
Ask HN: How many still use torrents to download Movies instead of using Netflix? - leoplct
Nowadays there are many services to stream movies&#x2F;tv shows such as Netflix, Hulu, Amazon etc..<p>Do you find always what are you looking for?<p>Do you use Torrents when something is missing?
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jasonkester
Netflix/Lovefilm, etc. are a good way to justify that you've "paid" for that
thing you're downloading off bittorrent.

There are so many ways that the paid content providers just can't hang, that
even if something is available from them, you'll often get better service by
just downloading the equivalent torrent.

So thanks, Lovefilm for sending that Mission Impossible DVD in the mail with
so much DRM that it won't play in any of the DVD players in any of my 3
machines using any of their various operating systems. No, don't trouble
yourself sending out a replacement disc. I've already watched the movie (turns
out there's this website you can type movie names into and simply download
them in HD. Who knew?) But thanks for making the effort.

And thanks, NFL GamePass for selling me access to all the games this year for
$150, but it turns out that you'll also need to not let your Auth servers go
down, say, four minutes before the game kicks off because that way I'd be able
to actually watch it. But again, don't sweat it. Somebody actually cut
together a nicer, higher resolution version of the same game and stuck it
online.

It works out fine, actually. The studios, rightsholders, etc. all get my money
like they wanted (and I wanted to give them). And I get to watch the stuff
they tried their best to let me watch using their sorta broken infrastructure.

Sorted.

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pasbesoin
I've refrained from illegal torrenting and the like.

However, Netflix' streaming content in the U.S. has been getting steadily
worse, from my perspective, over the past couple of years.

Numerous films and distributors that used to be on there, are gone. "Owners"
creating their own channels or shopping around for "better" deals, I guess.

New additions seem to consist largely of TV series -- a few big names, and a
bunch of lower-tier stuff -- and B movies as well as an increasingly poor
selection of foreign films (including _a lot_ of Korean stuff, amongst
others). Sure, they picked up "Iron Man" and a couple of other big names, but
these are really outliers. Most of what they are adding and maintaining is
"meh", at best.

I'm not willing to sign up for a gazillion different, fragmented services. So,
from my perspective, "legal" streaming is already beginning to -- or well on
its way to -- failing.

My bandwidth hungry neighbors and increasingly crappy and overpriced ISP
aside, the technology actually works pretty well, these days.

It is, once again, the business side that is failing.

Finally, with respect to this, and to O'Reilly Safari and a few other things,
I've come to the opinion that temporary, fee-based access to a online library
is a bad financial decision. I wish I'd taken the fees I've paid, and just
purchased titles. DVD disks and e-books or real books.

And while I'm not a "file sharer", I have no problem with the idea of
stripping the DRM from said purchases, for my own use. I'll be damned I'm
going to let e.g. a dispute between Amazon and some publisher or some problem
with my account result in the compulsory "unpurchasing" of a title, or my
entire library, that they've "sold" to me.

I haven't done it yet -- most of my ebooks are DRM-free through O'Reilly --
but they are pushing me in that direction.

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wattson12
People outside the US have much less choice (both in services and content)

I've had netflix for about 6 months (using unlock-us to access all regions)
and have probably torrented only 10-20 movies in that time (down from a few a
week)

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arkokoley
In most countries, other than US, UK and a few others, these services are
either not available, or the internet speeds are not fast enough to stream
movies. For eg. in India, we the avg speed we get is around 20KBps. So its
ptrtty much impossible to strem via Netflix, Hulu or amazon.

Torrent is the best (read only) option we have. I myself download about 3-4
movies and several seasons of tv shows a week.

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fit2rule
We don't have Netflix here in Europe, so I guess you're only asking this
question to a small number of Internet users.

I would totally use Netflix if it were available to me. I tire of downloading
torrents to watch films and shows - if the producers of this content were more
tech-savvy, I'd be quite happy to be paying for it. As long as it worked.

~~~
UnoriginalGuy
"Europe" is a big place. The UK, Ireland, Spain, Norway, Denmark, Sweden,
Netherlands, and Finland all have Netflix.

I cannot speak to how good it is in all of those regions but in the UK it is
quite good, not quite as good as the US, but well worth the ticket price.

~~~
bprieto
As of today, it is not available in Spain.

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dirktheman
Netflix has a pretty good collection of mainstream movies and series. Big plus
is that my wife and (young) children can use it, too. I do use newsgroups
sometimes to download series (X-Files) or older movies (Bullitt) that I can't
find on Netflix, but I'm downloading substantially less than before.

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wisienkas
People do use Torrents quite actively still. Mainly because movies are out way
faster than on netflix and you have to use third-parties to access the US-
netflix which contains way more movies than danish netflix. Also in danish
netflix you are forced to watch most movies with subtitles :/

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codegeek
Primary reason to use Torrents is to get the latest movies that are not out on
Netflix yet. I am still waiting for the movie "Escape Plan" and even though i
m not big into torrents, it is making me go that route.

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hawleyal
There is nothing on Netflix.

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onedev
I always torrent. I usually always find what I'm looking for the day it goes
on air (new TV shows like Shark Tank).

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fredr
I use Netflix and iTunes through my apple tv. I've gotten too lazy to download
anything via torrents.

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yen223
I do. Netflix, Hulu, etc are not available in my country.

I do have a Spotify account though.

