribution rather than a fixed binary.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex
Intersex is about characteristics, not biological sex.
Heh. This is like medieval illuminators who painted fig leaves over the nude drawings made by their predecessors.
Or the prudes went around whacking the Johnsons off all the statues
You don't have public libraries in the U.S.? In my country, it's government-mandated job of public libraries to collect historical media.
We do have that. It's the library of congress that ensures the safety of culturally important media in the US.
And of course we have public libraries with all kinds of good media.
I don't think the comment your replying to is even talking about public libraries. I believe they're saying if society determines a person is cancelled and it's on a streaming service, it can instantly disappear from most streaming media.
And of course we have public libraries with all kinds of good media.
I don't think the comment your replying to is even talking about public libraries. I believe they're saying if society determines a person is cancelled and it's on a streaming service, it can instantly disappear from most streaming media.
I don’t think it’s about individuals getting canceled. It’s about how the streaming service has carte blanche power to decide the material on the service, regardless of what society wants.
My point was this. Maybe they have that carte blanche power. Isn't a good public library system (where the work is also accessible) a good enough counterweight to that power?
An original streaming-only movie or tv show will never be on a DVD at a library. I would say it is almost an -service- to society to continue to torrent content that has been edited or purged by major platforms.
This is something that could and should be fixed with legislation
Our public libraries are underfunded and used as a punching bag by conservatives. Libraries have very limited shelf space and must constantly prune items from the collection. If a movie isn't checked out for a few months, it gets sold for like 50 cents and replaced with whatever is currently in demand.
Most public libraries don't have the resources to archive materials. That's mostly down to academic and specialist libraries, and the library of congress.
Most public libraries don't have the resources to archive materials. That's mostly down to academic and specialist libraries, and the library of congress.
That’s sad, where do you live?
I’m in Illinois; under state law libraries exist as independent taxing bodies - the only way to underfund or otherwise interfere with them is at the ballot box, and it would take years of concerted effort by at least 60% of the local population (indicating that this is really what they want).
I have some family in Indiana; their libraries are funded and controlled at the county level to maximize what they can do cost-wise and to ensure that rural farmers also have access to all the resources. That structure also makes it much harder for goofballs to interfere.
I’m in Illinois; under state law libraries exist as independent taxing bodies - the only way to underfund or otherwise interfere with them is at the ballot box, and it would take years of concerted effort by at least 60% of the local population (indicating that this is really what they want).
I have some family in Indiana; their libraries are funded and controlled at the county level to maximize what they can do cost-wise and to ensure that rural farmers also have access to all the resources. That structure also makes it much harder for goofballs to interfere.
does LOC archive content that was never put on a physical format?
Yes. I don't know a whole lot about their system, but I do know they tried to keep an archive of all public Twitter posts for a long time
> I do know they tried to keep an archive of all public Twitter posts for a long time
That was the result of a specific deal Twitter made early on (itself a marketing stunt, of sorts). It doesn't mean the Library of Congress is generally in the business of archiving DRM-ed media on streaming services.
That was the result of a specific deal Twitter made early on (itself a marketing stunt, of sorts). It doesn't mean the Library of Congress is generally in the business of archiving DRM-ed media on streaming services.
The US has by far the largest public library system in the world, and it's not close. So by what metric would you consider it underfunded?
Comparing size without considering population will only lead to bad conclusions. Could you imagine someone claiming cancer deaths in Germany aren’t a problem because it doesn’t have near as many deaths as the US, it’s not even close? Sounds silly, right?
The US is reportedly 62nd in the world in libraries per capita. [1] Given the US has more wealth per capita than most of the world as well, I think claiming we underfund our public library system is fairly obvious.
[1] https://onlinegrad.syracuse.edu/blog/best-countries-book-lov...
The US is reportedly 62nd in the world in libraries per capita. [1] Given the US has more wealth per capita than most of the world as well, I think claiming we underfund our public library system is fairly obvious.
[1] https://onlinegrad.syracuse.edu/blog/best-countries-book-lov...
> Given the US has more wealth per capita than most of the world as well, I think claiming we underfund our public library system is fairly obvious.
This is only the case if you think the proper level of funding is a function of population size or wealth instead of whatever is required to obtain sufficient results. If you're looking for results, it seems the proper level of funding would actually scale with population density (sparser areas require higher funding per capita to provide the same access).
I think you can make a case for that sort of model, but I don't think it's "fairly obvious".
This is only the case if you think the proper level of funding is a function of population size or wealth instead of whatever is required to obtain sufficient results. If you're looking for results, it seems the proper level of funding would actually scale with population density (sparser areas require higher funding per capita to provide the same access).
I think you can make a case for that sort of model, but I don't think it's "fairly obvious".
Mentioned elsewhere, but books in circulation (overall and per capita). Also, in the US you can get almost any book from elsewhere sent to your local library at no charge.
What measure are you using for "largest"? The US is 3rd in the world by population and 1st by GDP, so in absolute terms it's to be expected that they would be "large" in many categories, simply by having more people and money. (And then there's geographical extent.) The relative (per capita, perhaps) measure is more salient.
Based on books in circulation (overall and per capita). Also for anybody who isn't familiar with interlibrary loans, check it out. In the US you can get access to almost any book around the country sent to your local library. The system is amazing.
If you mean the library of Congress sure. If you mean the most libraries not based on a quick google (https://www.quora.com/Which-country-in-the-world-has-the-mos...). But I guess it depends on what you mean. I am genuinely curious as there are several ways of looking at this.
Also, the person above could have been talking about compared to days past. I can tell you the libraries I had access to when and where I grew are less funded (many closed), but again depends on where and what you’re comparing against.
Also, the person above could have been talking about compared to days past. I can tell you the libraries I had access to when and where I grew are less funded (many closed), but again depends on where and what you’re comparing against.
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Maybe limit the actual truth to the top 1-5% , and leave the masses to the sanitized version of history… which is basically the status quo in the west with mainstream media / Hollywood, and CCP in the east with China.
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This is like keeping a shotgun in your house to protect against the government. If the government is ready to conduct systematic disinformation campaigns, your DVD’s probably won’t help.
How did Vietnam and Afghanistan fare against "the government?"
Better than the Confederacy my cherry picking cliche replyguy.
Can someone clarify this chain for me? Keeping a gun to defend your home against the government is probably futile because the government always has more weapons and more fighters than you.
The other three cases were all wars - an apples to oranges comparison.
The other three cases were all wars - an apples to oranges comparison.
You think members of the U.S. military would side with the government and execute orders against American citizens on American soil?
They are trained to do anything they are told. Anything.
Remember the Chinese military had no problem mowing down protestors if their bosses give the order.
That said, it is easier and safer to defend yourself from a government in modern society with information and free uncensored communication than with guns.
Remember the Chinese military had no problem mowing down protestors if their bosses give the order.
That said, it is easier and safer to defend yourself from a government in modern society with information and free uncensored communication than with guns.
>They are trained to do anything they are told. Anything.
Yeah, you've never been in the military and appear to have a knowledge based on memes of it. Read the officer's oath and see what we're trained to do.
Yeah, you've never been in the military and appear to have a knowledge based on memes of it. Read the officer's oath and see what we're trained to do.
What sources are you citing here?
You seem to be completely off-base.
No, in the United States, the military and all federal employees explicitly swear an oath to the Constitution, and are forbidden from executing illegal orders, regardless of the chain of command.
Yeah, PLA goons in Communist China certainly do things differently.
In the United States, the people are the government. Where are you?
You seem to be completely off-base.
No, in the United States, the military and all federal employees explicitly swear an oath to the Constitution, and are forbidden from executing illegal orders, regardless of the chain of command.
Yeah, PLA goons in Communist China certainly do things differently.
In the United States, the people are the government. Where are you?
All the members of the NSA swore an oath to the constitution but what they actually followed were the orders of those cutting their paychecks to spy on the American public.
Also note all the leaked footage of our military gleefully mowing down children and keeping score. They are never prosecuted for war crimes either. Just part of the job.
That is how humans work everywhere. The US is not special.
Also note all the leaked footage of our military gleefully mowing down children and keeping score. They are never prosecuted for war crimes either. Just part of the job.
That is how humans work everywhere. The US is not special.
It's more nuanced than you are presenting here. The obvious middle ground is the use of "Poison Cabinets" where certain works are deliberately and explicitly separated from their contemporaries with obvious labels explaining that they express ideas or opinions known now to be harmful. This way they are not lost or erased but also not treated as if they are perfectly normal and acceptable.
For another thing, there is also at least some element here of the right to be forgotten. It's obviously different for groups vs individuals but our systems should allow some amount of agency to people who regret things they have produced in the past and wish for them to be forgotten.
For another thing, there is also at least some element here of the right to be forgotten. It's obviously different for groups vs individuals but our systems should allow some amount of agency to people who regret things they have produced in the past and wish for them to be forgotten.
sublinear(4)
You can lend them. Have a friend over and find out they have never seen <insert meaningful show or movie here> before?! No need to quick search and figure out if it's on a streaming service they have, just walk over and snatch it off your shelf and hand it to them.
In the 00s the trade in media lending was so brisk my friends and I would keep spreadsheets and little databases of who-borrowed-what-from-whom. There's even a DVD little lending library in my neighborhood. Not to mention the public library system has tons of physical media to choose from.
I love streaming and rarely turn to physical media these days, but as my kids get older and want to watch the same things over-and-over-and-over... building that DVD collection out again is looking really appealing.