I was a happy Netflix user until 2018, before that I haven’t really pirated any movies (with very rare exceptions) for almost a decade but I recently started again. I’m was doing my monthly budgeting and realized I was paying for too many subscription services. Netflix, Amazon Prime, Shudder, Disney+, Hulu and Crunchyroll. My family likes to watch different types of content that is distributed on many different platforms.
I was never subscribed to these many services until a couple years ago. I was thinking which service I should cancel when I realized I had the option to cancel all of them this entire time. I’m torrenting again and I started saving a considerate amount.
The only service I’m paying for is Spotify which I think it’s fairly priced and offers all the music my family listens too (and it’s convenient). All the competitors pretty much offer the same content and that’s how streaming services should be.
I remember back in the day using eMule and BitChe (to look for torrents). Now I’m using Deluge as my torrent client and I I get my torrents from 1337x. What sites are you guys using?
I wish streaming companies would take notes from Spotify. It’s not too expensive, non-exclusive, acceptable quality even on higher end gear.
Doesn’t shove idiotic recommendations on my face, doesn’t bug me about my address, doesn’t randomly drop in quality because my neighbour is taking a piss. Looking at you, Netflix, you expensive useless piece of shit.
(I’m fact, Spotify’s recommendations are so good that I’m constantly finding new stuff I actually like.)
Personally I find the recommendations really bad lol, I never stray outside of my library or playlists. I find music looking at artists I like then seeing other songs they wrote, or search what I hear playing in the world around me, or what I’m watching.
I use an AI playlist creator called songslikex.com which builds a Spotify playlist based on one song. Think it’s better than Spotify recommendations and I have found a few new artists that I really like with it.
There’s also, everynoise.com. you can find any genre of music and it will link to a Spotify playlist. I’ve found so much cool stuff on there.
The “exclusive content war” already started with podcasts. Wait a few years and let’s say Miley Cyrus will sign an exclusive contract with Apple Music and there you have it.
It‘s probably going to be the other way around if anything, Spotify eventually doing various moves worsening the experience in an effort for more money. It‘s surprising how long it is holding out (and I‘m still using and enjoying it too), but ever since I learned about Enshittification, I‘m expecting it to worsen eventually.
3 companies own like 90% of all music copyrights and they are getting a fucking sweet deal from Spotify.
Artists are starting to get screwed and it’s only a matter of time before they come for the customers.
Buy CDs, use Bandcamp, install Nicotine+ (preferably in that order)
Oh it’s gonna enshittify, that’s for sure. It just hasn’t yet.
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My spotify recommends are hilarious. I played a track white noise that went for like 6 hours. Spotify recommended ai has all white noise tracks ignoring music choices.
1337x is my favorite right now for TV/movies and Nyaa for anime. Between that and Usenet, I can get 99.5% of what I want.
I use qbittorent and Sabnzb for downloads.
Since you’ve been out of the piracy game for awhile you may consider looking into *arr apps (radar, sonarr, prowlarr, etc). They can auto download movies/tv you want and format them in a way that Plex/Jellyfin like, so you can get a whole library of content with just a few clicks. There’s a bit of a learning curve to the setup though.
What do you find on Usenet thats not on torrents?
It’s not so much that I can’t find things on torrents, it’s that I don’t have to worry about something not having seeders so it’s more reliable for old uploads. In addition I’ve found it to be better for single episodes, multiple release groups that I use seem to only use Usenet.
As for things that aren’t movies/tv, I think Usenet is better for slightly more obscure content, such as comic books.
I think it depends on the country and language content. If i want german movies, i dont find them on torrents.
Torrents are kind of risky here and usenet seems to be far safer. So a lot of uploaders use OCHs or Usenet.
Since you are looking for German movies you might be interested in my German DL Sonarr & Radarr guide:
https://github.com/PCJones/radarr-sonarr-german-dual-language
OCHs?
Only way to watch good quality content on Linux is pirating. So, fuck 'em media houses. Imma sail my ship to the high seas!
Seriously, I pay for streaming services and Blu Rays and still wind up just pirating the stuff I already own half the time because that’s somehow more convenient…
Same here. Subscribed to some streaming services because my family members use them. For me, it’s simply much faster and more convenient to pirate. It’s not helped by the fact that the stuff I watch are more often than not unavailable on any streaming platform.
I would suggest getting a seedbox and joining a private torrent site like torrentleech. That’s what I use and then upload to my NAS that runs Plex and can view from anywhere on any device.
How do you join a private site?
Aren’t they all invite only?
You can visit this site and they show which private trackers have open signups. You can also buy an invite to certain private trackers. https://www.invitescene.com/forum/34-open-trackers/
Some, like torrentleech, do open invites on a regular basis. But most do not and you’ll need an invite to get in
That is the definition of private tracker, yeah. Doesn’t require much work to join some entry level ones though, and is worth it. Keen an eye out for open signups.
I think a lot of us are in the same boat. The early days of Spotify and Netflix killed piracy for me.
Convenience and a fair price? Not on my watch! - Greedy corporate assholes
I’d honestly be willing to spend $30-$60 a month for 2012 netflix. It’s the content loss that really killed things for me. Stupid-ass copyright holders.
Been torrenting all through with 1337x and yts.mx despite paying for Netflix. The occasional piratebay for more obscure movies. RARBG was my favorite tracker, but sadly, they are no more.
Luckily I live in China where nobody bothers about copyright laws, so I can max out my 1gbit connection that costs me 2 full dollars a month 🙃
a rarbg copycat group popped up here: https://therarbg.com/ not quite the same but I figure it’s worth following and using as a drop-in replacement for rarbg.
Ah nice, thanks a lot!
Very similar situation here. Around 2017/2018 I had Netflix and Prime Video. I was able to watch 95% of the content I wanted to watch and only had to download some obscure 90’s SciFi series they didn’t have.
But the industry had to fuck it up and create too many platforms. We have Netflix, Prime, Disney+, HBO, Paramount Plus, Apple TV+ and many more. I am not subscribing to your service because one or two titles might interest me. It’s way too much cost for a lot less value I had in 2018.
I even wanted to make an exception for Apple TV+ because their series are absolutely amazing. But they force you to buy an expensive Apple device to watch the content in 4K on the Safari Browser. Go fuck yourself, Apple. It’s not even a technical issue, because they play the trailers in 4K but then switch to 480p with a terrible bitrate.
Don’t go to the big media outlets and start crying that piracy is too damn high if you make it more inconvenient to watch your programs legally than just downloading an MKV file from somewhere.
It’s like the old cable tv days where you had to get hundreds of useless channels and multiple packages and pay a fortune just to get the 3 channels you actually want.
Too many shitty streaming services. Just pay for a reliable VPN and torrent to your heart content. I’m using qbittorrent and transmission.
I have surf shark vpn. Are they reliable or who do you recommend?
Surfshark is okay for torrenting but I don’t really trust surfshark when it comes to my sensitive info.
Make sure you aren’t downloading things manually unless you have to. Radarr, Sonarr, and Lidarr can be configured to download the latest media for you automatically. It’s not 2004 anymore :)
Thank you, I needed this! Now I need to get these set up
welcome back, still using 1337x now
I relate so much to your situation.
I was a subscriber of Netflix, HBO, Disney+ and Apple TV+.
Started to look at alternatives and ended up with a Real Debrid subscription coupled with Stremio and Torrentio.
It’s been smooth sailing for me.
I’d be fine with a minimal streaming service and being able to rent shit I want to watch but rental streaming prices are fucking ridiculous. It is $20 to rent Fast X. It is only $25 to “buy” it. One that is not still in theaters is still $6 to rent. And if it is ancient, it is $4 to rent. When I was a wee lad, in the early 2000s, it was $3 to rent a new release and $1 for old movies. That required a storefront and an employee. Shit should not have gone up in price 100% and 300% respectively. General inflation has not gone up nearly that much and more efficient tech is supposed to make things cheaper.
So fuck all that. I’ll pay for Disney because I have a kid. But they are starting to remove shit so it is likely I will be dropping that sometime in the future.
Qbittorrent has search engines as plugins, just google it and choose which ones you want
https://torrentgalaxy.to/ is a public tracker that has some decent stuff.
https://torrentleech.org is a good private tracker that has frequent open invites. All their boxsets are freeleech so it’s pretty easy to build up a good ratio
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Ever since I did this, I haven’t been able to go back. Never thought I’d be technically paying (albeit cheap) for piracy but it’s just really that convenient.
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I finally got a plan for real debrid and Jesus Christ, it is really a game changer
